Would popularity put you off a name?

[ghoulelocks]

DH andI just can't agree on a name. We settled quite easily on ds's name, but a dd is proving difficult. We liked ds's name as although well known isn't common,he'llprobably be the only one in his class.

The girls name we finally settled on is Amelia... but on mn I've just realised there may be a few in her class.We've just moved too, to a naice bit of London to compound it!

Our other names were:

Vera, lovely in our country of origin but everyone here seems to react to it like I'm thinking of calling her 'hairnet' or something! I love the name, but don't want to embarrass her.

Lydia, not sure if it's a little harsh

[CruCru]

Lydia is a lovely name. I also love Amelia - it being the top name would put me off - having said that, I've never actually met one (lots of Amelies though). Vera - not sure. Think it's old lady chic a bit too far and makes me think of Last of the Summer Wine / Aloe Vera.

What about Elvira shortened to Vera? Vera is cute for a tiny girl but one day she'll be a 45 year old with a job and family.

[RedGreenWhiteViolet]

Dd1 is Olivia. It hasn't been a problem so far. There is one other in her class but they have different nicknames. We really liked the name and decided that we'd compromise on originality.

I really like Lydia, though.

[BadRoly]

No it wouldn't - both dds' names are apparently very popular as is ds1's name. But we are fairly certain ds2's name is probably unique.

[Leeds2]

Lydia is lovely!

[nkf]

I wouldn't mind perennially popular like Sarah or Elizabeth. But I tend to go off the inexplicably in vogue names much. If I'm going to strike out on my own then I want to be completely alone. All those names are nice but Verity is nicer than Vera. Are they all vogueish?

[HolyAutumnGoldBatman]

Popularity does put me off a name, yes.

I'm in London and know about 30 children called Amelie/Amelia/Emily/Emmy/Millie

I don't like Vera or Lydia very much.

How about Vivienne nn Vivi?

[saffronwblue]

Vera and Lydia are both lovely. The popularity of Amelia does put me off. Have you considered Veronica, Vero for nn?

[Dogsmom]

Popularity has put me off a name, I've always loved Lily and even used it for my German shepherd 13 years ago, I'm now 6 months pg but wont use it because of its popularity, when I was at school it was all Claires & Sarahs and they were all given nicknames according to surname/looks etc

[ILikeRed]

Amelia has been my future daughter's name since I was fifteen and now that i'm finally thinking of becoming a mummy, it's suddenly the most popular name! I'm fuming!
Still, it'd never put me off. Should I be lucky enough to have a little girl, I'd want her to have the most beautiful name I could think of. You should go with what you love and hope (as I'm doing!!) that other people will be put off by the popularity of it...!

[MrsJohnDeere]

Lydia is lovely.

[elizaregina]

lydia is harsh and i know the harshest most horrid lydia there can be.

vera - no.

[elizaregina]

really like amelia - is popular but still not as much as olivia which has gone crazy for some reason....also soft, pretty with lovely nicknames....

[bigbluebump]

Yes, popularity would put me off because for me a name is there to serve a purpose, namely to identify someone or something.

Lydia is lovely, as is Vera - both are not that widely used and would be lovely choices imo.

But Amelie/Emily/Amelia/Emilia has been overdone imo - there are just too many of them out there already!

[Ephiny]

It would put me off a bit. I have a very popular name for my age group - at one point there were five of us in one class at school and I could never be 'just' my name. Even first name plus initial didn't work as there were two of us with the same surname-initial .

It's less of an issue as an adult as you don't tend to be so segregated by age at work etc, though there are two of us in the same office at the moment . And I was at a charity event a couple of weeks ago where there were a lot of women of around my age, and I was constantly turning around hearing someone call my name (there were four of us that I identified, plus one dog ).

DH wants to use Emily or Amelie if we ever have a girl - I am saying no way!

[Ephiny]

Oh that was a lot of faces. I guess that's how I feel about my name!

[bigbluebump]

I think the reason some us don't like Vera is that we associate it with older women. You just need one little, cute Vera to completely change this association imo!

[weegiemum]

It would put me off. I was one of 4 susans in my class, I hated it!

[Yamyoid]

Sorry, yes popularity would put me off. I always liked Amelie since the film but by the time dd came along, I kept hearing it everywhere. So it was scrapped.

Vera is kind of nice but Vera Duckworth was such an established character in Coronation Street, it's hard to shake the connection. She makes the name feel quite hard, which I think it isn't really. But your dd's generation won't have any knowledge of that character so you should go for it if you want. And she won't have Ephiny's problem. My parents changed my name at 6 months cos it was so popular. I'm glad they did!

[tammy234]

Yes, it would put me off. I too hated having to share my name with quite a few others. There are SO many lovely names out there, does there really need to be yet another little Amelie (as nice as the name is) - agree that we sometimes forget why we name someone - to identify them.

I like Vera, also Veronica.

[Notnowcato]

Popularity definitely puts me off. I was one of 21 (count them) girls with same name in my secondary school (five classes), seven of them were in my class!!! Dreadful.

Am now meeting loads of mothers with my name: our children all have quite 'different' names :)

[footphobic]

My three dds have classic but unusual names and I like the fact there are no others in their year or social groups. With one, a diminutive of it is very popular, but we don't shorten it.

We have a Lydia, often called Liddy. We have only met one other but not at the same school and I don't know anyone at all with youngest dd's name.

I don't think it's a reflection on the names that they are less popular as I think they are both lovely and work well at all ages.

[3monkeys]

Didn't put me off. Mine all have common names as I wanted them to have something easy. We have a weird surname that always has to be spelt. DD has a very close friend with the same name as her and they don' mind at all

[EdithWeston]

The snag with Vera is the automatic "Duckworth" that follows it, because of the very longstanding Corrie character. I think it'll be a little while before that has faded enough in UK.

Frequency of use of a name is difficult to gauge, as the stats come out only once a year, a few months in arrears; so depending on your due date, the latest usage figures could be from 18months before.

I'd stick to the name you really want: you cannot predict if it'll have shifted up or down the list between publication and the birth - if it dropped 12 places and you hadn't used it, would you kick yourself? If it stays the same, does it matter? And it's a lovely classic name, in use for decades, and which won't be as strong a generational marker as say Ruby or Evie/Ava which blipped up from low usage.