When cultures Clash..I refuse to give my father-in-laws name to my son.

[orangebee1]

Ladies, last week i delivered twins, one boy and one girl. My husband is Greek and tradition here dictates that the grandson must be named after the grandfather.
I am English and it's unthinkable to me that i can't choose my son's name. I am happy to have the grandfather's name (Yiorgos) as a middle name, but certainly not the first one and am insisting that my huband and i find a name we BOTH want.

I delivered by c-section and after two days (when i was still in the hospital recovering!) what should have been a joyous occasion turned into tears and arguments over the name choices - i wrote the names my husband and i had agreed on on facebook and his family saw and all hell broke lose.

My husband was so taken upset by his family's reaction, he was crying and distressed and finally changed his mind about the names.

As yet the babies are unamed and referred to as "the boy" and "the girl".
His sister says to me "you have three children now, what is it to name one of them after the grandfather - he has only one life and waited all of it until this day for his name to be passed on".

Am i being unreasonable??? Would you name your child a name you really do not like at all to keep the peace???

Xylem, the OP also lives in Greece.

Orange Bee, if BooBoostoo 's explanation still applies, you will need to insist on your name choice first at the baptism . Sounds as though somebody was trying to pull the wool over your eyes with that compromise. ..

Booboo - my name on my baptism certificate is my Greek name whereas all my official documents have my English name. This might not be an issue for me though as my parents forgot to resister my birth in Greece! I lived there for years with just a British passport without any problems. I did try a couple of times for citizenship but, oh my the red tape!

Op - I don't think you've ever said if your dh has actually bothered to tell his family that he had agreed as a condition of getting married to you that you weren't going to use inherited names?

I would ask his family how important they think promises made to spouses are when it comes to agreeing whether or not you will get married to each other? Hopefully they will agree that they are very important and at that point you say then why are they encouraging dh to break his promises to you?

Because if they think promises are important but are happy for dh to be bullied out of the one he made to you then what's to say that they will honour their compromise and they will just fix it do you end up being the only person who calls your ds by his actual name - it will be just a pet name. In fact going by booboostoo's post, it looks like they have told you to your face that they are stitching you up and hoping that you won't realise until too late that the christening document will be the official document with the 'wrong' name as the important one.

I would come up with your own compromise:

• that if they want the children christened then they are called the names that you and dh originally chose for them
• that if they must have yiorgis then it is added as the second middle name and that is in that position on the christening certificate
• that the children's names are registered officially using the official document route booboostoo mentioned, not the Greek orthodox christening certificate
• that PIL can use yiorgis as a pet name when they are at their home or talking to their friend's and family but that you and dh will always use your name for him and that they will also use it for official things

I can see why you'd do an 'all or nothing' approach for the christenings - easier for them to all be treated the same and then if it does become important to any of hem later on, they can't accuse you of leaving them out of or treating them differently.

Depending on how important christenings are to them you could offer yiorgis as a more important name but no christening - risky in case they take you up on it and hen go ahead and do the christenings behind your back.

I would also ask for a genuine apology from them and your dh for ruining these first special days with your twins, particularly given you could have so done without all this. They need to understand how badly they have treated you over something that you and your dh had already decided on. Just out of interest did you have any other conditions for getting married? How worried are you now that your dh isn't going to bother about them either?

On a practical note - go over to the breastfeeding topic and see if anyone there can give advice on getting your supply restarted, there are some very knowledgeable people who might be able to suggest things.

And congratulations to you on having your twins and dealing with all this at a time when you have so much other stuff on your plate.

Oh and I'd be very tempted to put something on Facebook in reply to the palaver that went on there in response to your naming announcement to say that the names that were chosen were special to you and dh, that he had agreed years ago that you weren't going to use any relative's names for your children and that the bullying and pressure you've had as a result of this has turned what should have been a special time with your new twins into a horrendous few days/weeks? where instead of supporting you through difficult times whilst your new dc and you were in hospital needing lots of extra help and support you were beeing bullied into calling your child something that you did not want. They have had their children and have had their turn at choosing names - it's now your turn along with your dh.

Looks like there is some good practical stuff cropping up on the thread so hopefully you will use it before being bullied or tricked into any compromises which are effectively giving you your name as the pet name!

zipzap - you really recommend putting some passive aggressive shit onto Facebook? Why not go the whole hog and tell her to go and moon her FIL?

Gosh no! Do not post that on FB, however much you're tempted. It would only make everything far worse.

On the official naming thing. You can register your children now, without a baptism certificate and given them whatever name you want. There is the option of not registering a name and only doing it with a baptism certificate later on, but there's nothing stopping you registering now. A lot of Greeks do wait for the baptism, but you don't have to (we didn't, we registered them both as soon as they were born, names and all). Might be worth doing that too, if you decide to go for the "compromise".

In the light of the truth of that so-called compromise, I would on a plane back to England with the 3 dcs, and without the h!

