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Help[Opinions] I have a question for those of you who have children, What was the process like for naming your child?
I asked this question because I was curious about the reason and process for naming the child.
This message was edited 3/1/2024, 6:58 PM
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Spent about four months shooting down spouse's half jokey offerings of things like Xerxes, Boniface, Ptolemy, and Griselda. Then countered with a list of classics and family names, many of which he shot down. We whittled down the survivors to a top handful and went armed with them to see which one the kid fit into. No final decision was made until we met the child. Then an honor name for the middle. Took our time and kept the process to ourselves, worked fairly well.
Between my parents and my siblings, we all had at least one name beginning with the letter "C' and/or "E". In total, 5 "E"s, 5 "C"s, 1 "D" and 1 "S". I know it sounds silly, but I felt it would be bad luck to not use names beginning with "C" or "E" for our daughters. So, their initials are EC and CA, one of them being the opposite of my mother's initials.
This message was edited 3/2/2024, 8:36 AM
I don't have children but I do know the process of how my parents picked me and my siblings names. With the eldest my older sister was named my father's favorite girl name: Christine, after his motorcycle who in turn was named for the car, Christine. My dad convinced my mom that if she let him pick the firstborn's name then he would let her pick the second born's name. Me. But my dad is a dishonorable man and when my mom was pregnant with me she said she wanted to pick her favorite name this child: Grace, he was adamant he should pick this child's name as well. My mom was very upset by this and went to his older sisters and then the church elders to make him keep his word. Only then did he "let" my mom pick her favorite name. He wanted to name me Jacqueline "Jackie" after an ex girlfriend 🙄 my younger sister was an unplanned pregnancy a few years thereafter. Anna was picked simply because it was a deeply rooted family name on both sides and i suspect since she was unplanned they weren't too invested in the naming process. She has a 2 part first name and the second name was a female variant of a male family members.
for the middles: my elder sister's was an honoring middle name after my mom's best friend. For the younger, the middle name was picked after that best friend's daughter that tragically passed away prior to the younger sister's birth, and I'm the only one with a middle not after a family friend as mine is Diana after the princess of whales. Grace after princess grace and diana after princess diana.
*worth noting that mother hasn't been friends with that best friend since the early 2000s (she moved away after her daughter's death and lost contact with my mom) and as such I would be anxious to name a child after a friend as a result on the chance I stopped being friends with them. I would find it weird having the middle name after a woman (or man) I had no connection to in the present.
for the middles: my elder sister's was an honoring middle name after my mom's best friend. For the younger, the middle name was picked after that best friend's daughter that tragically passed away prior to the younger sister's birth, and I'm the only one with a middle not after a family friend as mine is Diana after the princess of whales. Grace after princess grace and diana after princess diana.
*worth noting that mother hasn't been friends with that best friend since the early 2000s (she moved away after her daughter's death and lost contact with my mom) and as such I would be anxious to name a child after a friend as a result on the chance I stopped being friends with them. I would find it weird having the middle name after a woman (or man) I had no connection to in the present.
This message was edited 3/2/2024, 7:59 AM
I picked my top 100 from my PNL (which included family names) and read them to my husband 1 by 1. He shot down all of them but 5. 🫠 Safe to say we have very different tastes in names! But it did make the process easier.
I like this way of doing it!
For our first we used the GG and gggg grandfather mn same name and dh first name as mn
2nd mn was masculine form of my middle name as we'd gone through years of treatment and wouldn't have a girl to pass my names to
4 years later and after 18 years of trying we named Amy (After Many Years), also loved the meaning and name and she got my mn
Our ectopic pregnancy baby we named with the meaning highly valued much loved, prayed for, asked for. He was our first pregnancy. His first name was the name I was going to have if I was a boy
2nd mn was masculine form of my middle name as we'd gone through years of treatment and wouldn't have a girl to pass my names to
4 years later and after 18 years of trying we named Amy (After Many Years), also loved the meaning and name and she got my mn
Our ectopic pregnancy baby we named with the meaning highly valued much loved, prayed for, asked for. He was our first pregnancy. His first name was the name I was going to have if I was a boy
This message was edited 3/2/2024, 4:23 AM
In a word, interesting!
