Godmother stole my son's name

[MagsMaggie]

My baby son's Godmother recently had a baby boy and called her son the EXACT same name as my son, her Godson. She did not even ask us before stealing his name. I know that my son does not "own a name" however we did not use another name as she asked us not to. The name we gave our son is unusual. She had not heard of the name until we named our son. What type of Godmother names her newborn son after her baby godson? Our sons are so close in age. She even used the exact same spelling. My partner and I are angry. Are we being unreasonable? I feel like she has ended her relationship with us by doing this

Completely overreacting.

Can you not see the contradiction in acknowledging you don't own the name whilst accusing her of theft in the same breath?

Give your head a wobble.

Annoying and weird. She's definitely not a friend. A true friend would have discussed it with you first. I'd change my son's name back to the one I first chose, then get on with my life without her in it.

She stole your child's name? Are you insane? There are people out there is this world dying with cancer or starvation l, people that can't afford to pay their bills, children committing suicide and yet you ruin a relationship over a name that doesn't belong to you, it belongs to nobody, get a grip

TBH life is short and too short to worry about this! Unless you have an extremely unusual name (and even then) Someone will be at School,Cubs wherever and have it! My friend had a baby and called him the same name as my DS.I was quite flattered .I would just enjoy your friendship and just say Big Larry little Larry or whatever

I’d be pissed too.

how olds your son? Would it be possible to change his name back to the one you originally loved but didn’t use cos of her? I’m petty so I think that’s what I’d do and leave his current name as a middle?

I wonder if those same posters would name their child the same name as a friend. Honestly.

'He will meet others with the same name' yeah no shit, it's different when it's a friend of the parents that knew you rname and still chose the same name for theirs.

Really odd for her to do that considering she asked you not to use another name. I would try and question her about it and she what she has to say. But not in a way you'll fall out.

She's also going to be the one that looks like an idiot. As if it is really that rare. Your child was born first and people will know she copied it.

People like that need to grow up.

People on MN always say "you don't own a name" (the baby name equivalent of the cool wives) but I think most people I know IRL would be annoyed. She had the audacity to ask you not to use a name and then stole your other name? She's a cheeky bitch and I wouldn't want to be friends anymore after this.

Well it’s done now and she’s clearly batshit so I guess you won’t be hanging out together much more and so the problem of the boys growing up together goes away.

I’m interested in why her baby’s father is not also being blamed here?

People are allowed to complain, despite other things happening in the world. Such a weird thing to say. Get a grip.

@Boomchuck Single White Female (very old movie; so showing my age a little —lot— )

stealing. What type of Godmother. angry. ended her relationship with us.

Gosh, this all sounds like very hard work.

Maybe her plan was to end the relationship?

Sorry, but I'm with the 'get a grip' replies.

Why on earth did you choose a different name to the one you originally loved, just to satisfy her? And then you went on to make her Godmother? That's some hold she seems to have over you!

In your situation now, I would have to call her out and ask "why did you not use the name you asked me not to call my son", see what she says. I can't be doing with people like her though and would probably distance myself going forwards.

I personally wouldn't be bothered by this - our 2 DCs have the same names as our closest friends 2 DCs - we each picked one of them first and the other copied - they are quite common names though!

However, in light of your update about this being part of a bigger issue, maybe it's time to reevaluate the friendship.

People do not own names and to ruin relationships over it is just petty.

Brilliant 🤣

Bloody hell, did you get out of the wrong side of the bed? So unless someone is starving or has cancer they are insane for complaining about anything? That's MN fucked then.

Until I read your most recent update, I would have said this is not worth cutting her off over and you just need to have a chat with her about it and say something like "I thought you were going to call him X? After all, you did ask us not to use it ourselves" and then if she says something like "I liked Y better", I'd just be like "well it is a great name, just thought you'd be bothered by us both using the same name since you were so insistent that we didn't use the original name". You do need to have that conversation with her or it'll drive you nuts.

However in the update where you've said there's been other jealous behaviour, I'd cut her out for that. Still have the conversation above as I think it'll be interesting to hear how she explains this one, but life is too short to deal with what I assume is probably manipulative behaviour from jealous "friends". I cut out my bf years ago for similar reasons - I realised one day that was subtly trying to direct my life and encouraging me to make decisions that benefitted her and not me so that her life was comparatively better and I just realised one day that she was making me very miserable.

Its called putting things in perspective, life is way to short for petty rubbish and as for the drip feed.....

I'd be cross. She asked you not to use the name you wanted and now she's ignored that one and gone for the rare name you chose.

I'm not sure what I'd do about it TBH. I'd have to say something.

Could you be bothered with years of “Marcus-my Marcus I mean- did blah blah” oh “I wonder where Marcus is?” “Your Marcus or my Marcus?” etc etc though. Life’s too short.

Also I think that the kicker here is her knowing that using the same name was bad and specifically asking OP not to use a particular one. That elevates it above normal “oh well, what can you do?” annoyance levels.

My Dad’s cousin copied my quite unusual name and spelling but they didn’t really know each other and certainly had never discussed names together, so it was fair game really. Different scenario here.

Not at all. It is a possibility and you must know that. Someone wants an argument. Power trip. Perhaps you are a narc too

I said myself that I do not own a name but it is a rare name that "millions" of people do not have. I have only met 2 people with this name, my son and her son. I am unhappy that she asked me not to name our son our OG choice so she could use it. We respected that and picked this rare name instead because of her. Then she decided to use our son's name instead of the name she asked us not to use as she wanted it

Yes, she’s super weird. I’d try to see it as a funny story to tell my child when older. When conversing with Crazy Godmother in future i would jokingly refer to her son as “Unique Name the II”. If she objects then she can explain her whole thought process.

I know some who did this too and still think it's weird even though the kids are in their teens now. They were godparents to "Balonz" and then named their second daughter Balonz too a couple of years later. It's not an unusual name but there's no family connections or similar reason for using it, the family of Balonz1 had no idea it was going to be used, and both families are part of a big group of friends so the kids are forever referred to as "Balonz Surname1" and "Balonz Surname2".