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Original poster

Christmas cards addressed using my husband's first name

134 replies

HeidiHole · 21/12/2011 11:01

My husband and I are celebrating our first Christmas as a married couple.

Neither of us have legally changed our name to the surname of the other.
I'm still Miss Heidi Hole, and he is still Mr John Smith

As it means a lot to my husband, I have agreed for our first child (due May) to have his surname Smith. I'm as tolerant as possible of people calling me Mrs Smith, and have accepted that it will happen a lot more if people know my child is Master Smith.

Likewise, my husband has been referred to as Mr Hole, after I booked something for us in my name. He can accept this too.

However here's where I get really bloody angry. We have received numerous Christmas cards this year from his family addressed to Mr & Mrs John Smith

Firstly I have not changed any legal paperwork to Smith and the ASSumption that I have ticks me off. Thats not the big issue though, the big issue is the Mrs John Smith. My first name is Heidi, and it always has been. I am friendly with all of my husband's family, they call me Heidi to my face. They've never said "Hello John" because they know that's not my name.

As explained up post, if is was just Mr & Mrs Smith i'd let it slide with just some angry muttering. But I'm going to explode if I see yet another Mrs John Smith.

I absolutely refuse to have this happen every Christmas for the next 30 years. We don't see his family much as we just moved abroad. How do I stop this? Should it be my husband who drops into conversation that my name is Heidi, not John and perhaps they shouldn't be so fucking rude in future, or should I do it? And how should I do it? I'm sure they're not being ignorant on purpose, they're all lovely people and I'm sure they'd be sad if they knew how offensive they were being by airbrushing my name out of my life.

OP posts:
philbee · 28/12/2011 14:45

kahlua - I didn't really feel it would be losing my identity, but I already had a name and was used to it, so we decided I should just keep that one. I come from New Zealand and it is very common there for women to keep their names, so I also felt like it was a nod to my family history, and as we are the only ones in the UK it seemed important to keep it, even though it won't go anywhere as DD has DH's surname. I don't think rings is the same as both people usually wear rings, not just the woman, whereas traditionally it's only the woman who changes her name.

SantieMaggie · 28/12/2011 14:50

Oh fgs stop getting so worked up about it - just politely point it out to them and be thankful they sent you cards and are still here and able to send you cards.

Bunbaker · 28/12/2011 14:56

"They think it is funny and all a bit of a laugh but it just shows me how ignorant they are and that they have totally missed the point."

I suspect it is because they don't attach the same importance to it as you do. I always try to address people the way they wish to be addressed, but if I wasn't sure and I knew that the couple were married I would address a card to Mr and Mrs His Surname simply because that is still the default setting. I wouldn't use the husband's first name on the envelope though.

BelaLug0si · 28/12/2011 15:01

in my case I have politely and repeatedly asked people to respect my wishes. And also explained it on this thread several times as well. Apparently they are incapable of taking any notice.
I don't subscribe to the "putting up with peoples' behaviour because they might drop dead tomorrow" approach.
I give people several chances and that's it because if I'm capable of remembering what someone's name is then they are too.

Bunbaker · 28/12/2011 15:10

"in my case I have politely and repeatedly asked people to respect my wishes. And also explained it on this thread several times as well. Apparently they are incapable of taking any notice."

That is just ignorant and disrespectful. If anyone asked me specifically to address an envelope the way they wanted me to I would do so.

"However, perhaps some people would feel uncomfortable supporting in any way the old tradition of fathers 'selling' their daughters to men and then women changing their name to indicate whose property they were."

I think an awful lot of women don't feel that they are chattels to be given away. I took OH's surname because I wanted to. I don't feel in any way that I "belonged" to my father and am now "owned" by my husband. I see it as an old tradition where the original meaning is now meaningless - or it is to me anyway.

WhoKnowsWhereTheMistletoes · 28/12/2011 17:20

I agree that not many would see themselves as chattels, I would not describe any woman who changes her name as such either, but to me it is a sexist tradition (as is the use of Miss/Mrs) which I had no wish to participate in. I consider our marriage to be a partnership of equals so it would seem strange to me to label only one of us as married by name/title.

FlangelinaBallerina · 30/12/2011 09:08

The idea that it is etiquette to address someone in a term which you know they find offensive is a contradiction in terms. This is why you are talking shit, Marriedandwreathedinholly. And I do not believe for one second that someone with enough savvy to use a computer and type coherent sentences can possibly think that deliberately offending someone is anything other than rude. Personally, I can cope with incorrectly being called Mrs DH's surname, as a lot of people still do that and it remains the default assumption. But anyone calling me by his first name too is simply forewarning me of their own backwardness. Nonetheless, I would have the manners to address any woman as Mrs Husband's First Name Husband's Surname, if she so wished.

Kahlua, that is not what a wedding ring signifies. Additionally, it is not for you to decide what the more important things in other people's lives are.

marriedinwhite · 30/12/2011 11:11

flangelinaballerina I have just checked with Debrett's it is still the correct etiquette to address a married couple as Mr and Mrs DH etc. etc. I have never sought to deliberately offend anyone and feel you are exceptionally misguided. Frankly, your comment that I am talking shit speaks volumes in the context of manners, respect and courtesy, far more than how an envelope is actually quite correctly addressed.

StewieGriffinsMom · 30/12/2011 11:48

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

marriedinwhite · 30/12/2011 11:54

It rather depends who you mix with I think.