My first pregnancy was quite unusual and I couldn't imagine a mere male surviving it, so we spent our days considering girl names and failing to agree. We wanted to use our mothers' names as mns - Beatrice, and Bertha Maria - and I would have been staying with a friend whose full name is Vickie when the child arrived (husband on the other side of the planet for excellent reasons) so we also wanted Vickie. We shuffled the names like playing-cards, but no luck. I was hoping for a boy so I could name him Peter. The TV one night, while we were visiting my cousin, mentioned that a celeb named Peter had been born on the day we expected our baby, and we laughed merrily and said 'If it's a boy, it's got to be Peter'. And it was, and he is Peter David (a form of my birth surname) Alastair (after two good friends).
Next time around, we had a daughter. Beatrice was fine, but my mother had disliked her name so we were hesitant about using it as a first name. Bertha Maria was too much to deal with, so we ignored Bertha and used Mary instead of Maria. I secretly wanted to name her Lucy but didn't say so. Just as well: when she was born she somehow didn't look at all like a Lucy. So I took a name book and went through the girl names, looking at her to see if any of the ones I liked would be OK. The first one I found and liked was Caroline, and I was very grateful to her for not looking like Zoe! Caroline Beatrice Mary pleased us very much; sadly, she died when she was four. We decided to have another child, and to use one of Caroline's names for her if it was a girl. Peter, aged 6, said that if it was a boy, he'd leave home. He didn't have to, and we decided on Beatrice as the first name, Elizabeth (my step-MIL and also because it's so beautiful) Anne. So her initials are BEA, and her nn of choice is Bea.
My husband has two younger brothers. All of them got family names as their mns: the younger boys each got Fraser, and to his mild regret, DH got Ernest.
My mother, Beatrice, had an elder sister Eva. I asked my grandmother why, and she said 'Well, she was our first'. I asked if they'd have named a son Adam, and my Granny had obviously never thought of that and couldn't say a word for minutes on end!
My first pregnancy was quite unusual and I couldn't imagine a mere male surviving it, so we spent our days considering girl names and failing to agree. We wanted to use our mothers' names as mns - Beatrice, and Bertha Maria - and I would have been staying with a friend whose full name is Vickie when the child arrived (husband on the other side of the planet for excellent reasons) so we also wanted Vickie. We shuffled the names like playing-cards, but no luck. I was hoping for a boy so I could name him Peter. The TV one night, while we were visiting my cousin, mentioned that a celeb named Peter had been born on the day we expected our baby, and we laughed merrily and said 'If it's a boy, it's got to be Peter'. And it was, and he is Peter David (a form of my birth surname) Alastair (after two good friends).
Next time around, we had a daughter. Beatrice was fine, but my mother had disliked her name so we were hesitant about using it as a first name. Bertha Maria was too much to deal with, so we ignored Bertha and used Mary instead of Maria. I secretly wanted to name her Lucy but didn't say so. Just as well: when she was born she somehow didn't look at all like a Lucy. So I took a name book and went through the girl names, looking at her to see if any of the ones I liked would be OK. The first one I found and liked was Caroline, and I was very grateful to her for not looking like Zoe! Caroline Beatrice Mary pleased us very much; sadly, she died when she was four. We decided to have another child, and to use one of Caroline's names for her if it was a girl. Peter, aged 6, said that if it was a boy, he'd leave home. He didn't have to, and we decided on Beatrice as the first name, Elizabeth (my step-MIL and also because it's so beautiful) Anne. So her initials are BEA, and her nn of choice is Bea.
My husband has two younger brothers. All of them got family names as their mns: the younger boys each got Fraser, and to his mild regret, DH got Ernest.
My mother, Beatrice, had an elder sister Eva. I asked my grandmother why, and she said 'Well, she was our first'. I asked if they'd have named a son Adam, and my Granny had obviously never thought of that and couldn't say a word for minutes on end!
This message was edited 3/2/2024, 12:43 AM
I forgot about how you had lost one of your children. I'm so sorry for that. Bless her soul. That's cute that your grandmother chose Eva because she was the first. Your children all have nice names.
Thank you.