Got it. So my question was answered. You get to decide who’s uncomfortable.
My idea is, I will raise my children how I see fit and you get to raise your children how you see fit.
I have wonderful, respectful children so I think I’m doing a pretty darned good job.
@bhs1978 I can’t tell which post you’re addressing, but I’ll bite. If someone wants a larger bubble around themselves semantically, and another person wants to push that with a title that implies a closer relationship – first name or the use of mom or dad – then I’m on the side of the person who wants the boundary. It’s my opinion, and I’m not going to cloak myself in the awesomeness of my grown sons to hold it.
@HouseChatte I don’t disagree with you and my post was not addressing you.
I defer to the parents wishes (of minor children) as adults get to make their own decisions.
My response was to a poster up above who insinuated what I should be teaching my children.
I think we all have the right to raise our children how we see fit. As I answered above, if the parent of the child insists they call me by my first name I would be fine with it. If the parent insists they call me Mrs. Bhs, I am good with that. I’m not going to tell someone else how to raise their children.
And yes, my grown children are awesome. as I’m sure the grown children of all of the posters here are awesome, regardless of if we raised them to address others by Mr. Mrs. or their first names.
<<if maya="" smith="" marries="" john="" paul="" jones,="" but="" keeps="" as="" her="" last="" name="" -="" she="" is="" not="" mrs.="" jones="" neither="" of="" those="" names="" even="" correct.="" some="" other="" kid’s="" parents="" don’t="" get="" to="" make="" up="" a="" for="" her.="">>
Why wouldn’t she be Mrs. Smith if Smith was the name she kept after marriage? Mrs. indicates a married woman and Smith was her legal last name. My aunt kept her name of birth after she married. She was a kindergarten teacher and she had her students call her Mrs. Last name.
Mrs is mistress of husband which is why it’s used only with his surname. It doesn’t mean married.
If you absolutely insist on having your kids do last names, use Mr and Ms unless instructed otherwise. Ms is used for both married and unmarried women.
I was raised to call most of my parents friends Aunt and Uncle FirstName. Otherwise they were introduced by just their first name. Last names have always been a mishmash in families around here so we use first names or whatever the person introduces themselves as. It is much better (imo) than making assumptions about last names.
As an adult, I’m so glad to run in circles - both personal and professional - where first name is the default. One of the nice things about being in queer communities is that you never make assumptions about title or surname - so first name or introduced name is 100% the default.
I repeatedly have to explain to Mr R’s extended family that I am not Mrs. R’sName or even Mrs. Romani. It is infinitely easier to insist they call me Jane or Aunt Jane.
FWIW, I never had a problem with calling teachers and whatnot by their preferred name - Mrs X, Mr Y, whatever.
@bhs1978 You misunderstood my scenario. I gave the other parent a choice. The parents could decide what their own kids were to call the other adult OR the other adult could decide what the child who was not their own should call them.
The other parent was “trapped” because what he really wanted. as I pointed out to him, was a one way street. He could decide what his child should call me, but I could not decide what my kids would call him. Nevermind that he wanted his kid to call me something that was NOT MY NAME!
Faced with having to choose (and I let him choose who gets to decide) he chose to have each of us decide what the others child would call us. As I suspected having a child call him by his first name was unacceptable. Which was fine. I believe in calling people what they want to be called. But if he said that it was more important for his kid to call me 'Ms Maya" and ok then for my kid to call him Roger, that was ok with me. Got it now?
@romanigypsyeyes ok I can go with that Mrs. does not mean marriage. I hope you can see that it does indicate a woman is married. Some women like to indicate they are married, some women had to make a choice before the term Ms became acceptable in their neck of the woods, so some women do use Mrs. their birth last name.
I think our language and customs do not always allow for what is the most precise answer.
I, for one, am glad that we are evolving. A woman can now use Ms. in the same way a man uses Mr. in most places.
Yes, Ms. is a great equalizer that way. We don’t have to know whether a man is married to refer to him as Mr., and it is nice not to have to know whether a woman is married to refer to her as Ms.
There are 2 couples I know of who are colloquially referred to as Dr. Mr. Jones and Dr. Mrs. Jones - in one case two professors and the other two M.D.s. And yes, it could be Dr. Jon Jones and Dr. Paula Jones, but the other way is more fun.
My kids grew up calling every unrelated adult Mr, Mrs, Ms except my best friend from 6th grade whom they addressed as Aunt and Uncle. Our preference and we felt it showed respect for their elders. For our adult friends who said call us first name, they said no. I don’t want children to call me by my first name.
In the Montessori elementary school, Ds were asked to call teachers by their first names. They both said we aren’t allowed and compromised on Miss or Mr First Name. Interestingly, within a few years all the teachers were addressed as Miss or Mr FN.
DIL in-law calls me first name, SIL to be doesn’t call me anything. Yet. I really don’t want to be addressed as mom or dad by anyone I didn’t raise, though one of D’s friends has called me mom for 15 years. H and I have different last names, but I answered to Mrs. C even though I’m not.
I know that in the past, Mrs. did not necessarily mean you were married. That said, I think in contemporary usage Mrs. strongly suggests you are married, that the last name is also your spouse’s last name. Ms. means you aren’t telling - it’s no one’s business what your marital state is.
Son’s SO (of 2+ years) at first called us Mr amd Mrs.My2sunz, but as they got more serious, I’ve noticed that she generally doesn’t call me anything. We get along well, so I think perhaps she felt that was too formal, but not able to switch over to first names (which I would prefer). I plan to say something about this next time I see her because I think she may be “the one” and I don’t want it to be awkward.
On a related note: both of my own parents called their respective in-laws Mom and Dad. Both had close relationships with them, which I thought was the norm; in fact, I actually thought that in-law jokes were just that - jokes. Until I married. I barely knew MIL when we married and she said to call them Mom and Dad, which I did but never should have started. We do not have a close relationship at all and many years ago I got to the point that saying “mom” to her felt like it stuck in my throat. So now I just don’t call her anything. If I could go back in time, I would have just used first names.
DH doesn’t call my parents much, but would use Mom or Dad. I call my inlaws by their name – we discovered early on that my MIL, having raised a housefull of boys, just couldn’t register a woman’s voice saying Mom. FDIL calls us by our names. I just kept signing cards and notes with my name, and she got the hint. Her mom is quite possesive so there was never any question of using anything but our names.
Ex-girlfriends called us Mr/Mrs but I think for high school kids and early college, that’s appropriate.
Where we live the norm for children was miss or mr first name, particularly our friends. Northeast people they call mr and Mrs. I still call my moms friends Mrs last name and I’m 52.
The kids friends growing up call me miss eye. College friends and up I try for first names.
I have a grand cat and grand dog - don’t judge it may be all I get. We’ve already picked Mimi for me - nieces and nephews call me that as it’s a nickname from my first name. Hubby was joking and called himself papsi and that seems to have stuck. He could very well end up with that if the kids actually get significant others.