If I am not aware that someone wants to be addressed as Mr F and Mrs S Jones I will adopt the default position which is actually the correct form of address. If someone wishes to be addressed by an incorrect form I shall address them in the manner of their choice - for married couples I believe it is often "the Jones family". If they do not tell me, however, they have no right to take offence. If I happen to make a mistake and forget to make a note in the family address book or change next year's labels I would consider it rude if they pulled me up when I had been kind enough to think of them and to send a card.

chibi · 30/12/2011 11:57

Would you be happy to recieve a card addressed to 'unreconstructed, inflexible dinosaur'?

I understand this is the correct form of address. At any rate, as long as someone was thinking of you (albeit not highly, or tbh very much at all)

marriedinwhite · 30/12/2011 12:01

Chibi read the posts and tell me who is being inflexible. I have merely said it is the correct form; I have not said I would not be flexibile, neither have I said any one is talking shit. How very odd that those who bleat about how they are addressed and how rude they perceive the correct form are those who have the ill grace to fire insults. Do you not see who is being rude here.

chibi · 30/12/2011 12:16

Is it bleating to want to be addressed by you own name? Really?

The insistence on being correct, but flexible enough to accomodate the wishes of others, it reads as though people are demanding to be addressed as 'the lord high poobah grand vizier of spray cheese' or something equally bizarre, and you are humouring their mad whims, as wrong as they are.

I don't think it is bizarre, or demanding, or incorrect to expect that people will address you by your own name. It is strange to think that there are people who will do so, but who are congratulating themselves at how tolerant they are, and smirking to themselves that it is incorrect

I am foreign, and I find such customs fascinating (graceless and crass, but fascinating).

FlangelinaBallerina · 30/12/2011 12:18

Ah married, I thought you'd pounce on the talking shit part and pretend this is somehow worse than deliberately calling someone something you know is offensive to them. You did. How predictable. But no, the use of an Anglo-Saxon scatological term is not in the same ball park as not even allowing me my own first name. I could list all the swear words I know, and I know fuckloads, and I'd still be only a drop in the ocean in comparison.

As for etiquette, do you genuinely think Debretts is the last word on these things? Because it isn't. Etiquette is about manners as well as customs. If someone has told a person that they wish to be addressed in a certain way, but the addresser still persists in using a term they know the other person finds offensive, they are being deliberately rude. If you do not do this, then it doesn't apply to you, but if the cap fits, wear it. Additionally, etiquette is constantly evolving. Things that you thought were acceptable a few years back may no longer be so. Given that you are apparently such a stickler for proper etiquette, I assume you'll be mortified at causing offence and wish to tailor your behaviour accordingly, in order to avoid doing so. If you do not feel this way, then I venture to suggest that actually, perhaps you care about maintaining a particular mode of address rather than etiquette itself.

marriedinwhite · 30/12/2011 12:22

FlangelinaBallerina how like my 17 year old son you sound.

FlangelinaBallerina · 30/12/2011 12:24

Given that my teenage years are sadly behind me, I shall take that as a compliment. You being so fond of good manners, I'm sure it couldn't possibly be intended as anything else.

WestleyAndButtockUp · 30/12/2011 12:26

I had this ruck with my mother when she was sending out invitations to our wedding. She was insistent that this is the proper way to do it; I was insistent that times have changed.

Ironically, I caught it when she was addressing a card to my feminism lecturer and her husband, as "Mr and Mrs Jack Turner".

pornmonkey · 31/12/2011 01:47

good posts marriedinwhite but I fear you are in a minority of one here...

flange it's not a compliment to be compared to a 17 year old in this context, honestly...

LoveInASnowyClimate · 31/12/2011 08:50

I actually agree with MarriedInWhite as well. Convention, not insult.

HandDivedScallopsrgreat · 31/12/2011 09:15

Blimey I can't believe can't see how rude it is to address people by a made up name rather than their real name. My name is not, never has been nor ever will be Mrs Husband's Forename Husband's Surname. I have my own (very unique) name, if you could be so kind as to use that.

I have found this problem has increased the longer I have been married. It would seem that people humoured me to begin with and obviously the longer I am married and the more children I have the more my name (and by implication my life) has morphed into my husbands.

My father has always seemed to overlook the fact that I never even changed my surname. I left it, thinking choose your battles. However having read some of the antiquated and downright dismissive views on this thread I will tackle him over how insulting it is to call someone by a name other than their own. Strange how men don't go through the indignity of being a name different to their own due to "convention" (which is bunkum anyway, ignorance is more accurate).

StewieGriffinsMom · 31/12/2011 09:16

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

lollygag · 31/12/2011 09:28

I've noticed that most women are strongly principled on this.If it's Gerald from the office who wants to marry them they want to keep their own name but if it's Leonardo di Caprio then it's goodbye to ms Smith and hello Mrs Di Caprio.

rosy71 · 31/12/2011 09:34

I've noticed that most women are strongly principled on this.If it's Gerald from the office who wants to marry them they want to keep their own name but if it's Leonardo di Caprio then it's goodbye to ms Smith and hello Mrs Di Caprio
Really? What a strange comment. How many people do you know who've married someone famous?

lollygag · 31/12/2011 09:40

Well not famous exactly but a local councillor.

HandDivedScallopsrgreat · 31/12/2011 09:56

Convention can (and should) be changed as times progress. Otherwise we would all be walking around in corsets, not showing our ankles, not being able to own property or have financial independence and our husbands could legally rape us.

But hey, convention must trump rudeness and the right to be addressed by your own name.

Lollygag how do you know I am not married to someone famous or someone with an exotic surname?

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