'AITA for 'ruining' my husband's family's tradition because I think it's stupid?'
"AITA for not following my husband's family tradition?"
After_Ad3961 writes:
My (28F) husband (29M) comes from a very traditional family. While we disagree with his family on many things, it has never really been an issue until now. I am currently eight months pregnant, and my husband and I couldn't be happier, as we've been trying for a while.
Since I first found out I was pregnant, we've been discussing names for our child. In my husband's family, tradition dictates that the child be named after his grandfather. Basically, first-born men in his family only have one of two names: James or Henry. My husband's grandfather was James, so his name is James too. My husband's father is called Henry, so our child is expected to be named Henry. And so on and so forth.
However, my husband and I didn’t really want to name our child Henry. Although it's a beautiful way to honor family members, we wanted our child to have a name that felt personal and unique to him. So we chose another name and decided to wait until after the birth to reveal it to everyone.
This week, my mother-in-law came to visit us and help set up for the baby. She brought us some presents, including a bunch of clothes she had hand-embroidered with the name Henry. I thanked her and told her it was nice, but reminded her that we wouldn’t be naming our child Henry, as we had already mentioned before.
She started insisting, saying that it was tradition and that it had to be that way. I explained that we preferred to choose our child’s name and suggested that Henry could be his middle name instead.
She immediately went to my husband and started saying things like, "You're not going to let her do that to our family," making it very dramatic and claiming that I was breaking a tradition that supposedly went back hundreds of years (honestly, I’m not sure about that).
My husband tried to explain that we had both agreed on the name and our reasons for choosing it, but she wouldn’t listen. She even suggested that we name him Henry on paper as his legal name but call him something else, but I felt that would be confusing for him and told her we would name him what we had chosen.
She kept begging my husband, saying that I was ruining the family tradition. At one point, I lost it (partially due to hormones, I think) and told her that this was our child, so we would do what we wanted and didn’t have to follow a stupid tradition.
She stormed out, and since then, my husband has been receiving texts from his father and sister accusing me of making his mother feel terrible, along with other things I don’t really remember.
I understand the importance of tradition—it can be beautiful—but I also feel that it shouldn’t be an obligation and that it’s okay to change things. We won’t change our baby’s name because we’re truly set on it, but were we wrong for not following the tradition? I’m not entirely sure and honestly just mentally exhausted by all this drama.
OP responded to some comments.
NojaysCita says:
I will never understand this. What if your family had the same tradition? Who wins? NTA in the slightest. Congratulations on your pregnancy and give your sweet boy whatever name you and your husband choose!
OP responded:
Honestly no idea, and it's so confusing and unpractical too! Thank you so much!
SafeWord9999 says:
Your husband needs to snap back and say THIS IS MY DECISION instead of allowing them to blames you.
OP responded:
He's been trying to, but his family won't listen and they're convinced that I manipulated him or something. But at least he's standing up to them so there's at least that.