To expect people to use my actual surname when sending us Xmas cards

[CantStopEatingCheese]

First AIBU post so be gentle!

Every year this gets to me. I am married but never changed my surname to DH's surname. Every year Christmas cards arrive with "Mr + Mrs DHSurname" on the envelope. I am not Mrs DHSurname, I am Mrs CantStopEatingCheese. I would expect cards addressed to "Mr DHSurname and Mrs CantStopEatingCheese". Is that too much to ask?

I can uderstand it coming from elderly relatives (for whom the concept might be alien). I can understand it from people who maybe don't know us very well (or only know DH and might not be aware of my surname). I can even understand cards addressed to "DHSurname Family" (both DCs have his surname so there are more of them than me). But from my own parents? Close friends of mine who've known me since before I got married? Is this not a bit weird?

Can I add that I come from a country where women don't change their name when getting married (there is no official way for achieving this) and that when this law was passed back in the 80's my mum changed her name back to her maiden name (my parents are still married).

Yabu bigger things in life to worry about.

I worry about the oppression of women. The societal expectation that women will change their names and particularly the enforcement of that expectation on women who did not by ignorant or uncaring friends and relatives contributes to that oppression.

That's a lot you worry about there, scone.

It's funny how often women are told that there are "bigger things to worry about" when they express concern over any issue that affects them directly. We always seem to be expected to put ourselves at the bottom of the pile of things we should be concerned with.

This comes up every single Christmas time on MN and every year I just think why do you care so much? But then I'm not married to DP and get Mr & Mrs his surname on the envelope from his side. they all know we're not married too. I have never given a rat's arse. We got a card from so and so, how lovely.

First AIBU post so be gentle! said the OP

But the millionth millionth thread on the same boring subject

There was a similar thread last week which delved a little more deeply into why women care so much about this particular issue.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/2255362-Envelopes-upon-which-I-become-my-husband?

It keeps coming up, Porto, because every year women keep finding their identity erased and get, quite rightly, upset about it. The threads will stop when people start addressing women in their own right. Would you consider it equally boring for women to keep posting threads about the need to win maternity rights, the vote or equal pay?

If you find the subject so dull, don't read or post. But for some of us this is very, very important.

And it's of no importance to others of us, but you should still respect our posts should you not Annie?

Disagreement does not automatically signal disrespect, Bowler.

If you don't care how cards are addressed, Bowlersarm that's fine. I can absolutely respect that. But I won't respect someone dismissing something crucially important to me as "not worth bothering about", and not will I respect someone who can't be bothered to address me on a card as if I were human being with my own name and title. I write a whole heap of Christmas cards each year, and it is no great chore to address each one in the best, most correct and most respectful manner I can manage. Why bother sending a card if you don't care enough about the people you're sending it to to address them in the manner they prefer?

I'm baffled as to why anyone would send someone a Christmas card when they can't be bothered remembering their name.

I am with you, OP. I correspond regularly with overseas relatives via Facebook so they KNOW that I am NanFlanders. Yet I STILL get cards addressed to Mr and Mrs DH and Nan DHSurname - or worse, Mr and Mrs DHFirstName DH Surname, as though I lost my first name too. I don't correct them because I know it seems petty to mind. But I do feel that a lot of them are actually 'correcting' me, in their Christmas correspondence ....

sigh For those unable to use google, or who think that the way they jolly well want the world to work, is the way the world works:

A woman's name does not ever automatically change when she marries. Her husband's surname does automatically not become her legal name in any way.

She has to take action to change her name if she wishes to take her husband's name. It is a special circumstance, however, in that it's relatively simple to just change it and a deed poll isn't needed (yes, actually a deed poll is not really legally required for any name change but in practice it helps when dealing with organisations).

I just dont understand people saying 'they're just getting through their Xmas cards and don't really think'

They dont really think? It doesn't occur to people to get people's names right? I'm sorry but that is either bullshit or there are a lot of rude people out there. Of course people's names matter! You would never address a card to 'some dude'. If you dœnt have time to get someone's name right then perhaps you send too many. Correct spellings and titles show that you care.

