Walking into a surname disaster?

I'd just say any child can have DP's current surname as it is (if you intend to marry) if not I'd wonder whether it is ok to let the name go. Many Irish don't use Nic, it isn't unreasonable at all to have this slight and usual anglicization.

Only go with his dead mothers name, if you like the name.

After reading other threads today consider marriage for long term
financial security.

Be traditional. Give the baby your name. If you get married later, you can change it whatever you/your husband want. That will a) buy you time to convince him and b) ensure that the baby’s name match’s that of one it’s parents which seemed to be your concern in your OP.

Mine is very rusty too Nose, but that sounds familiar to me.

Bean Ui XXXX = wife of XXX

Open to correction. My Irish is long gone

If you got married and took his name, what would it be? Is there a different thing for "wife of"?

WhatLoveInTokyo said!

If he's Ó then baby should be Ní. It's only if he's Mac that it changes to Nic. Just so that she doesn't have something nobody has in Ireland either...

The baby doesn't have to be anything though, especially living in the UK.

So, say for example the OP's partner is John O'Brien- that's the same he goes by in the UK and not Seán Ó Briain. They plan on calling the child Áine after his mother. He wants to call the child Áine Ní Briain, when he's John O'Brien and his partner is Sarah Smith.

Nothing necessarily wrong with that but even Irish people don't do that except if they go to an Irish speaking school.

I get that he's an expat who wants to pass on an important part of his heritage but his actual surname should be sufficient. And I say that as someone with an O'xxx name, inherited from my father who was an O'xxx. The only time I use the Ní was when I was speaking in Irish.

Basically she would sound like an ambulance siren.

this made my day.

Oh god, someone used the term Eire.

Sound the klaxon!

DP not DH

He's being ridiculous. Even in Eire they rarely do that. Tell him to grow up.

You got bigger problems than a baby name. Your dh doesnt respect you at all.

KenandBarbie Few people in Ireland go by their Irish surnames, but the Anglicized version of the name usually includes the O or Mc and men and women both use the Anglicized version, so you'll hear that. You'll only hear Ní or Nic or Uí or Mhic if a woman is using the Irish version. So that's only half of the total people using the Irish version, making the numbers even smaller.

KenandBarbie - have you never come across Sharon Ní Bheolain on the news?

If you give the baby your surname and then get married it is easy to change the child’s name with yours and his agreement
If you give them his choice of surname then split up you would need his permission to change it to match yours- and it doesn’t sound like that will happen

that’s the most complicated “I hated my nasty women’s last name and couldn’t wait to have a nice men’s one” story i’ve ever heard!

That’s a bit unfair. I hated my surname too, was very glad to take my DHs name. The men connected to my surname were fucking awful

I would give any children my surname and cross the whole family name bridge when or if, we got to it.

Lulu- that’s the most complicated “I hated my nasty women’s last name and couldn’t wait to have a nice men’s one” story i’ve ever heard!

Give the baby your last name. Problem solved.
Just that. If he wants to give the baby his surname, he marries you and it follows automatically. Otherwise s/he has your surname.
I'm sick and tired of reading about men who want to pick and choose which responsibilities they accept. If he loves you enough to have children with you, he will want you and the children to have the legal protections of marriage. Then he gets to carry on his family name.

Just to add, the reason we decided to give the DC one of DH's names not mine was because it was by far the easiest to spell, and sounded best, not anything to do with them "taking their father's name". And we weren't married when we had DC1 but were by the time DC2 came along.

I am pretty traditional and we have a super traditional set up. I'm Mrs DH and my children have DH's surname. We had a brief discussion about the "Mrs DH" thing before the event - no big deal for either of us. Kids had his/our name without question.

But.....there's no way I'd have gone for that if we hadn't been married. No way at all. I used to have a colleague who had a daughter from a previous relationship; every time they went away she was queried at passport control. And she was (eg) Claire Palmer and her daughter was Lucy Edwards. If you are attempting to travel with a child with a clearly non-UK surname, you can be sure this will happen to you. And if you do end up splitting up down the line, you'll find this bloody irritating at best. Stick to your guns.

My great grandad had a very traditional Irish spelling of our surname.
It was simplified and 'Scotiscised' by the priest, when he married my great-grandma in Edinburgh
It was further simplified when my grandad married my grandma. By which time it was not an attractive name at all. I hated it when I was growing up.
I was very glad to marry DH and have his very Yorkshire surname.

Can't comment on the Irish angle to the names.

However, our DC have a slightly different name to both their parents - DH & I both have double-barrelled names (although DH rarely uses his and goes by just one of his names). We did not want to inflict a double barrelled name on the DC so they both have one of DH's names.

It doesn't make any difference in day to day life, but on passports I am Ms A-B, DH is Mr D-C and the Dc are just Mr. C.

And it's given us no problems at all. Except the rare occasions when the DC were younger when I was travelling alone with them and was asked to produce a birth certificate as we had different names.

Give the baby your last name. Problem solved.

Since you're planning on having more children, just alternate.

DP and DS1 have the same surname, DS2 and I have the same surname - we travel a lot, and we've not had issues (raised eyebrows, and we have to be accepting about things like letters home from schools getting it wrong for one of us fairly often - although then firm if it really matters like on applications/id)

If he's had his way entirely on the first child, it's only fair you get the same on the second.

BTW, I had to veto the idea of DS1 having DP's name (and his father/grandfather's name) because it already caused them hassle (and it was a boring name), we compromised on it as a middle name - but perhaps I was lucky that he was open to negotiation...