Children's Names

[waitingforafamily]

Hi there,
I'm fairly new to this forum but we are being matched with 2 lo's under 3 and wanted to talk to anyone who has experience with names and changing them 😳
We have some very unusual names that are not good and I'm worried about them. It has been a 13 year journey to get to his point and we have 2 beautiful kids coming to us to complete our family but the names 😢
I feel really awful wanting to change them but I am really struggling with it...
Any help would be gratefully received 🙏🏻🙏🏻🙏🏻
Thank you

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/adoptions/2898266-Name-change

Are they really that bad? After 13 years do you not think that you could get over it?
If they are identifiable then fair enough but if you just don't like them I think SS will be reluctant at matching panel.

It's not about not liking them or disliking (although we do) but they are so ridiculous. I won't say what they are but here's an example "Princess Leia". The little girl is 14 months so not too difficult to talk about using a new name but the little boy is 2.5yo...

I realise that I sound like it's about us and not the kids but they are so distinctive and weird that they will be found or maybe even bullied later on.

I'm so excited, we both are, but it's making me so stressed out 😢

If it were "Princess Leia" you could call her "Leia" day to day, surely. My advice is for you to read back through 6 months or more or do a search within adoption for this subject. It is a subject which people feel strongly about and sometimes a discussion is merited but in relation to your OP I feel you could gain some insight into the various issues from previous threads. If you have been waiting to adopt for 13 years I am surprised you don't already know this though. Best of luck to you.

Princess leis was an example. It's not just a case of dropping the princess part. I am trying to explain without giving any names away. I have not been trying to adopt for 13 years. Only 2, the rest is infertility.

They are both very unusual names which not only are almost made up and weird!

What is OP?

I have broached it to the SW and they are unsure about changing but when we adopt them then we can make our own plans surely?

When we adopted our two children we changed both of their names - our little boy was 2 years 9 months and our little girl 18 months. We kept both names relatively similar - but different. We had full support of our social workers. The only person that struggled/didn't like the names was the foster carer but they came round to them. On our very first visit we called both children by their new name and have never looked back, they have never questioned anything. One suggestion I have got especially with the older child is to keep drumming the name into them so literally everytime you speak to them you are using their name - my sister got mad with me but when I explained why she got it! If you want any further advice just get in touch, good luck with the rest of your journey 😊

User1485199539 - thanks so much for the message. Could you PM so we can chat further? Our two little ones are pretty much the same age and sex 😊

If they are really identifiable. As in type it into Facebook in 15 years and they will be the only (or one in 10 etc) then I think the courts and SW would support the change. I would try to choose something that sounds similar though to reduce confusion.

hi waiting - we've adopted 4, changed 3 of the names. only one we kept was our child who came to us at nursery age as we felt they were too old to change at that point.
our SW supported us, but many on here have come up against opposition to name changing.
look up some of the previous threads on this topic as it has been discussed lots.
If your older one is pushing 3 you may come up against some SW saying a name change is not in his/her best interest due to age at this point.
I'm a regular here so feel free to PM me.

We have name changed.
Very lovely name and doesn't strike you as unusual.
But once we checked with the office of national statistics it's not been used in several years.
We felt modifying the name was in the best interests due to social media.
We didn't get any problems as we explained our reasons clearly.

OP is the original poster, you waitingforafamily.

It sometimes the opening of original post, I think.

I've contributed lots on this topic so read back of interested.

You can't really discuss this with the social worker or you run a risk of not being approved. But you can do your own research and make your own choices if they are for the best interests of the child/ren.

Please also be aware two children both with unusual names will be more identifiable then one. Please do read up on this topic.

We name changed. Our son came to us when he was 3 1/2. Birth name is middle name. I actually love his birth name but is is not common and more importantly, he refused to answer to it. Only social workers and birth parents used it and I think it may have had bad connotations. His foster carers had another nickname for him and he had yet another one for himself (language delay). We wanted one name that he could say, learn to write at nursery and we could all use. So we started using a nickname that could be a derivative of his birth name and he started using it within a day, correcting anyone who used a different name. When we did the adoption order, we put it down as his first name (for safeguarding, social media etc). At this stage we did not need sw to agree or even discuss it.

Hi, sorry to slightly hijack thread, but can I ask when people told their DCs about their names being changed?