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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

To want our baby to have my surname?

237 replies

ellie19812 · 04/08/2013 13:50

Our baby is due in January, we are living together however the idea of marriage does not appeal to me (maybe this will change in the future, I don't know yet).

Anyway, I really want our baby to have my surname, however he and his family have assumed the baby will take on his surname.

AIBU?

OP posts:

PurpleGirly · 04/08/2013 21:05

shrugged I happily and willingly took my husbands name - it made no difference to me professionally. In answer to you quoted piece about everyone changing their name, if you read my point it was that the OP's DP's parents were from a generation where that is what happened.

I do not think that me wanting to take my husband's name makes me old fashioned or anti- feminist. I made a choice, that is what equality is about - being free to make a choice.

squoosh · 04/08/2013 21:05

You often hear women say 'I changed my name because I didn't really like mine anyway'. I've never once heard of a man changing his name for this reason.

SoupDragon · 04/08/2013 21:12

Bowler....but why are women "quite keen" to use their husband's name? That's so sad.

No need to feel sad on my behalf. I happily change my name when I got married,and haven't changed it back now I am divorced. It doesn't rhyme with my first name, unlike my original one.

Your way isn't necessarily the right and only one.

SoupDragon · 04/08/2013 21:14

You often hear women say 'I changed my name because I didn't really like mine anyway'. I've never once heard of a man changing his name for this reason.

I have. On Mumsnet, funnily enough.

I also know a couple where the DH took his wife's surname although I have no idea why - it would have been rude to ask and I have better manners.

treacleturkey · 04/08/2013 21:17

Indeed, my view isn't the right one, its just the one I favour.

WorraLiberty · 04/08/2013 21:17

No, what's sad is when women try to patronise other women for making different choices to them.

Sad my arse

SoupDragon · 04/08/2013 21:18

Yes, the one you favour and then refuse to comprehend or accept any other.

sonlypuppyfat · 04/08/2013 21:19

And we are all entitled to it eh treacle

treacleturkey · 04/08/2013 21:19

Worral, you mean 'different from.'

IAmTheTwelfthDoctor · 04/08/2013 21:20

But you didn't generally use your father's name in any form if your parents weren't married (unless they were posh enough for you to be given a FitzSomething patronymic), so it's simply not true to say that it has "always been" the case that the child of unmarried parents would take the father's name.

treacleturkey · 04/08/2013 21:20

Anyway, I'm all for equality, that's all. I don't care how we get there.

WorraLiberty · 04/08/2013 21:22

And now you're the grammar police?

Getting sadder by the minute....

treacleturkey · 04/08/2013 21:26

Thanks!

monniemae · 04/08/2013 21:31

My dp and I aren't married, have no plans to be, and I'd never take his name anyway. I felt it would be weird for the baby to automatically take his name; I was surprised that my family assumed it would take mine as we aren't married. Don't want to double barrel or amalgamate names, wasn't sure of solution.

When I was newly pregnant, DP tentatively asked what our unmarried friends had chosen to do. Then said "xx [dp surname] is pretty rare you know". We laughed, out of surprise that he was bothered as much as anything, and looked into which of our surnames were the least common. They were pretty much the same.

Anyway (longwinded, sorry), I later had the idea of giving the baby my mother's surname. My mum, now dead, was one of four daughters who all changed their names. I suggested it to dp as "this way we each get to have our own surname" and he went for it...

My family weirdly not happy about it, and god knows how his will react. But it's the right solution for us and makes me happy that a bit of my mum/her family will follow the baby through life unless/until it chooses a different name.

Hth!

Preferthedogtothekids · 04/08/2013 21:39

I heard of a woman whose maiden name was Hussy. She changed her name when she married to her husband's, which was Hoare.

As you were.

Alisvolatpropiis · 04/08/2013 21:45

treacle

No it isn't sad. It's a choice you didn't make. That is all.

HTH

squoosh · 04/08/2013 21:47

Monniemae that sounds like a brilliant compromise!

Snog · 04/08/2013 22:07

my baby - now aged 13 - has my surname and not her dad's.
i find it nothing short of bizarre in this day and age for a baby to be given the fathers surname!

Bowlersarm · 04/08/2013 22:09

Snog. Why?

sonlypuppyfat · 04/08/2013 22:11

snog now is an odd way of thinking

unlucky83 · 04/08/2013 22:29

Going/being in a foreign country ...and different values ...
In Egypt on an internal flight - on the tickets I became 'MRS DP surname' and our DD 'lost' my surname ...
DP's name is nowhere on my passport ...and I paid with a card in my name - I think they thought they were protecting my honour or something...(but it did worry me a bit - the discrepancy between the ticket and passport...)
This actually made me change my passport when it came up for renewable to include the 'Dr' thinking that might seem more 'acceptable' in countries like that in the future especially cos planning on going to a more strictly Muslim country in future (but it just appears on the reverse of the photo page -so was actually a bit pointless really...)

(Easy to forget how 'liberated' we are in this country - a long story but in Egypt I had to give a statement in the police station - the police thought it was side splitting hilarious that I -not DP - was looking after all our money especially because DP had to interrupt to ask me - a WOMAN - for some money so he could buy lunch for himself and DD... (they even called others officers into the office to tell them 'the joke')

GreenSkittles · 04/08/2013 22:30

You haqve to have the conversation with your OH. Tell him you want the baby to have your surname and how does he feel about that. Then you go from there - maybe a double barrelled, maybe a merged surname, or a flipped coin. But you have to talk to him.

I told my ex that ds would have my surname in case we split up - we were heading that way - as it would be simpler for me. He did have my name, and we did split up, so I'm glad I put my foot down!

Alisvolatpropiis · 04/08/2013 22:39

Snog

That is really rather odd.

PurpleGirly · 04/08/2013 23:43

I have not mentioned married/unmarked in the context of the past, only in the future. I was trying to rationalise why the OP's ILs would find it odd, and also said it was none of their business. What I find odd is that in the quest for equality women have gone completely the opposite - to what we have campaigned years to overcome. A baby takes two, therefore two should be named whether married or not, if circumstances mean it is a good solution. I find it really odd when women say that they find it bizarre that a child should be given it's father's name - why? Is the father not part of it's life? But that is my OPINION. E erroneous should have the right to choose and not be put down because of their choices, I am no less of a person because I am Mrs PurpleGirlY. Than if I was Ms, Miss or Dr.

PurpleGirly · 04/08/2013 23:44

Unmarried that should be! Not unmarked

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