How did you decided what your parents would be called as grandparents?
This baby isn't even close to entering the world and DP and I are already arguing over what our parents are going to be known as.
We had a big blow up this afternoon about it. My mother and MIL are sorted, MIL wants to be known as Grandma, my mother wants Nan/ny/na. Easy! The problem lies in what we want our fathers to be known as. DP wants his father to be Pa. "Grandma, Grandpa, its traditional. So your dad must be Pop, as your mum is Nan. Traditional."
The thing is, my father has for years and years said he wants to be a Pa. He and my mother divorced when I was younger, and he became a step-father to his partners 3 daughters. He's been their main & close father figure for the past 15-16 years, they are so close the daughters call him Dad. Which I have no problems with at all, I never have. I am very close to my step-sisters and step-mother. One of dad's step-daughters has had a baby, his now 15months or so. And he knows my father as Pa. Even though Dad's not technically his grandfather. I have no probs with that at all either, as I know I will still be giving Dad his first "real" grandchild. DP though thinks thats just plain wrong and weird for this little boy to call my father Pa as they are not related. No amount of explaining the situation has him understand it at all.
DP refuses to have FIL known as Pop, as "thats not traditional! He WILL be Pa". I have a Nan & Pop, and a Nan & Pa, so told him I've never known "traditional" and dont have a problem with having two Nans or two Pa's or a Nan & Pa or a Gran & Pop. I never got my two nans confused (LOL) growing up. But he wont budge. He got pretty annoyed at me tonight about it and snapped "Whatever just have it any way YOU want then!".
Idk, I'm so confused. I dont know how to work this out. I wouldn't even know how to approach my dad and say "FIL wants to be Pa, so I'm afraid your going to have to be Pop. DP doesnt care that your already known as Pa because the baby isn't even your real grandchild so you shouldn't have any problems with this."
Any outside thoughts? It's ok if you think I'm approaching this wrong and should agree with DP If you do think that though, any advice on how I can speak to my father about it?
And sorry this is so long!! Kudos if you get all the way through it
DD's grandparents chose what they wanted to be called. MIL is Nanna...and I'm still not totally sure what my parents want to be called as they've never actually said
i don't think there's anything wrong with having two Pa's. to avoid confusion you could always call them Pa [surname].
Huge 's We left the grandparents to decide. My Dad has decided he wants to be called "Grumps" until he's "old enough to be a Grandad" lol, my step- mum is "Nanna Ann", my Biological mum, MIL and FIL still cant decide what they want to be called "because they are not old enough" to be any of the traditional names so have been labeled "Gran" 's and "Grandpa". They've had 20months to decide and still haven't come up with anything so they can just suck it up. Lol
I would suggest making your DH tell your Dad he cant be "Pa" or ask him how you should do it, make him see it's not as easy as he's making it out to be. Would that make a difference or would he not really care?
Other than that hun I have no idea. He sounds like he's being a bit childish IMO. I hope you can sort something out.
When preg with DS1 my mum said she was going to be Nanna and Dad said Grandpa cool all good.
Mil and Fil were going to Oma and Opa (FIL is dutch) but a few weeks after DS1 born she decides she wants to be Nanna as a friend told her she should be grr and FIL decides grandpa!!! I wanted different from each other grrrr. MIL wants to be nanna first name where as I dont like kids using first names, I would be prefer nanna surname!!
My kids have Nanny, Nanny T, Granddad and Granddad Rabbi....the mil wanted to be called her nickname but i said no way, as i wanted that level of respect to be there iykwim
good luck with it all....dont let it be a big thing between you and your dh
I agree, don't let it be a big thing for you and DH. You may well find that your kids decide this for themselves anyway.
I call my parents, who DS sees regularly, granma and grandad. DS calls them "gee-gee" and "do-do". And DH's parents are "gee-gee bok-bok" and "do-do bok-bok" (the bok-bok is for the chickens at the place we were staying when we visited DH's family last year)
My parents wanted to be called OB1 and OB2. I will leave it to your imagination to figure out what the OB stands for... I was not impressed.
So anyway, the moral of this story is, you never quite know what you might end up with.
For a while there I had Oma and Opa (Oma died this year), Nanna and her longterm partner <firstname>, and my parents ended up Little Grandma and Grandpa without any planning. My partner's mother has picked her own title for herself and her husband, and his father hasn't picked one for him and his wife. We don't see them often enough for them to be called anything other than their firstnames, although I know their other grandchild uses their proper grandparent titles. We see grandma and grandpa quite a lot though - the DDs think Grandpa is the Best Thing In The Universe
I don't know if DD#1 sees her grandmother on my ex's side, I certainly never hear about it. Last time I checked my ex was very much estranged from his mother and stepfather, which does increase the available pool of grandparent titles ...
