To feel worried about what nursery staff will think?

[birbfbb]

I have an almost 2 year old. Her dad sees her but has limited involvement. He recently said he wanted to be on the birth certificate and I was really pleased about this as I felt it was a great shame for her not to have her dad on it. I know the risk with him being on there etc but I am able to defend myself should he apply to court etc and have the means to do that. I am not worried about the rights it would give him. I really do want him on there.

I booked an appointment for it and he didn’t turn up. I am really gutted because soon I will have to give the nursery the birth certificate and her dad’s space will be blank.

I feel like the nursery will judge me even though I would have had him on there the first time if he had wanted to be on it. He said at the time he didn’t want to be on there. I feel like they will see DD differently and she will be judged. I’m just really stressed about it and almost don’t want to claim the free hours so I won’t have to show them the certificate.

Honestly, nursery wont even raise an eyebrow. They've seen everything. They know families come in all different shapes and sizes. They wont judge you and they wont treat your child differently.

Nursery really really won’t care.

The nursery would have seen loads of birth certificates without the dad on.
Why on earth would they treat a 2 year old differently because of not having a dad named on their birth certificate?? Why would anyone do that?

Honestly I really wouldn’t give it a second thought.

Nursery staff see children from all sorts of homes, this is an absolute non issue to them. They will only photocopy it, it's doubtful that they will even notice. Give yourself a break!

They won't even notice, it's just an admin task for them.

Nursery really won't mind or judge.
As only are in the birth certificate only you have parental responsibility so legally you can make all the decisions for your child without the dad being involved. This makes your life much more simple particularly if you want to apply for passports or go abroad.

They will have seen a lot worse! Main questions from them might be around safe guarding and if dad is allowed to pick up / drop off etc. Who is approved to get them in emergencies etc.

Honestly I think you’re better off not having him on the BC! You can always show nursery their passport instead if she has one? I’ve always been asked for that and no one has ever mentioned the birth certificate which I don’t think I even have copies of. But they will not care and will have seen it many, many times before.

I’ve handled hundreds, maybe thousands of birth certificates, at work and tbh I’ve probably not even noticed. You want the full name and dob, no reason to scan down further. If I did I wouldn’t blink, it’s not unusual and there’s so many different reasons for it.

Honestly I'm a childminder and see lots of birth certs, I absolutely wouldn't judge!

However they probably already know since you would have given details of those who have parental responsibility when she joined.

You are massively overthinking this. No one will care. Personally I think it's very sensible in certain circumstances for a father not to be on the birth certificate...so it's not something I'd negatively judge at all

The only person likely to see it is the one doing the admin. The staff in the rooms are not likely to see her birth certificate. Even if they did they wouldn’t care.

Only the administrator will see it, and as PPs have said, they may not even notice. But you'll want to discuss your child's family situation with the staff anyway so they know how to handle discussions about mummies and daddies.

Unless things have changed in the last 20 years, the actual birth certificate doesn't have details other than name, sex, date and place of birth. I've just checked DD's birth certificate.
The bit with mothers name etc. is a a copy of the entry in the register. Nursery don't need that.

I work in a nursery. We see every sort of family dynamic and honestly, I nor anyone else I know that works with children would bay an eyelid at this. I wouldn't judge a child for this at all.

Honestly I wouldn't even give it a second thought. My DH (we weren't married then) was out of the country when I had our daughter so his name wasn't on the certificate. We only got round to adding his names on when she was 9! No one ever mentioned anything or treated her any different (and I didn't explain either), so don't worry at all

@InTheRainOnATrain thanks I didn’t think of this! I will do that instead, haven’t got her passport yet, reckon I could get it by September? Maybe too soon?

@guivdsfhub ok thank you that does make me feel better x

They haven't got time to be thinking who is or is not on the birth certificate.

yabu to think nursery will treat him differently.

if it helps I had to tell school when my Ds started school his dad was a risk to him if he turned up at school . I didn’t expect him to be treated differently.

i can tell you a blank space on the b. Cert won’t even register .

low involvement tbh life is easier if he isn’t on it .

Does he pay child support ? I suspect if not he is under the illusion he doesn’t have to pay if not on bc?

@MintTwirl will they not tell them though?

one of my worries is that they will think he doesn’t see her at all when he actually does so she does have contact with him

I'm in this line of work but not on admin side. Honestly it wouldn't even cross our minds. The only time it's been noted was for a Father's day project. We looked at the class list and agreed if any child had no contact details for Dad then we wouldn't do the project.

@birbfbb

one of my worries is that they will think he doesn’t see her at all when he actually does so she does have contact with him

Is he number 2 on the emergency contact list?

My dh has been military 22 years. My mum was always number 2 on our kids list and my mum was always number 1 for mine.

I felt daft putting my mum at my age but its amount who can help in an emergency.

You don’t want them to judge you as a lone parent, you poor thing, we are such dreadful people, oh the shame … 🙄