NEED TO KNOW
A woman hides her unborn son’s name to prevent her sister from stealing it, as she allegedly did once before
Her sister insists she’s being unfair, while their brother jokes, “Nobody should tell the baby name thief the name they’ve chosen”
Despite pressure from family, the woman stands firm — and turns to Reddit to ask if she’s in the wrong
A woman seeks support from the Reddit community after a tense family situation leaves her questioning her decision to keep her unborn son’s name a secret.
She explains in her post that she is pregnant with her first child, while her sister is expecting her second. “This is her second child and my first,” she explains, adding, “We’re both having boys.”
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Stock photo of two pregnant women
While them being pregnant at the same time is fine, the real issue goes back three years, when her sister found herself at the center of a dramatic baby name controversy.
Back then, her sister and her sister’s best friend were both expecting daughters, and things took a turn after her niece’s name was revealed. “My sister complained for 8 months that they didn’t have any idea what to name my niece, and then all of a sudden she had a name right before she gave birth,” the woman shares.
Once the name was announced, the celebration didn’t last. “The BFF said that was the name she’d chosen for her baby girl and my sister used the same first and middle name for my niece and she couldn’t believe she’d do that.”
The fallout was swift, but the woman’s sister defended herself with a blunt response. “My sister said it’s first come first serve and she needed a name badly,” she writes. “That her BFF had time to find another name.”
Now that she and her sister are both expecting again, with her sister due just a few weeks earlier, the woman says she’s being cautious. “I don’t want her to do the same thing to me,” she confides.
To avoid a repeat of the past, the woman and her husband have decided to keep everything private. “Nobody knows we’re having a boy except me and my husband and we plan to keep it that way,” she reveals.
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But her sister hasn’t taken the hint, repeatedly asking what name they’ve chosen. “She has asked what our boy name is and as an afterthought she asked for our girl name too when she realized I knew what she was getting at,” the woman writes.
Not wanting to reveal anything, she decides to hold her ground. “I refused to tell her,” she says simply.
That didn’t stop her sister from pressing the issue. “She tried to whine about name sharing being the fun part of pregnancy,” the poster shares. Trying to deflect, she even makes up fake names. “I made up a couple of names on the spot to tell her and she saw through it,” she says.
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Stock photo of a pregnant woman coming up with baby names
But even after getting caught in the fib, the woman doesn’t waver. “She told me to just tell her the name and I said no again,” she explains.
The tension didn’t stay private for long. The sister brought it up in front of the whole family, hoping to pressure her into revealing the name. Instead, their brother lightens the moment with a cutting joke. “Nobody should tell the baby name thief the name they’ve chosen,” he quips.
That remark hits a nerve and makes the situation more uncomfortable. “My sister got upset and asked if that’s why I wouldn’t tell her,” the woman recalls.
Feeling accused, her sister insists she’s being treated unfairly. “She told me I was holding something against her that she never did to me,” the woman writes.
Their mother tries to step in with a compromise, but the woman doesn’t budge. “Mom asked why I couldn’t just share the name and everyone would know my husband and I chose it first if my sister used it,” she shares. “But I still said no.”
Now the woman is left questioning whether she’s doing the right thing. By keeping the name between just herself and her husband, she’s trying to avoid history repeating itself. “I don’t want her to do the same thing to me,” she says.
Read the original article on People
