to think it's just plain wrong to want change your DCs name by deed poll before their first birthday?

[ButtonBoo]

Just that really.

A mum in my friends NCT group has said (seriously apparently) that they are looking into changing their DDs name by deed poll. She's 10mo. They think they've made a mistake in choosing her name and don't like it anymore. It's an uncommon name but not crazy weird.

Is this not just really odd? I know their baby, their choice etc but it's weird surely. Does anyone regret their name choices that much they'd deed poll change? Can this even happen before the childs 16yo?

YABU, better to change it than live with a name you don't like for the rest of your life.

Salmotrutta - I had thought of him as a certain name from when I knew I was pregnant and for some reason couldn't get it out of my head. No reasonable explanation

Better earlier than later.

The only one I would have changed is dd's, I blurted it out whilst still on the operating table and it stuck. Others were fine, ds2's was actually decided on the way to register him.

At 10 months she can do it on the birth certificate if she makes an appointment with the registrar. I really can't see the problem with name changing so young.

I've known two couples who have done this, and I did think it odd at the time.

However, I chose what I thought was a lovely Scottish name for Dd2 (I'm a Scot living in the SouthEast), and reckoned it would be unusual down here. No. Every play park / softplay / toddler group I've been at has at least a couple of other girls by the same name. I did seriously consider changing it when she was about 8 months old, but she suits it and we've got used to it - and it would have felt odd trying to get used to something else. I still sort of wish I'd chosen a different name in the first place though.

I wish we'd done this at 6 months.

We called DD2 shortversion of her name from the start. DH wanted her to have longversion on birth certificate, something I was unsure of and he later regretted.

Yes, you can be "known as" and that's what we did for some years. Mainly we just told people her name was shortversion and that was that. But it's still problematical, with teachers who insisted on calling her longversion, passports where "known as" is just not good enough, doctors and dentists who repeatedly ignored requests to call her shortversion.

By the age of 12 (and way before) she was very clear she didn't want longversion at all. Every time she told people her name they said "oooh, are you really a longversion?" she wanted to say no - because she didn't feel she was - but that wasn't truthful. We also got to the age where GCSEs, official certificates etc were on the horizon, and she was adamant she didn't want them saying longversion all her life.

So, at the age of 12, we changed it by deed poll. In theory she is still a minor so the only people who had to agree to it were DH and me, but we wouldn't have done it without being led by her. Since doing it she has been so happy with her name. She feels shortversion is really hers now. When people ask if her real name is longversion, she says no and smiles :)

YAB a bit U. They could be saving the child a lot of angst. If parents regret and dislike a name, that will rub off on the child. Besides, the child can always change it back in later years.

Jock I bet your daughter has the same name as mine. We were living in England and thought we were mega original; only to return to Scotland to realise everyone is called the same name. I'm quite dissapointed but do feel it's her name now.

Yabu - sooo none of your beeswax. Good idea to do before first birthday.

bissy - what's the name..Isla? Maisie? Iona?

This is one of those situations where it's weird when it's a real-life situation, but if you were reading about on here happening to someone else, you'd probably think it was a perfectly normal, acceptable thing to do.

I have to admit that although this seems like a perfectly acceptable thing to do in theory, if I actually knew someone thinking of doing this IRL I'd probably quietly think they were a tiny bit bonkers.

Figured I probably have outed myself anyway. It's Peggy. I thought it was quite retro/cute but they want to change to something 'safer'

Yes, i agree better now than later but it's not like they're changing it because she doesn't like it. She's 10mo! What if they change it and she ends up hating her new name and preferring her original name. A change back I guess?!

Coming around to thinking it's not 'wrong' just odd.

It's the sort of name that could annoy more, once it began to, though. I think it's sensible to change it tbh, not odd. I think it's cute and retro, but that can translate to gimmicky and dated in another decade, and then it really would be hard to alter.

It's plain wrong because you don't need deed poll.

the law is that you can change a child's name in the first 2 months and change the birth certificate (but not the surname)

the easiest way to do it is by baptism.

here

i missed the 1 off 12.

12 months

musicposy - you didn't need deedpoll if you're UK. as long as you can prove that she goes by shortversion then that's all you need to change her name - even the passport office only needs to know what her proper (ie the name she uses) name is.

i thought you could only change the name on birth cert if the child had been christened using a different name if that was not the case it was a deed poll.

ofcourse i could have made that up

Oooh I love Peggy. But I'd use Margaret as the given name.

I think if you really hate the long version of a name, then don't put it down. But if you don't mind it, but prefer the short version, put the long version down.

yabu - none of your business.

"I think if you really hate the long version of a name, then don't put it down. But if you don't mind it, but prefer the short version, put the long version down."

You see, we were in this position. I still think longversion of DD's name is a nice name. But at the end of the day, she hated it. I think that was just probably because we never called her it. Plus, the older she became, the more shortversion suited her and the more I really liked it. Longversion would not suit her at all now.

quietlysuggests we struggled with the barrister thing, like you! We thought she ought to have a proper, grown up name she could use if she ever wanted to become anything serious. Your DH is right, it just became confusing and inconvenient. Your DD can always change it if she ever wants to be a barrister and feels her name doesn't suit her profession! :)

I didn't know we didn't need a deed poll - we came up against enough hassle over the years to suggest it would be useful. Plus we were quite lucky, one of my best friends is a solicitor so it cost us the grand total of £0

Passport office did say they needed a deed poll, by the way, plus a letter of consent to the name change signed by both parents. Of course, we could have spoken another day and got another story, who knows! But one of the overriding factors for us was that last passport they said they could not issue it in her known as name, it had to be her birth certificate name. She was determined that this time round it would be in her proper shortversion name!

perfectstorm Fri 05-Oct-12 16:14:57
It's the sort of name that could annoy more, once it began to

Yes yes yes it could. They're making the right call (sorry if there are any Peggys on here....!)

I don't get people who name their baby when he/she arrives, 'to see what they look like'.
You have 9 months to choose a name! I picked a name for DD shortly after 5 month scan when I found out what I was having, used it on bump for a couple of months and decided I didn't like it.