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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

This is weird right?

133 replies

TheTravellingLemon · 17/12/2015 15:30

I found out this week that my ex has just had a little girl and given her my name. Is this weird? It's weird right?

We split up a good 10 years ago and have since each gone on to get married and have our own families but it's still weird isn't it? We were together for 7 years and we were very serious with an awfully messy breakup.

To be clear, before I get flamed for some unforeseen reason, I don't care, it's just odd. Isn't it? Or AIBU?

OP posts:
RudeElf · 17/12/2015 16:04

When i started seeing my EXp he had just finished a relationship with another woman. Once during our relationship i found out he had spent the evening with her that he claimed was purely a catch up (that he instigated) Hmm anyway sometime later, i'm fuzzy on the timeline tbh but it was months rather than years, she had a daughter and named it his name but with an 'a' on the end. Like carl becoming carla. It was weird. I did suspect. He was a bit shifty but i put it down to being freaked out she had basically used his name. I've seen the baby in a photo but EXP, the woman and her partner all shared the same colouring so it was difficult to tell from one photo if there was a likeness. I still suspect. Either way in think its odd.

CherryPits · 17/12/2015 16:05

No its not weird. It is obviously a name they both like and he maybe doesn't associate it with you, because there is now enough water under the bridge, and unless he was pining for you, blokes are sometimes quite good at moving on better than women are.

notmynameohno · 17/12/2015 16:05

Definitely weird unless it's something like the baby's grandmother's name.

thegiddylimit · 17/12/2015 16:05

Yes that is weird. I like the name of an exgf of my brother but I thought naming DD using that (not very common) name would be weird for DB.

Having said that DS's middle name is the same as an exbf of mine. However it is also the name of my brother and father (and a common name) so no-one in their right mind would think we'd named DS after the exbf.

Agree if it's Sarah it's slightly less weird than if it's Talullah. Although if I discovered any of my exbfs had a daughter called my (common) name that would still feel strange so I get where you are coming from. And I did not have any relationship beyond 2 years before DH. A 7 year relationship with a bad breakup, even if it is 10 years later is weird. Were you very young when you were together?

toffeeboffin · 17/12/2015 16:05

Yes it's weird.

Years ago in another life I was seeing a guy, very briefly for maybe a month.
Didn't realize he was already had a partner who was pregnant. He gave the baby my name. Odd.

Werksallhourz · 17/12/2015 16:08

I think it is weird. To be honest, if I were you, I'd find it unsettling.

Names have associations for people -- it's the reason why very few people in Britain will ever call their son Ebenezer. There are some lovely names I would never use for my DC because they were the names of certain bullies I went to school with, and those names instantaneously conjure up those connections in my mind.

So I would question why an ex-boyfriend would make such a decision because, as soon as the name was even mentioned, the first thing he would have thought was that he once had a serious girlfriend/fiancée by that name. Who would want to call their child by a name that had such associations?

But then, something similar happened to me about twenty three years ago. A friend of my then boyfriend had a child and gave the child the same name as me. My name is not particularly usual, so it was obvious that he had got the name from knowing me, and, at the time, I just thought it was sweet.

Then, about ten years ago, I bumped into this friend in a pub. We started chatting and he told me straight: "I named my daughter after you."

I am afraid it made me feel quite uncomfortable when he said that. After all that time (he probably hadn't seen me for about thirteen years), and over a decade of his daughter having the name, he still had a strong association between me and that name -- enough to mention it when I bumped into him. It creeped me out a bit, to be honest, as though there was something I didn't know.

But I tell you what is really creepy ... ex-boyfriends using your name or your phone number as new computer passwords nearly a decade after you originally split up.

TheRadiantAerynSun · 17/12/2015 16:11

I named my DS the male form of an ex-gf's name (it's one letter different but the same in the usual shortening.) We weren't together long and to be honest it didn't occur to me until a couple of years after.

I did feel slightly weird about it and would probably die of embarrassment if I ever bumped into her and had to introduce him Blush

SoWhite · 17/12/2015 16:12

If it is an unusual name, weird. If it is just a name, that he has known many of in his life, not weird.

ricketytickety · 17/12/2015 16:14

weird but complimentary in a way as he must have fond memories. But still weird. What would his partner say if she knew???!! How does she not know? Has he not told her about his 7 year relationship with you?

