Regret asking godparents

[soilisplantlife]

Hi,

I asked one of my friends and her husband to be godparents. I've known this friend for a long time but we have fallen out of touch and reconnected a few times.

My partner has close friends who are a couple who I wanted to ask as well but he seemed to prefer the idea of my friend and her hubby being godparents to our first.

Since asking them, I regret it. They've had a lot going on in their life which I appreciate, but they never ask how baby is, what she's doing etc. Even when she was ill they didn't seem to care (they knew she was ill and didn't even send a message).

I feel like it doesn't take long to drop me a message just saying how is baby/I hope things are going ok but they never do.

They seemed really excited when we asked them (a while ago because of lockdown) but haven't mentioned it at all since. It's now been several months. (We will get baby christened eventually but we want family there and due to the rules we haven't been able to yet).

I don't want to fall out with them but I don't think they should be baby's godparents anymore as they don't seem to care about how baby is getting on with things.

Does anyone have any advice on how I can approach this subject without a fall out? If it's possible thank you.

I guess people have different opinions of godparents' roles.

There shouldn’t be any opinions. A godparents role is very clear: to bring up your child in the faith, and act as parents if required through abuse/neglect/death.

Anything else is just your hopes and wishes, and it would appear your expectations are far too high.

Exactly what emilyfrost said.

I’m a Gdoparent to my friends daughter and see my responsibilities as being a visible part in the girl’s life. Attending every birthday/visiting at Christmas etc. I did this faithfully for 4 years until I made said friend Godmother to my daughter. My friend missed her first two birthdays, showed no interest, almost felt like she was avoiding meeting us at one point! I actually looked into changing the Godparents too but it’s not looked upon lightly by the church. In the end I just resigned myself to the fact that some people just don’t care about it as much as others. (I know this friend is also Godmother to at least 2 other kids). I stopped making an effort with her DD and we didn’t see eachother for ages. Coincidentally in the last few months we actually have been back in touch and she actually came to my DD’s birthday this year! Maybe absence does make the heath grow fonder and if you stop bothering with her she’ll realise she needs to pull her finger out a bit?!

Thank you Lola for your comment, I hope she is making more of an effort going forward!

There are many definitions of being a godparent and I suppose mine differ from some of you. Neither are invalid, just opinions.

I'm not happy with the lack of care my friends are showing, so I don't want them to be my baby's godparents anymore.

I asked for advice about how to approach this with them without causing a fall out, not for a debate around the definition of godparents. (Just a reminder)

There is only one definition of a Godparent: to encourage the spiritual development of the child.

It really is difficult esp as you were each others bridesmaids. I honestly don't know how you ditch them without massive upset.

I'm thinking the other persons idea of having someone else as well as might be the way forward. When you tell the first pair they might just decide to pull out.

Did you say they had other stuff going on, they aren't struggling with infertility are they??

I don't think I'd try to do the Christening behind their backs as they are bound to hear about it or when lockdown is over ask 'Eh when's the Christening'.
You never know who knows who or what mutual friends people have. In theory I shouldn't know any of my BILs friends but I worked with the wife of a guy he went to uni with. The world can be a small place.

What do you expect?

I speak to my not-a-Godson's mother every couple of months. Their father even less frequently although historically he was a closer friend than his wife. They live about 200 miles away from me. We see each other a couple of times a year. Not at all this year.
We periodically text message between phone calls.

I wouldn't know if my godson was ill. I don't know about important sports matches/ good report cards etc. because I'm not that closely involved in his life. I do sometimes go along to big national tournaments to support him (and usually end up going off to do stuff with his little brother to let his Mum & Dad focus on him).

My contact with my Godson himself is even more limited - a postcard every few months. Sometimes I send random presents - often books. I always buy him (and his brother) a fancy advent calendar and a birthday present.

I don't buy any of my friend's children christmas gifts. There are too many of them and I try to treat them all the same as the fact that I'm a "not a godparent" for one family is a bit of a sticking point.

Aside from the general mismatch in expectations about what being a godparent means, I think there’s a mismatch in that you’re expecting them to show godparent levels of interest now when they’re not actually godparents yet, IYSWIM.

I’d be inclined to cut them a bit of slack. Put the whole thing off for a year and see how you feel? It’d be a shame to lose a good friendship for the sake of one difficult year. I assume there is no urgency to christen - I’m in an unusual-ish situation in that I am a practising Christian (religiously, whilst being not very culturally Christian at all), so view the whole thing very churchily, but haven’t had my own children christened at all because I sort of don’t believe in that 😂 I was baptised and confirmed at 25...

With my children it took a while to see which of my friends were going to be the truly significant adults in their lives. It wasn’t necessarily the closest friends from my pre kids life, and it also wasn’t the case that these adults were super interested in them to start with. IME some people are just more interested in generic babies than others.