To be annoyed at in-laws changing my surname when I haven't

[Chinashoes]

I have been married for five years but have never changed my surname. My in-laws know this (MIL has complained about it to DH, one of his aunties has seen the need to bring it up at three separate parties, everyone received a full explanation when we gave our kids both of our names) yet they continually send post addressed to me but with my husband's surname. More recently, after me clarifying things yet again to the auntie in front of the rest of the family, they have also started to call me Mrs D H. I've never made a fuss about this to any of them but it really does upset me. I feel that they're deliberately disrespecting my choice when they know that this is important to me, and now using the Mrs DH thing as a passive aggressive way to say "we won't call you your name". I'm starting to think about texting people as and when it happens to say "you know this isn't my surname, please call me Ms Shoes from now on", or maybe posting about it on Facebook. Would this be unreasonable, given how long this conversation has gone on for?

[TeamEponine]

I kept my surname, but it is a little easier as both DH and I have the titles of Dr. So I avoid the "Mrs" issue.

My MIL, who is lovely, dies find it difficult to get her head around me having kept my name. DH isn't from the UK, and is from a culture when a woman keeping their own name is totally unheard of. MIL is in her 70's and me not changing my name was the first time she had ever heard of it happening. She's really trying to get her head around it, but can't quite. Post to me is named in various ways. Post for both DH and I is usually addressed to Dr and Dr DHname. Post just for me can just have my name only, but sometimes she includes both, so Dr DHname MyName.

I really don't take offence as I know she's not doing it to be awkward, PA or to make a point. She is trying!

We decided that DD would have my surname, and MIL similarly will tend to address post to DD with both surnames. She is totally fine with DD having my name, but seems to find it difficult to break from her cultural conventions.

[TeamEponine]

Dies!!! Does - stupid iPhone!!!

[MyFavouriteClintonisGeorge]

It doesn't sound like forgetfulness. It sounds like people who have taken umbrage because OP has not adopted their name labouring the point in a fairly childish way. I can also well believe it because it is the kind of thing one or two people I know would do.

I would get your Dh to have a word to the PIL and SIL, OP,explaining that it has tipped over from stubbornness to a lack of respect. If after that they still do it, be very direct with them about it.

[MetalMidget]

My mother told me that there was no point in getting married if I wasn't going to take my husband's name!

[SilverBirchWithout]

You've let them know your reasons and how you feel about it yet they still persist in addressing things to you incorrectly. They are rude and enjoying making a point to you that they don't approve and IMO being goady.

You have a choice; you can ignore and smile to yourself about their rudeness and stupidity or keep reacting and feeding their strange pleasure in goading you into reacting (& no doubt they love talking together about Shoes and her 'weird name obsession').

What they are doing is a sort of bullying and certainly disrespecting your choices. They are enjoying making you annoyed. Don't feed that, ignore their pathetic social ineptness.

[RattieOfCatan]

Majestic IMO for my kids I'd be happy for them to drop a name, bit like how they would do it in Spain I suppose.

We considered creating a new family name from our names upon marriage (several combinations that would have worked and wouldn't be out of the realm of normal) but I didn't want to lose my name. I have a very unique surname in the UK whilst DHs is extremely common, so it gives our children the best of both worlds. DHs name when they want anonymity and my name if they want to stand out. If I double barrel my own name I'll be using my surname on anything professional still as there are people in the field I want to get into with Rattie DHName already!

[Brekekekex]

I didn't change my name. One of my friends complained "but it's so hard to remember!". Whaaat? She's known me as Brekekekex Koax for 10 years, how can it be hard to just.....keep calling me that? She was pretty sheepish when I pointed that out - fortunately she took it well

OP - no idea what you can do about your ILs, but yes, in your case it is rude, disrespectful and borderline bullying, so YANBU.

[contrary13]

There's a bit of this going on in my family, too... My DC are both double-barrelled, but one uses both parts, and the other uses only the first part. Entirely their choice - I figure that their names are theirs to do with/use how they like. I also only use the first part of the surname... having legally changed it from my father's surname as soon as I was old enough to do so (for no reason other than I hated the name and always had done, and my DF was lovely about it). My children's name also uses my father's surname, though, because he was quite upset when my oldest was born about his name disappearing completely. It was a small thing, it made him happy, and I figured that my children might like his surname even though I don't (one does; one doesn't).

Neither have their fathers surname.

My maternal grandmother persists in sending us mail address to "Miss My Father's Surname", for me (I'm neither "Miss", nor "My Father's Surname" and haven't been for 25 years now), and "Miss/Master Their Fathers Surname" for the children. For a long while I'd patiently correct her... think it was all sorted... then find myself gritting my teeth the next time she sent cards. It was a total faff, because she'd send cheques for birthdays, the children's of which I'd then have to sort out (never cashed mine: I have never wanted anything from her; but the children's weren't mine to decide about, in one way). An endless loop of frustration and irritation. And then it dawned on me that she wasn't doing it because she was forgetful - quite the opposite. It put her in the position of being a victim, of some sort, whilst she was manipulating my emotions and controlling a situation. I stopped correcting her. I stopped contacting her about changing the children's cheques over (I simply gave them the amount myself). She contacted my mother (whom I'd not lived with for over 15 years at that point) to ask why. Not me; my mother. As though I was nothing more than a silly little child who needed to be put back into place by my elders and supposedly betters. My mother asked me, only to be told that I'd made the executive decision that if my grandmother couldn't have the manners to respect mine and my children's names - then I wasn't going to respect her need to be in absolute control of us. We'd never been close (for various reasons, which I won't go into here), my DC barely knew her, it wasn't a hardship not to have her in our lives (in almost 12 years, she's met my DS three times - upset him to the point of tears twice, and told him that Santa doesn't exist, on Christmas Day, when he was 3 years old!).

Now, she tries to send the cards through my mother - who realised that she couldn't force me to accept them. After all... they're not addressed to us, they're addressed to people who either have never, or no longer exist...

As for my ex-inlaws, they were quicker to grasp that the DC don't have their surname at all. They knew me when I still had to use my father's surname, so it took them a while to grasp that I'd changed my name (my own parents took to the change very smoothly, in comparison) and the concept of the DC not being labelled as part of "their tribe"... confused them, I think, into simply not bothering with surnames. Any/all post is addressed to us by our first names. Much simpler.

[lorelei9here]

Puzzled by posters saying it's ignorance
The OP has explained and specifically said it got worse after the latest explanation.

I'd send post back or bin it. Say "I didn't get a card....you did remember to address it to me...anything with Mrs DH on it goes in the bin, it can't be from anyone I know".