We are going through this too - DH's parents are already Nanny and Poppy, so they get to hang on to those. Maybe not "traditional" but I really want this baby to be close to its cousins, and part of that is calling the grandparents the same name.
The issue? My mum can't handle anything that makes any recognisable connection to the word grandmother. Nanna, Nanny, Gran, Grandma, they're all out. I think she might be pushing for "Ma" but I think it's silly.
I don't know whether that really contributes much! I would tell your DH to stick "tradition" as it's a flimsy tradition anyway.
My mum and dad were already Nan and Pop to my sisters kids so theirs stayed the same - can't have different grandkids calling them different stuff. Even though i am a let them shoos their own I have to say I really disliked my ILs wanting to be called the same thing as my parents (cos I really don't like them) so we insisted on Grandma and Grandpa so DD would know the difference. She has two Nans though that are DH's Nans too though.
Your step sister's little guy is related to your dad, families are made of always love not always blood. DH is my family and we aren't blood relatives. DF is your family and he isn't your blood relative. Yes I agree he's being silly. sweetie. Try not to get stressed over it now. It will often sought itself out without you realising. Perhaps you could bring up some cool grandparent names in a discussion one day and they (the ILs) take a fancy to them all by themselves.
I do however get why your DH is senitmental about those names. When I was a little girl I was quite sentimental about my Nana and Pop and I got quite agressive when DHs parents wanted to be that to my little girl - not that I'm saying DH doesn't like your family, but i get why he's hanging onto his train of thought too.
we have a Nanny and Pop (DH parents) and a Nangee and Gramps (my parents). My mum wanted to be called nanny as well but she decided it was going to be too confusing for our DD so she decided on Nan the G for the start of her surname. My Step dad always wanted to be a Gramps.
I think it's best to let them decide what they want to be know as. And FWIW I totally get that your Dad is already Pa, my families a bit like yours. My sister had a different father to me (he died when she was young) and her kids call my Dad Pa. Then we both have a step-father, who our kids call Grand-dad. My Dad's partner didn't want a grand parent name so she goes by her name. Our mum died when my sister was pregnant with her first and wanted to be known as Nona, so that's how we refer to her. DH's mum is Mimi, her husband is Opa. DH's dad is Grandpa and his wife is Grammie. You confused yet?
I guess I'm just trying to make the point that there is no normal or traditional these days. Becoming a grandparent is a very special thing (whether it is through blood or love), I think it is only fair to let them as individuals decide how they want their grandchild to relate to them.
Hi, I think bubs will decide - they usually have a mind of their owns anyway! I think it is unfair of your partner to want your dad to change his name....but I really dont think it will happen even if you try to call him poppy it is likely your child will call him what his other grandchild calls him. Got to have the same name for all grandkiddies I think.
Really, I agree with everyone else it isnt really up to you to chose but the actual grandparents. I remember when my mum first become a grandmother and she told everyone she would be known as Sharyn not nanna or grandma (as she was too young - at 39 - which could have been true) - but the moment my neice arrived and mum was holding her her first words were 'nannas here bubba' - very cute.
You probably couldnt get many more grandparents than my family but my DS has 7 nannas and one aunty who thinks she is a nanna who refers to herself as grammy lol! All are referred to as nanna ......! Same with poppys - although only 4 of those! And I have found my neices/nephews never get them confused! Go figure....they will be talking and saying nanna said such and such and I will be like what nanna and they respond with nanna such and such silly! lol
Both of the grandads wanted to be grandad.The Nan's didn't mind.
DS learnt to say Nan really quickly so my kids have 2 Nans and 2 grandads. They know exactly who is who all of the time and have no worries with any of it.
It can get confusing to others though.
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how to decide what to call grandparents
If you do think that though, any advice on how I can speak to my father about it?
's We left the grandparents to decide. My Dad has decided he wants to be called "Grumps" until he's "old enough to be a Grandad" lol, my step- mum is "Nanna Ann", my Biological mum, MIL and FIL still cant decide what they want to be called "because they are not old enough" to be any of the traditional names
so have been labeled "Gran" 's and "Grandpa". They've had 20months to decide and still haven't come up with anything so they can just suck it up. Lol
marcellus, your DS is a crack-up!
(cos I really don't like them) so we insisted on Grandma and Grandpa so DD would know the difference. She has two Nans though that are DH's Nans too though.
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