A mum-to-be claims to have been left devastated after her mother-in-law told her whole family the full name of her unborn child without getting permission to do so first.
When it comes to big life events – such as getting engaged or having a baby – these are moments a couple will want to share with the world on their own terms.
But it seems this can be a tricky thing to do as once word gets out about your special news it can be difficult to keep control of the secret.
This is the lesson one mum-to-be claims to have learned the hard way recently after telling a few select family members the name she and her husband had chosen for their unborn baby.
The child is to be their third and final addition to their family and they’d picked a sweet moniker that would honour a lost loved one.
They were planning on waiting for the baby to be born to announce his name, but it seems the husband’s mother had other ideas.
Writing in an anonymous post on Netmums, the expectant mum shared her devastation after her mother-in-law announced her unborn child’s name without her permission.
She asked fellow users for some advice on how to handle her situation and admitted she was now considering changing her son’s name, despite the significant meaning it held.
The post reads: “I’m currently pregnant with our third and final baby, me and my husband had decided on our son’s name and we have told close family what we are calling him. We also decided on his middle name to be my grandad’s name because when baby is due it will be a year since he passed away.
“I decided I didn’t want to announce the middle name until baby was born.
“Anyway, long story short my husband was watching the football with his family at the weekend and ended up having a few drinks and mentioning the middle name when I wasn’t there, when I came to collect him my mother-in-law asked me if that was the name and I said we aren’t 100% decided yet as I was shocked she had been told.
“Later that evening she went to a party for a family friend who passed away who also has the same name as my grandad and my MIL decided to write a paragraph in the book on our behalf because we weren’t there (we didn’t ask her to or know about it she just said she thought it was a ‘nice gesture’) which is fair enough but she wrote love from all of our names and then the baby’s first AND middle name!”
The woman added: “I’m so annoyed not only because she announced the baby’s name in a book that pretty much all of my husband’s side of the family will see but because she made it look like we’ve chosen his middle name after her friend who’s passed away and not my grandad.
“This might sound silly, I know I’m probably just being hormonal but I can’t stop crying, I’ve told her I’m upset she would do that but now I’m considering changing his name altogether and keeping it a secret from everyone else because it’s upset me so much. I hadn’t even told my own mum what the middle name was and I feel like everyone knows.”
A number of people replied, with some suggesting the mum stick with the baby’s name as it holds sentimentality.
One person wrote: “So she voluntarily told you that she wrote the baby’s name in the book after you told her that the name hasn’t even been confirmed yet ?? That’s kinda messed up of her to do that when the baby isn’t even born.”