Miss, Ms or Mrs

That’s my Christmas cards posted. As a result of this thread everyone is addressed by Christian name and surname, nothing else. I never realised it caused so much angst.

I’m married but I use Ms most of the time if I have to use a title at all. Although I did get a Christmas card from my sisters in-laws addressed to “Mrs and Mrs AmberSpyglass” and my wife and I have “Mrs and Mrs” mugs which always make me smile.

Whether you keep your name depends on when you got married. Back in the 1960s I wanted to keep my name and investigated it as well as I could.

I was told, erroneously, that, legally, I had to have my married name on my passport and that it could cause problems and confusion doing anything as a married couple (mortgages etc) if we had diferent surnames.

In the end the problems seemed so insurmountable I gave up and went along with changing my name. Although i always thought that if my marriaage ever ended, and it hasn't, I would immediately revert to my birth name.

Mostly pronounced the same as 'miss' in my experience.

I am sorry LucyLoo12 that you were on the receiving end of somebody's bad manners. It seems as if the said (and sad) lady is grumpy because of the mess in her personal life & she decided to take it out on you. I would not bother with "friends" like this one. It is so exhausting to remember everyone's foibles & preferences. Delete her text, delete her name from your mobile, delete her from your life. Delete, delete, delete! Do not get caught in somebody's web of grievances & telling off-s: you are not a fly, you are a butterfly! Merry Xmas!

Agree KaEllen!

Never changed my name either.

Oh, and I always kept my own name.

wow, nine pages on this thread!
In Germany, where I come from, they did away with 'Fraulein' back in the seventies, at least officially, though it took some time to be universally adopted. (Which it has been for some time now, so addressing a young German woman as 'Fraulein' is certainly a faux pas!)

For as long as I have lived in the UK I have used 'Ms' - single, married, divorced, always Ms. Why should anyone infer my marital status from my title? It's nobody's business.

And don't get me started on women being addressed by their husbands' first name plus surname! That is a throwback to the dark ages.

Also, it took me a long time to get used to school kids calling female teachers Miss. That seems extremely oldfashioned! If they call male teachers 'Sir', surely the female equivalent would be 'Madam'??

I think that a title, whatever it might be, is often a mark of respect. Having been a teacher for many years, I was very used to being addressed as Mrs Allegretto. I quite missed it when I retired and realised that (almost) everybody now called me by my first name.

Each to there own but I would have horrified if I wasn't addressed as Mrs. I am widowed. As far as I am concerned I am still married.

Death ended my husband life. It did not end our marriage/relationship in my eyes.

Legally I must put widowed on earth. However I do not see myself as single nor ever will. I am still married

I think its getter to leave a title off if you are unsure.

I was Ms when I met my 2nd husband 19 years ago. I had reverted to my maiden name. My daughter is not married and I always use Ms with her which she uses too.

100% feminist here! Some posters appear not to know the definition. Women are treated as 2nd class citizens in many ways. Why do women take a man’s name? Why do only women take a title that announces if they are married or not, but men don’t? It is seriously ridiculous in the 21st century!

By the time I divorced, my baby brother had married a woman with the same first name as mine, so reverting to my original family name would have caused all sorts of complications. I was also moderately well known in my professional field by my married name. Besides, I preferred my married name.

Fortunately it was a very civilised divorce, and I asked my ex-husband and ex-MiL if they minded me keeping their family name. Ex-H didn’t mind at all, and MiL was delighted that I wanted to do so.

I was going to post that it may depend on your maiden name compared with your married name.

I did go out with a couple of people who had more interesting surnames than DH's.

I kept my married surname after divorce as it was a nicer name. Much to the annoyance of my ex's new wife.

When my eldest was away at university, he started adding titles such as Countess to any mail (birthday/mother's day cards) he sent me. At that time, we were still relative newcomers to the village, so I don't know what the postman made of it ?

I use tireless in this way too but sometimes by omitting the titles you can cause confusion if for example several people in a household share the same surname and initials.
It's not so bad for birthdays when sending cards because when the card drops through the door, it's pretty obvious who is for but at xmas or with other posted correspondence throughout the year, the wrong person could open something they legally shouldn't

BlueSky

If you are widowed you are still Mrs DH but if you are divorced do you really still want to be known as Mrs EX?

Doesn’t bother me. I liked my married name better than my unmarried name in any case.

Exactly, I am 64. I refer to myself as a spinster. Don't give a flying s**t what others think. But one thing's for sure, I am the very opposite of a shriveled, dried up old woman! No one could ever accuse me of that, spinster or not.

What a rude chit. That's the thank you she gave you for caring enough to send her a card? You should have been the one telling her off for being an ingrate, rather. I hope you will "miss" sending her any more cards, ever.

"spinsterish"- that sounds like something out of the dim and distant past.
What's wrong with being single? Women no longer need to marry in order not to starve

If you are widowed you are still Mrs DH but if you are divorced do you really still want to be known as Mrs EX?

I don’t like the term Ms and don’t like to use Miss for older people, it sounds very spinsterish! If you are widowed then I think it is OK to use Mrs. Otherwise I would just use name or initial.

Why not just put her first and last names - forget the Miss/Mrs/Ms.
However, how rude of her to pick you up on this. I have been divorced for over 15 years now and still get called ‘Mrs ...’. Better that than being ignored.

I get really irritated if I'm referred to as "Mrs" especially by organisations or firms that have my contact details in front of them. I've always been Ms if I've had to use any title at all. I'd much rather be known by my name only.