Whose name does the baby get if not married?

My boyfriend and I are expecting our first child together. We found out we’re having a son. The baby carrying his family name is extremely important to him. He has a lot of pride around passing down his family name. He also wants to name our child’s middle name after his grandfather.

This pregnancy is unplanned and we’ve talked about marriage being part of our plan. However, we’re not married now and I am having a hard time with the idea of the baby not carrying my name 😥. It would be one thing if we were married and all carried my boyfriend’s family name. I can’t imagine dropping my baby at school or traveling and having different names than my own son. My boyfriend is a wonderful man and he his basking in the joy of creating an extension of himself. I tried having the conversation with him of wanting to include both his family name and mine. I’m happy to drop mine once we get married. He’s not the type to react or lose his temper but I could tell it bothered him and we didn’t finish our discussion. This was about a month ago and he is continuing to tell people how excited he is for the baby to carry his family name, etc. I say nothing but it makes me sad.

Be honest with me ladies. I’m willing to suck it up if I have to for the fam. Or, are my feelings justified? This isn’t about shaming him. He’s a wonderful man and he’s over the moon excited about starting a family! I’m just not sure how to approach this. I don’t want to kill his joy.

UPDATE: He proposed!!!!!!