Walking into a surname disaster?

It is very easy to change a surname provided both parents agree.

It can be very difficult to change a surname if one parent wants to block it.

I would stick to your surname for now.

If you get married, then both you and children change your names to his XXX one.

I think if he uses the Irish version of thoe surname you should use Ni. It's flat out wrong to use O in this case.

Every days a school day. Learnt a lot here!

All part of the tragic tale of the Irish language, dinosaur!

Cel982 🙌🏻

So many of my family, friends, colleagues and even people on the TV use Ní I was starting to think the other Irish posters were living under a rock

Cel Nice to see someone else that knows what they are talking about.

I think some (Irish) people on here are missing the point that O' is for the Anglicised versions of Irish names - so O'Byrne, O'Kelly, O'Flaherty etc. In which case both sexes use it. Ó is for the Irish language surname - Ó Briain, Ó Ceallaigh and so on - and is sex-specific, with Ní being the female equivalent. The OP's partner uses the Irish language version, so their daughter would correctly be Ní if they decide to give her his surname.

Whoever said that nobody in Ireland uses this convention is just plain wrong. I'm in Dublin and can think of half a dozen friends off the top of my head.

(Obviously there are larger issues about whose name the child should get. But if using the father's name, this is the correct way to do it. Calling the female child of an Ó name by O' wouldn't really make much sense linguistically.)

I'm from ni
Alot of my university friends are called by English version of their name but tend to write the Irish version - particularly useful when preventing pupils / parents from finding them on Facebook (all teachers/ youth workers )
Could you do this - on paper dd is xxx irish name and then known as English version?

Op will your DD be Úna Ńi Surname? Does have a bit of the ‘ambulance siren’ sound ... but a lovely first name

Miggeldy - your username: love it !

(It’s been said enough already but OP, for the sake of being on topic I’m going to reiterate it - if he’s that traditional then I expect he’ll be marrying you, eh? Then you can create and agree a family name together. In the meantime he can learn to compromise.)

he did say I could give the child my surname but a) I didn't really believe that that would be the way to harmony b) I think we will get married at some point and I wanted us all to have the same surname

Perfect, no more problem!

She has your surname, which presumably has no nees or noos in it. Then if you do get married you can have the O' or Nic' conversation then.

However if you stay in England, she'll have a lot of name explaining in her future... I'd stick with yours. Maybe he can change his name.

I have a friend who’s Ni xxx and couldn’t for the line of me fathom it so thanks.

I’m glad DH’s Irish surname isn’t an ‘O’ one now as this sounds like my worst nightmare! Though as I was saying to toddler DD this morning naming convention on her daddy’s side is the mummy gets to pick, so I took full advantage and didn’t mention it’s the opposite on my side .

DH was happy with all DC’s names though, it he’s a really good actor! Luckily for us my mum and his dad have similar names, as do my dad and his mum so they’re all represented in some way.

For a woman, having a child is a bigger commitment. For a man, getting married is a bigger commitment.

And the OP has said she wants to get married.

"It's 2018" doesn't mean "marriage isn't as important as it used to be".

"It's 2018" means "lots of women are having babies outside of marriage because there's no stigma anymore, but find themselves left high and dry if the man buggers off".

I would never give my children the surname of a man who wasn't committed enough to marry me.

Some posters on here assuming that women are desperate to get married and need ‘bargaining chips’ to force a man to marry then . It’s 2018, marriage isn’t compulsory or the be all and end all. Having a child together is a bigger commitment imo anyway.

Once you've had a baby with a man you're not married to it's harder to walk away if he decides he doesn't want to get married. As opposed to if you have no baby you can say "either you commit to me or I walk".

Since the OP is already pregnant, giving the baby her surname and saying she'll change it if they get married is one of the only bargaining chips she has left.

Register the baby alone, so there is no pressure on you to cave & give in to his demands.
Register baby in your surname, with a beautiful first name of your choice.
IF and WHEN you marry, you can consider changing the baby's name then, and only then, so that you all share the same surname.
Giving a child the fathers surname when you are unmarried is giving away a lot of legal rights that you may regret. Especially if you split up a couple of years down the line...

I used to work with a girl whose surname was Ni XXXXX.

Until this thread, I hadn't realised the connotations.

I think she came from a very traditional Irish family. She was super smart.

Registrar here. In answer to an earlier question from the OP, yes you can change a child's surname after marriage by a process called re-registration eg DC has mums surname and it is changed to dads surname or surnamed are double barrelled after marriage. But that is the ONLY time you can change it on a birth certificate after birth has been registered. So if you gave DC your partners surname when you initially registered baby you could not change it to yours at a later date on the birth certificate, only by deed poll, and then only with permission of the father because the father receives joint parental responsibility when they are named on the child's birth certificate. Hope that makes sense!

No, a child doesn’t automatically take its father’s name if the parents are married.
There are no rules, only convention.

All the posts about Irish names and pronunciation are very interesting, but miss the point.
The child's father wants to decide the child's name by putting pressure on its mother, instead of taking full responsibility for the child by marrying its mother - which would automatically give it his name.

His selfish insistence on getting his own way like this doesn't bode well for a good family relationship.

I do think the surname thing could be a potential issue. Also mothers travelling alone with a child who doesn't have their surname have encountered difficulties. More importantly, this will be your child too and it seems as though you have had very little say in the name at all and the compromises you have achieved are very minor. I think that the parent whose surname is not being used should have greater say in the given names, although I do think it is ultimately a joint decision. I would maybe use the honour name in the middle and suggest your own choices of first names. After all, so far the only part of the name you have had any say in is to not have the Nic in the actual surname.

I don’t understand how previous posters in Ireland have never met someone using the Irish equivalent of their name- we couldn’t move for them in North Dublin!

Irish here and lived in Ireland almost 40 years, never ever ever in real life met someone using Ni (except in Irish class when you learn your full name in Irish for the craic 😄) have lots of female friends and relatives who married O’ surname and are O’ surname now themselves.. unless you are living in a predominantly Irish speaking area it will be a pain for your child to have to explain this daily!

He can't take the moral high ground about tradition when you're creating a modern family out of wedlock.

(Not a judgey post - my partner and I don't plan to get married. Hence why neither of us can ever play the "tradition" card.)

I’d go with the O’xxx

I’m Irish, living in ireland, and there’s plenty of females with an O’Surname. Much more than there are that have a Ni’Surname.

I think you’re OH is being a bit ridiculous and selfish tbh.