changing my sons name for religious reasons

[MummyLau]

Hi, my son is almost 22 months, his name is kaydon. I chose this name because i thought it was arabic! the books say it is! but i later found out that it isnt! my husband is muslim, and i am a muslim convert. We are now thinking to change his name to kadir, because it sounds similar and its a muslim name. does anyone think this'll be a problem???? is it a weird thing to do??? will it confuse him?????

As I am led to believe you can use any name you like as a Muslim unless it is offensive or is specifically connected to another religion, e.g the name of a Hindu God for instance. I personally think it would be confusing to change his name now and you obviously liked the name. Kaydon is an unconventional name for a Muslim but definitely not forbidden.

My DH wanted to do the same, for exactly the opposite reasons. I disagreed vehemently, we had HUGE rows about it, but I'm holing firm. DS knows his name, introrduces himself and answers to it. Perhaps we oughtn't to have chosen such an ethnic name, but we did... we will change our family surname instead.

Your son is half your genes, and your family are not muslim, so it's easily understandable by anyone with sense that he is a 'product of 2 cultures' as it were. Both heritages worth celebrating and maintaining for his own sense of identity.

It's not like you called him George, or William or Harry - traditional 'Christian' names. Your DH didn't object to it at the time, so it's not like it ought to go against anyone's grain (and it's not their business either..)

It's a highly individual name, and a really lovely one in fact! If the book said it had roots in Arabic, it may have, but obscure ones. You both were doing what you thought was right at the time.

'God knows your intentions'

Please don't confuse the lad.

Sorry but personally I think 22 months is a bit late for your ds to have a whole new name when presumably he is aready responding to his first name and probably trying to say it. Wouldn't it be difficult for you to remember to call him his new name?

Are you abolutely sure that Kaydon (or similar sounding) isn't in use as an Islamic name anywhere in the Islamic world?

Could you give him an extra middle name or hyphenate Kaydon (e.g. Kaydon-Ali) to make it more Islamic?

i am muslim and as far as i am aware the word kayd means a leader or commander in arabic, so im sure kaydon is a grammatical varient of the word but i dont speak arabic so not 100%. my son is called zaydan which is a varient of the name zayd which sounds very similar to your sons. and as the person above correctly pointed out you dont have to have an arabic name just because you are muslim many muslims have persian, turkish etc names.

thank you ladies for helping me out with this! when i was about to give birth to kaydon, i chose the name and didnt give my husband any rights with this because he was not interested when pregnant. Thank god he has changed massively to be a great dad! so i was considering changing his name because of the massive turn around. But as most of you have said, i dont want to confuse him. Now my husband wants to call him abdul kadir! instead of kaydon! i said forget it!! hes staying kaydon then!! we havent spoke of it since!! i think i'll leave it as it is.

but i do like the double barrel idea! i'll suggest this! then he'll look both ethnics!! i'll actually even suggest ali coz this is his dads surname! hmmmmm..... i'll let you know about this!

My DH is Muslim and I am Catholic, our DS has a first name which is not a muslim name but his middle name is a muslim name, Me and my side of the family and my friends call him by his first name and my DH's family call him by his middle name. I know it might sound confusing but he answers to both names but theyboth begin with the same letter and sound sound similar. Maybe you could do this with Kaydon/Kadir. It works for us.