I should wear a name badge

[Pikachuwithyourmouthclosed]

My mother in law has just sent me a note to let me know that she's had to address my son's Christmas presents to my husband as she's not sure what name I go by nowadays.

She's only known me for 20 years, and what with me keeping exactly the name name for that entire time I can see how that's hard to keep track of

It's funny, no one ever seems baffled by my husband having the same name for his entire life, but apparently me doing the same is confusing for everybody involved.

(lets just skip neatly over the "had to" send the presents to him. Obviously, having a penis is not optimal conditions for receiving post on behalf of your children).

Why her 'confusion' then OP?

I'm assuming you two don't normally get on?

'Hi MIL. This is Pica. I think you sent that message to the wrong person, as i have not changed my name in the 20 years we have known each other.'

Hahaha Tentacle. Love it.

What tentacle says :)

Any further Provovation is met with worried looking insinuations that MIL is getting awfully forgetful these days

Or you can go the direct route and ask directly ‘you don’t like it that I never changed my name do you? Why is that?’

Wow! That’s outstandingly rude. And disrespectful. And..just bizarre.

How did she address the note?

Does she have early onset dementia?

My DC have different surnames from me and each other. People solve the problem by addressing mail directly to them.

It tips my MIL over the edge every time she posts stuff to us as she doesn't like the postman to know we're not married so she never knows who to address stuff I actually do like her, just a product of her generation

I don’t buy ‘product of her generation’, they are the generation that INVENTED. ‘Women’s Lib’!

DivisionBelle I'm pretty sure that didn't reach her, very poor levels of education and literacy. Perhaps product of generation was the wrong phrase?

The thing is, on almost every MN thread about keeping your own name and Christmas cards arriving addressed to Mr and Mrs HisFirstName HisSurname there will be MNers, young women from the here and now, saying “but that’s the correct way to address a married couple “.

So I think you are right, it’s not generation, it’s from a menu of different levels of adherence to tradition (from nostalgic to oblivious to unthinking to bloody minded ), different levels of education or social or cultural exposure to information, or a sort of territorial patriarchal clannishness. Not forgetting the possibility of a PA challenge to a DIL.

"I actually do like her, just a product of her generation"

How old is she?

Oh God. How infuriating. I like tentacles suggestion and also the idea of insinuating she's getting terribly forgetful.

Not a feminist issue but my Mil doesn't like the fact that my kids have Welsh names. All four letter, 2 syllable names, deliberately chosen to be easy to pronounce for our English relatives. She has spent the last decade deliberately misspelling and mispronouncing them to make a point.

Bertrand she's early 60's I've already admitted I was perhaps wrong with product of generation perhaps more product of immediate environment and level of education/literacy.

Why doesn't she just address the parcels to the children anyway? Children love getting post.
misses point of thread

My MIL and I get on very well and my birthday cards get my surname on, but any post to both of us is Drs Theirsurname.

Apparently this is because I've been assimilated. There is no escape. I am one of the Theirsurnames.
Yes, she's a fan of Star Trek and the Borg. It's a joke between us but anyone else who tries it can feck right off.

Meanwhile a friend always addresses cards to Mr and Mrs Myname, as her parents forced her to have a posh engagement party shortly after I met him, with place name cards, and in the stress she couldn't remember his surname. She (rightly) figured that any chap of mine wouldn't object to being Mr Myname for the night, so again it's a tradition.

My dad is a stickler for classic etiquette so thank you letters to his parents had to be Mr & Mrs Hisinitials Surname, but luckily he knew that if you have a PhD in your surname you can't then call yourself Dr Newsurname, so cards are Dr AB Hisname & Dr CDE Myname.

it's not her generation I agree - my MIL, despite some otherwise very traditional views, didn't even bat an eyelid when we told her that DP and my second child would have my surname (eldest has DP's), has never had an issue remembering any of her daughter-in-law's names - whether they were changed or not - and that is because she has very good manners and wouldn't dream of imposing her views on other people (and she's up for discussing things and potentially changing her opinion/politely trying to change mine).

And yes. Why not just send it to the kids. They love that.

I think it has less to do with age than mindset, I've been told by women younger that me that its 'illegal' to use your own name after marriage.

My MiL always refused to use my name, right down to sending cheques for the children made out to Mrs HisInitial Hisname which I then couldn't pay into the bank. DH would then have to send them back and tell them I couldn't pay them in.

Obviously as a man DH couldn't be expected to deal with trivia like the wifework of managing children's gifts so we went through this farce on a regular basis. It used to drive me nuts.

DP’s DB’s wife solves a similar problem by addressing mail to our family to DP’ssurname Family (also her surname as she took it when she married DP’s DB).

She’s in her early 30s.

I texted to ask if she might stop doing it but there was no reply. That told me

It’s not difficult knowing or finding out how to address people and those with a poor memory can make notes.

My MiL always refused to use my name, right down to sending cheques for the children made out to Mrs HisInitial Hisname which I then couldn't pay into the bank. DH would then have to send them back and tell them I couldn't pay them in.

My MIL does this. And my ds is adopted so, before his certificate with his new name came, she would send him cheques made out to John HerName so that we couldn't pay them in.

Never let it be said that that woman misses an opportunity to hold onto money.