Wife refuses to give unborn son her husband's surname and his family are 'furious'

A mum-to-be has sparked a debate after revealing she's refused to give her unborn son her husband's surname - despite previously making an agreement with her husband that their future kids would take it.

The 26-year-old woman posted her dilemma on Reddit to the "Am I A**hole" subreddit and shared how she and her 31-year-old husband were expecting a baby boy together.

"When I married my husband I kept my maiden name which he was perfectly okay with," she explained and added how they discussed this three years ago and "agreed that any future kids we have will automatically take his last name."

She also noted that her husband's family considers this to be a "huge deal" and "decided to keep to just go with it."

"But recently I started thinking about it a lot more and figured that it would be unfair for my unborn son to take my husband's family name and not mine. I talked to my family and they said my husband and inlaws are ridiculous to push this on me without a compromise expecting I go with it."

Sign up to our free Indy100 weekly newsletter

So the woman then went home to tell her husband that she changed her mind about the agreement they made and expressed how she wanted their son to either have both of their last names combined or just her last name.

"He was confused saying we had an agreement and then asked what was the cause of this sudden change of mind. I told him and he said I can't just do that and called me selfish when I pointed out that I'm the mother I get a say too."

She continued: "We went back and forth on this and he said no way he and his family will let me do this to his son, as if my last name is a disgrace. We had a fight and we stopped talking after this. He said that I broke and violated my part of the deal and I should just 'deal' with it now but I won't accept it."

iStock/Getty Images

The woman then asked Redditors to tell her whether or not she is in the wrong in this particular situation - and they were forthcoming with their thoughts.

Many felt both expectant parents were at fault for getting their respective families involved.

One person wrote: "What's with people on this sub lately talking to their biological family about their marital issues and not first conversing with their spouse?"

"…Am i the only one seeing the MY unborn son…and not OUR unborn son in the title…??" another person asked.

Someone else added: "I thought the exact same thing. It’s their child, not their families. Her family doesn’t get a say and neither does his."

"Both of them are guilty of letting their family influence their decisions here. Leave Mom and Dad out of it, you’re adults," a fourth person replied.

While others criticised the woman for breaking her promise to her husband.

One person wrote: "You literally mention that you’ve had this promise at least since you were married and have both discussed and agreed! He is right to be upset knowing you have already agreed and it’s a big deal to his family, which you are aware of, in my opinion YTA..."

"I agree YTA for all the above points, plus I notice how when having a change of mind, OP speaks to HER family then comes home with an ultimatum! Why not of just speak with the husband instead?" another person said.

Someone else added: "That’s on her. He was being upfront with how important it was to him. She was being flippant, not really thinking about it. But she made the deal."

However, the woman had some defenders in the comments, who noted how people can change their minds on these kinds of matters.

One person wrote: "But people are allowed to change their mind. That’s the thing, we all continue to evolve. OP offered the compromise that it be a hyphenated last name. Seems fair."

"This is something that needs agreement, though. It sounds like she just went along with it because the inlaws were pressuring her, and now she's reconsidering. I don't think anyone is TA here, she's changed her mind and something as big as her child's last name shouldn't be boiled down to a 'you promised!!' argument," another person said.

Someone else added: "People change their minds all the time. She was 23 and he was 28 when they had this discussion, and I'm pretty confident she wasn't thinking too hard about the realities of having a baby at that time."

All in All, the AITA subreddit concluded that the woman was the a**hole in this scenario - let's hope this surname disagreement gets sorted before the baby is born and that their isn't too much family drama.

Enjoyed this article? Then click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help it rise through the indy100 rankings and have your say in our news democracy.