Does your name date you to a decade?

[PaperwhiteTheFriendlyGhost]

I think mine does. Born 1986 and I don't think my name is given to baby girls anymore. It's a one word title of a classic novel.

There was a thread about my name a few years ago. I've always liked my name but people were saying it was old fashioned and middle aged (I am middle aged) it made me realise that my name has dated and all the women I meet with the same name are the same ballpark age.

When I had my DD I gave her a name that I thought was classic and timeless but not widely used but it exploded into popularity and there's loads of girls with the same/similar name.

I read an interesting article once about the cyclical nature of popularity of names which suggested that things reach a sort of critical mass where a name hasn't been used for many decades and then resurfaces. Certainly I don't think there were thousands of women 15-20 years ago all thinking "oh everyone is calling their DD Hannah I think I'll do the same". (Not DD's name by the way)

Yes. Totally. Early 70's

dd's name isnt even there
that is good it proves my name was popular 1910 and then 2000 and peaked again in 2015 but is getting less popular

Sorry for double post but also think associations to a name are also important. There are a few Eva's around here but 50 years ago no one would use that name because of the association with Eva Braun.

Similarly the name Myra has not been used for decades but as memories of the Moors murders fade it may well come back into use.

@OhamIreally I have never liked Eva but I love the name Eve. I don't know if it is subconscious for the reason you mention or just personal taste. I hated A level history because of being forced to study Nazi Germany and I avoid even the slightest involvement with reading about or watching anything to do with it.

Yes mine definitely does. My mum swears that she had liked my name since she was a little girl and hadn't heard of another one when I was born... A trait shared by THREE other mums of children my primary school it seems, who named their daughters with the same first and middle name as mine 😱😆 There were a couple of other first names only too. I heard a mum call my name to a toddler a few years ago and it stopped me in my tracks, that's the only time I've heard a young one. I do like my name though, hopefully it will make a comeback in another 30 years or so!

@OhamIreally I know it's all subjective, but I think Myra hasn't been popular because it's not a nice name. But I know what you mean. ( I heard Mabel and Hilda the other day - they're harsh sounding to me, yet someone obviously likes them ).
Fred is very popular as is Rose.
And Ted ( Bundy).

Born in the late 70s, and my name absolutely dates me to that time - there were 6 of us in my year at school with the same first name, and several of us also shared a middle name.

Interesting! To me, Ashleigh is a very 90s name and I (born 1990) grew up with a lot of them in my school year or a bit younger.

The ONS graph backs that up, it appears out of nowhere in the top 60 and disappears from the top 100 between the early 90s and 2000. So statistically it’s a great example of what we’re talking about here.

Mine dates me but makes me younger than I am.
My parents were early adopters of the name.

Oh yes. My name most definitely was popular in the 60s & 70s.

I agree regarding the name Ashleigh. I had a year 5 / 6 class circa 2000. So aged 10 / 11.
A very popular name for both sexes.

@WhatDecadeWasIBorn are you mid 30s ?

1948

I’m a Fiona, born in the fifties, I don’t think my name was that popular at the time, it was all carol Linda and susan which is what I really wanted to be called!

I notice quite a few of my mother's generation names (in my family) are popular again now. What goes around comes around.

@Mummyoflabradors Fiona is much nicer !
I like my name but as a teenager ( in the 80s) I really wanted to be called Kelly or Kimberly 🤣

I just did that name thing although it's just England and Wales stats but anyway my name peaked late 60s early 70s then it's just plummeted to extinction 😂

No, I was born in 1981, I'm 43 this year.

I've only met two others, a boy with the spelling Ashley - around the same age as me, and a girl with the same spelling as me in the early 90's, she was 4, a friends little sister, so ties in with the theory above.

Yep. I was born in 1994 and the only people I know with my name are within 10 years of me. SIL and I have the same name.

It does, but not the one I was born in!

My name - which I dislike a lot - is older than me by some decades, and I doubt anyone would ever revive it. It survives as the name of a bra for those large of nork and sometimes in culture, as a shorthand way of characterising an unattractive generally working class woman - the butt of jokes. Apparently, all my father’s fault.

Elizabeth. My DM absolutely loathed her name (fashionable when she was born well before WW2) but was soon very dated, and never turned into one of the now fashionable old-lady names, e.g. Phoebe (a GM was Phoebe and loathed it! Always used her middle name.)
So DM gave us all what she considered classic, ‘royal’ names that would never date us.

The most common in my year at school, now hardly ever used, were Linda and Christine - masses of them!

No my name is very popular in the 50s, but I was born in the 80s

Yes... but not the one I was born in. 🤣