Then FIRST comment on threads about teachers spelling kids names wrong is that it suggests they dont care. No one ever says 'they are just trying to get to through 30 books every night'

OP- I'm with you. I didn't change my name on marriage and people's refusal to accept/remember this used to piss me off no end. It's just plain rude to call someone by an incorrect name. It's no different to assigning someone a completely random surname that isn't theirs. If I were Ms loveareading married to Mr Brown, calling me Ms Brown is just as random and annoying as calling me Ms Smith, Ms Ramsbottom or any other name that isn't my name.

OP - start calling them all Freda Pratt, and if they complain say you thought they liked the idea of people just inventing names for other people.

It's the being called by my husbands Christian name that irks me more.
Can understand people's assumption that we share the same surname but I'm a woman so an clearly not called James fgs

Oh Bugger ... Are you my aunt? My original aunt used to get arsey if I didn't put Feckless' Uncles Full Title and Mrs X Uncle's Surname and then they got divorced and the present incumbent has kept her maiden name and I keep forgetting ...

I oftain just put christian names plus address on the envelope with normal people but Uncle Feckless gets very sniffy about that sort of thing - to be honest I couldn't care less, myself, which is just as well as we get all sorts of weird combination and spellings directed at us and life's too short to get worked up about it ...

So yeah, YABU.

But Happy Christmas anyway!

I bought address labels this year to stick on the cards that clearly show how we like to be addressed. Will see if it makes any difference next year. also bought them last year and lost the buggers

I got a card addressed to Mrs OHsurname before we'd even talked about getting engaged. It was from an elderly relative who I think was a little upset we had a child out of wedlock.

Thank you everyone who responded (whether you agree or not)! I don't have time to answer each post but some general points:

• Thank you to the posters who explaied why they feel annoyed by this much better than me. It is to do with respect, women's rights and yes I do expect close friends to remember my name.

• To the people who said "it's a lot of Christmas Cards to write, you can't expect people to remember": I think the first names only solution solves the time issue and the remembering issue.

• To the people who said "at least be grateful for the cards", I am! They are all lined up on the mantlepiece...and I always make double sure I send cards back to everyone if I haven't already. (I tend to them late and in batches...)

• To the people who said "haven't you got bigger problems/your life must be nice", maybe I do, maybe I don't, but don't see why that's relevant. People often worry about smaller things even when there are bigger things to worry about. There is no limit to how many things people might get annoyed/concerned by. Plus like someone else said above, assuming that once you're married you lose the right to be called what you want and you somehow become someone's property is not a minor issue.

• To the people who said that this has been raised before and therefore shouldn't be raised again...I'm sure this happens a lot on Mumsnet! If people think something is important, bothers them, want an answer, they might post even if it's posted before. Just go through the sleep/breastfeeding/potty training threads for examples. I think I made the thread title clear enough that anyone who can't be bothered with the topic can skip it! Reading it and then taking the time to respond saying that it's been done before serves no purpose other than wasting your time.

• And yes, I do have stickers with our names and address on that I always stick on envelopes so everyone who gets a card from me would have seen my real name last year (unless I managed to send them a card before they sent theirs)....maybe there is the answer! Do my cards earlier so they have a better chance of seeing my surname on the envelope.

I've stopped putting any surnames on Christmas envelopes, other than for PIL. I also put the name of the person I know best first, usually that's the woman. I'm sure there will be some who are offended by that though.

amicissimma - but I do all that for them, and get their names right!

This pisses me off too - my own bloody family do it! We had separate bank accounts for years after we married - one aged aunt sent a cheque every Christmas made out to Schnitzel DH'ssurname (for the kids) and every year I had to ask her to initial it with my proper name so I could pay it in. Didn't stop her the next year though

I find it even weirder to be addressed as Mrs Mysurname, however - as though I am married, but not to DH ...