Husband Won't Correct My Name

[TheTingTings]

Husband and I got married a couple months ago. Before this we'd been together 14 years. It was important to me to keep my surname for various reasons - we spoke about it and he was understanding and very clear that he didn't mind. I asked if he wanted to share my surname, and he didn't - no issues from me. Incase it matters, we don't have kids and don't plan to.

We got a wedding invitation from a family member of his, addressed to Mr & Mrs Husband Surname. No issue, but given their wedding stationery will likely be getting made up and to avoid any mixed messages, I asked if when he RSVPs for us could he text just to clarify my name so it can be right on seating plan, etc.

He said it's not a big deal and if I care that much I can text his family member myself. I replied that it mattered to me as it's my name, and he got really snarky about it, reiterating it wasn't a big deal and he wasn't doing it.

I welled up a bit as his reaction and the change in tone of our evening as it caught me by surprise, and to be honest I'm tired from a long day at work and this was just after getting in the door. He then flounced off and has closed the door over to the room he's gone off into.

We rarely argue, I can't remember the last time anything like this happened, but it's really hurt me. Not the invitation, but his attitude towards my name not mattering and being unwilling to do a small task to support something important to me. I could of course reply to the family member myself but I'm peeved that I've managed the name situation with my family as well as his immediate family, can he not help out with his wider family I don't really know to message?

Am I massively overthinking this?

That may have been the way when we were looking at peerage and etiquette but it is ridiculous.
lets say my husband is Joe Bloggs and I am Consuela Miggins. When we married, I kept my name. Even if I took his surname, I'd be Consuela Bloggs. I didn't take his first name and therefore should not be addressed as such. I'm a person in mu own right, not an appendage.

I'm a person in mu own right, not an appendage.

In some contexts that’s exactly what you are, eg a wedding you wouldn’t be invited to if you weren’t with your bloke.

Ah I do think you are being a bit over sensitive. I don't have my husband's name and we were given a gift that had Mr and Mrs xxx on it. It's not a big deal to me and I don't mind, I just find it quite funny. However it it does upset you, you need to tell the relative. Not sure why it's down to your husband. You do t need to bake a big deal about it, just ask them nicely.

This is a non-issue. You're invited because you are married to a person they wanted to invite. If you weren't with him, you wouldn't have been invited. He rightly doesn't see an issue. If you have an issue with it, it's on you to clear up. You can't refuse his name but then demand he panders to your expectations on something like this that he doesn't care about.

If this was always going to be such a big issue you probably should never have got married. Not just to him, I mean to anyone. By definition you are already Mrs Hisname Hisname as a result of marriage. You can choose to call yourself whatever you like of course, anyone can go by whatever name they like. It's a pseudonym though, you formally became Mrs Hisname Hisname regardless of whether you like that or not by gift of marriage.

In what way “funny”?

If this was always going to be such a big issue you probably should never have got married. Not just to him, I mean to anyone. By definition you are already Mrs Hisname Hisname as a result of marriage. You can choose to call yourself whatever you like of course, anyone can go by whatever name they like. It's a pseudonym though, you formally became Mrs Hisname Hisname regardless of whether you like that or not by gift of marriage.

None of this is true.

What an absolute pile of horse shit.

You have to actively TAKE a name. There is nothing automatic about it. Otherwise her husband is equally Mr Herfirstname Hersurname as well by definition.

I honestly can’t believe that people walk around in 2024 thinking this stuff, never mind writing it down for the world to see. Marriage is not a gift: it’s a legal agreement. Women have rights now, it’s not the 1850s, we aren’t property of men and anyone believing that any of the utter drivel you’ve written here should be utterly embarrassed.

After you’ve had years of it and nothing’s changed you either laugh or cry. Some of us choose to laugh.

Who told you all this? And why did you believe them?

Not remotely true. Just your typical faux 'I don't understaaaaaand' statement. I've lost count of the number of variations on this theme I've heard over the years: 'but your husband's name is your legal name!'

Wrong. The default legal position is that your name is your name unless you actively change it. I also don't buy that any woman who ever went through the headache of renaming bank accounts and passports fails to grasp this. It's just another way of putting women in our 'rightful' place. Any assertion of our own preference of identity is a gross imposition and people either shout the usual tired objection of 'drama!' or tell them they're getting ideas above their station. Cue 'it's not all about you!'

Don't sweat the small stuff. Small stuff being, BTW, not the basic courtesy of affording women their own names but making such a mountain out of the molehill of a simple, polite correction. It's one of the sillier MN threads and the reason why people very often laugh at this site.

Beyond me, but does tend to show why people struggle with basic tasks like declining an invitation, and why MN wedding threads are the gift that keeps on giving!

Because a relative of my dh is coming who has stage 4 cancer and it will probably be their last. So I'm going to swallow my own feelings and make it as nice as I can. Then afterwards, quietly tell dh that any incorrectly addressed cards won't get to their intended recipient.

Erm, I married my husband - I wasn’t adopted by him, no part of his name became my name. My name did not change. I think you are getting confused between convention and law. Really, really odd belief you have there.

It's a pseudonym though, you formally became Mrs Hisname Hisname regardless of whether you like that or not by gift of marriage.

I know others have responded to this spectacularly incorrect statement, but I would just like to add that a previous poster made the correct distinction between a name and a title. "Mrs. Hisname Hisname" is a title, not a name. And happily, it's increasingly being rejected even as a title.

Why isn’t your husband working himself to the bone for his relative?

No you don't. It’s a choice.

It bothers me when I get post addressed to:

Mr and Mrs 'His initial' Our surname

so I get why you're annoyed. I took his last name not the whole thing.

@Dotjones Of course you don't!
Even our wedding certificate envelope is clearly addressed to Mr and Ms D-B!!

Just message and tell them yourself - seems like more of a sore point for your husband than he is letting on

We recently received a wedding invitation and my first name was spelled incorrectly. I found it really annoying and it bothered me much more than I thought it would.

The invitation was from my brother!

My exH told me the wrong spellings of his sisters' names. Twat.