How could he mislead you like that? It is disgraceful.

Presumably he knew you were dead against baptism? Presumably he said he was OK with that? Was he just pretending?

Orangebee, I really think you're at something even more serious than a problem with the names.

Jux "In the light of the truth of that so-called compromise, I would on a plane back to England with the 3 dcs, and without the h!"

She can't take the children out of the country without their father's consent. Or a passport.

Doesn't sound like much of a compromise to me...you realise your DH will call him Yiorgos too? If he is going to be christened I'd INSIST that it was his proper name he was christened with. thats the least you should expect.

dont be bullied about this OP!

The child will not be confused by having different names.
My dd has an English name and two Spanish middle names.
She responds to all three of the names.
I call her by her English name. My dh calls her by her second name and my inlaws call her by the third name.
Never been an issue.
However, Op I think your dh is out of order.

It's all starting to feel rather Machiavellian.

Do you think the OP's husband suggested the christening thing as a means of tricking the OP into officially naming the baby Yiorgos?

And why can't his twin sister have a name???? Poor little things.

Elenio this is because some of your documents were done in the UK. If a Greek baby is born in the UK then the name will be written in Latin characters and changed to Greek characters any time the child applies for Greek documents later on.

There is an EU approved system for converting Latin characters to Greek characters which ensures consistency and works pretty well. The problem is that Greece is now applying the same system to convert Greek characters to Latin which doesn't work well.

So if I wanted my DD to be called "Charlotte" to get the phonetic sound right in Greek characters I would have to write "Sarlot" on her birth certificate (imagine these characters are Greek!), then in her passport this would correspond to "Sarlot" which looks awful to English speakers. To get anything near "Charlotte" I would need to write in Greek characters "Xarlotte" which is pronounced Harlot in Greek!

This is a new system - like many things in Greece it doesn't work!

I agree that It's fine to have more than one name and won't confuse the child.

Oh op that isn't really a compromise, it's them having their own way but if it can end this awful stress for you that can only be a good thing. Only you know if you can live with it. I'm so sorry you're stuck in this position and cannot blame you for struggling with your husband, this is basically about him going back on his word after all and I would struggle massively to move forward from that.
Congratulations again on the birth of your babies

Can we forget about cultures and feminism and political correctness .. and think about an old man who has, on the OP's own admittance, always been lovely to her, and his dream that his grandson would be named after him? Babies are part of a family, and the grandfather is also part of that family. As is OP. None is more important - or less important - than the others. Perhaps she should consider an old man, who has not as many years left as has OP. And has not made any decisions to move cultures, but has been 'lovely' in accepting the OP.

Not when this lovely old man bullies his DIL into using a name she and her DH agreed on they wouldn't use

OP I really hope you have some RL support because it is an awful situation you are finding yourself in, thanks to 'D'H

Yes, will no one think of the lovely old man, whose name takes precedence over promises, respect, oh and the mother of his grandchild?

Give me strength.

Well IMO that is no compromise!

When my DH can carry a child for 9 months and give birth to it, he can name it!

I chose the names for my children, although I would not have chosen something my DH was 100% against, I had the final say. I am furious on your behalf.

"His dream that his grandson be named after him"

Really? You reckon he's spent his whole life looking forward to this day? And how much contact is he actually going to have with this baby? How much practical support is he going to be?

And the OP, the baby's mother, is going to be using this name, day in, day out, hundreds of thousands of times in a lifetime. It really has to be something she's comfortable with.

Argue for zipzap's compromise OP, it will be better in the long run. I'm so sorry your husband didn't support you, and I do hope you're ok.
I second those saying get a family member to come and visit you, just for a bit of back-up.

This "lovely old man" will probably think that his son's wife should do all the childcare, cooking and cleaning and have a meal waiting for her h when he wants it, simply because she's a married woman. He probably feels his son is less of a man if he ever plays with his children or washes up. He expects his son's son to be named after him, with no consideration to the other side of the family because the daughter in law is female so her family simply don't count. Why can't another of his children have a son and name him after the grandfather? Either he has other grandsons already named Yiorgos so his lifelong dream is fulfilled, or he might have another grandson in the future, or could it be that he has no other sons and is only interested in his son's son, not his daughter's son?

If people always did what such "lovely old men" wanted, none of the women here would get to leave the kitchen or bedroom or go to work or have their own money or legal rights.

Jeepers creepers no wonder half the world is at war. Seriously OP for the sake of your health and your marriage just call your closest friend (preferably one who knows the both of you and is not xenophobic or hysterical ) and chat this through calmly.

And take a couple of days of 'family' time no visitors just you the DC and your DH. Don't talk about names just enjoy each others company. A bit of space and calm will do everyone wonders.

Abso bloody lutely, OhMer.

The general theme of many of the responses here is bloody awful. It's like Jeremy Kyle shagged the Daily Mail. Neither of whom would have to face the shit storm that would result if the OP followed their advice.