SaucyJack · 17/12/2015 16:17

Of course it's weird'

How many exes does he have that he can't find a name for his DD that one of them doesn't share?

ShebaShimmyShake · 17/12/2015 16:20

My son has the same name as my ex. We just really like the name. Ex and I split up 14 years ago so I don't think it's an issue.

MrsDeVere · 17/12/2015 16:21

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

PalcumTowder · 17/12/2015 16:26

What's weird is I have read this exact OP before. So maybe it is more common than you think...

Floggingmolly · 17/12/2015 16:29

Of course it's weird... Can't believe all the posters desperate to tell you how absolutely fine they'd be with this Hmm
I discounted one of my all time favourite names for the ds's because it was the name of an utter arsehole of a boss I'd worked for 10 years earlier.
Such is the strong association names have for most people.
That bollix spoilt it for me.

InTheBox · 17/12/2015 16:30

I agree it's weird depending on the type of name. If it's like Sarah then he mightn't have given it a second thought versus something more unusual / peculiar.

LaurieLemons · 17/12/2015 16:30

Definitely weird. I actually love one of my exes names and we were only together a few months but I just thought no that would be too weird! He must have just really liked the name and thought fuck it, or he's secretly obsessed with you Grin

Original poster
TheTravellingLemon · 17/12/2015 16:32

She definitely knows who I am. Like a PP said, it was an important relationship for both of us. He definitely would have mentioned me and she would have seen pictures of me etc. I was at a lot of big family occasions for 7 years and am in lots of wedding photos/videos etc.

OP posts:
FattySantaRobin · 17/12/2015 16:34

It's definitely weird. It would be like me naming my DS2 the name of my ex from 10 years ago. made even weirder by the fact my ex from 10 years ago is DPs best mate!

Birdie85 · 17/12/2015 16:34

It's definitely a bit weird. I used to really like my ex's name but couldn't even consider it for my DS as I knew I'd relate it to my ex all the time. Hmm

Just like if I ever have a daughter I wouldn't ever consider calling her Louise as that bitch made my school years a fucking nightmare and I'd cringe every time I said it. I'm still funny even with 'nice' Louises now because of that cow.

contrary13 · 17/12/2015 16:36

When my grandfather had a baby daughter with his second wife - after a total of six sons (three with my grandmother, three with the second wife) and having been separated from my grandmother for a number of years, he wrote to her to inform her that he'd named the new baby after my grandmother's mother. Which is all fine and dandy.

If he'd ever known the woman.

She died when my grandmother was a child, had never met my grandfather, and he knew that had he and my grandmother (well, just him, really, given how these things are genetically decided!) produced a daughter, she would have been given the name of her grandmother. I always put it down to him being an individual who always needed to be in control of everything, even the woman who walked away from him almost twelve years earlier (and am very grateful that my grandmother escaped, built a new life for herself and her three boys, and that his subsequent children all turned out to be relatively normal and very lovely individuals!).

NeedsAMousekatool · 17/12/2015 16:41

Weird. Definitely. I love a certain girls name but discounted it out of hand because it's DH's ex's name. I discounted another name that he liked because it was very similar to his other significant ex and she is evil

MySordidCakeSecret · 17/12/2015 16:46

def. wierd. I mean imaging the conversation, surely when his new partner suggested the name anyone else would have said oh no that's my exes name! end of convo..

Spilose · 17/12/2015 16:47

It's not that weird. LO almost ended up with the same same as an ex of mine. It was the same name as a relative of OH who had died tragically young. It didn't occur to me that it would be weird at all, nor did it cross my mind if my ex where to find out and form an opinion on it

caitlinohara · 17/12/2015 16:48

Yes of course it's weird. I love the name Heather and would have chosen it for a daughter but it's dh's ex's name so he vetoed it.

But there again, perhaps it's his way of showing the world that he is over you.

It's still weird though.

NerrSnerr · 17/12/2015 16:49

My first choice for a second girls name is the name of my husband's first girlfriend. My daughter has the feminine equivalent of one of my university boyfriends.