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AIBU?

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Original poster

To pull rank over dh with regards to naming our baby? We just cannot agree on a girl's name.

53 replies

Tropicana · 08/05/2009 14:04

We do not know the sex of our baby.

We have chosen and agreed on a boy's name, no problem.

However, we both struggled to come up with a girl's name that we really liked.

Now, I have decided that I really want to go for Caitlin, but he is not keen at all.

He wants Charlotte, which I think is okay but I do not want it. If I was to go along with it, I would always be thinking that I never wanted to call her that.

We just cannot come up with anything that we both totally agree on.

OP posts:
StayFrosty · 08/05/2009 14:47

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Sorrento · 08/05/2009 14:51

HOw about Clare/Claire/Clara sort of a compromise from both sides ?

My DD3 is my husbands choice of name and it's fine, 5 years later I like it.

Buda · 08/05/2009 14:51

Or do what I did. I too was convinced I was having a girl. We agreed on Laura. Laura Caitlin in fact! Agreed on a boys name too. Then spent last three months of pregnancy in seperate countries and I went off the boys name but never got around to telling DH. Didn't matter as we were having Laura.

DS popped out.

Doc asks what are we calling him and I come out with a name that we had once agreed we liked. DH kind of did a "where the hell did that come from?" look at me and then I added his late Dad's name as a second name and that was that. Can't imagine DS as anything else now! And I still don't like the original name and am SO glad we didn't use it.

JoyS · 08/05/2009 15:44

We had no trouble with DD1's name but we went round and round and round on DD2. I wanted Margaret or Edith (family names! classics!) he wanted Sophie or Olivia (nice names but not my style).

I wouldn't want to have felt coerced into naming her something I didn't like, just as he wouldn't. So we found something else that we both loved and tacked a family middle name onto it. It suits her.

I know what you mean about feeling little Caitlin kicking around, I had a whole nursery planned for little Edith Sophie! Keep looking or just leave it for a while, how far along are you?

Sassybeast · 08/05/2009 15:52

I would approach this in 2 ways - either pretend that you've given up on Caitlin and then come up with a gruesome alternative which you absolutely MUST have - Morticia or Ermatrude? He'll soon compromise

Or wait until you've just given birth and cry.

Being serious, I compromised on DD1s name and I do regret it. DH now admits that he was wrong to not agree to a name which meant a LOT to me personally. It was a huge issue for me when we went through a tough time further down the line and I've come to terms with it in many ways but I would always advise someone in a similar situation to keep going until you are both 100% happy. That may mean rethinking the whole thing. Is it the spelling that he has an issue with ? i must admit that whilst I love the name Caitlin, i think it 'looks' harsh if that makes sense and is much prettier when spelled Catelyn.

MummyDragon · 08/05/2009 16:02

I can COMPLETELY understand where you're coming from, especially re. feeling that the baby is more "yours" than "his." But if the shoe was on the other foot, you would think your DH was being unreasonable if he pulled rank on you re. the name, wouldn't you?

chequersmate · 08/05/2009 16:05

Why does Caitlin make you cringe MrsR?

(I don't have one btw, but I like it.)

fruitbeard · 08/05/2009 16:08

Well, we were convinced DD was a boy, so she was going to be James Alexander. No question.

We were so convinced she was going to be a boy, we barely thought of girls' names, other than to massively diss each other's choices or to think of ridiculously punnish names that went with our surname (a word that lends itself to such silliness).

I loved Caitlin. I also loved Niambh, Roisin and Sorcha but DH refused point blank to call a child a name that you couldn't obviously see how it was pronounced, iykwim.

He liked Rachel, Rebecca, Hannah...

His Jewish roots were fighting against my Irish ones!

Anyway, long story short, after 36 hours labour followed by traumatic CS, he handed me our baby daughter and half-wept "Caitlin. She looks like a Caitlin."

And so she does. I then told him of course she could have Rebecca as a middle name (one should be magnanimous in victory!).

Please, I beg you, do NOT spell the name Catelyn (or Katelyn, or Kaitlyn or Caitlynne or any of the other abominations I have seen), it is WRONG and HIDEOUS and will make you look like a loon who can't spell.

Sorry, Sassybeast, but it's true!

Sassybeast · 08/05/2009 16:16

Fruitbeard - you should have seen DHs face when I told him how Caoimhe was pronounced

katiestar · 08/05/2009 16:16

I wouldn't want my child named something that her own father hated.If it IS a girl you will need to find a name you both like.

fruitbeard · 08/05/2009 16:20

@ sassy

nbee84 · 08/05/2009 18:22

So how do you pronounce Caoimhe??

nbee84 · 08/05/2009 18:24

Agree with fruitbeard about spellings. Some people spell a name differently to be unusual or 'special' (!) but that poor child will go through his/her whole life having to spell it out for everyone.

SoupDragon · 08/05/2009 18:28

Caoimhe is not quite Keeva. More Kweeva or something IIRC. I wanted it for DD but had to ditch it due to spoiling and pronunciation issues/

FabulousBakerGirl · 08/05/2009 18:28

DH and I both did a list.

DH said that was the only name on both our lists. I agreed we would call him that and I chose the middle name.

I found the lists when was 6 months old. The name wasn't on my list....

Can't imagine him being called anything else.

Dh chose DD's first name and me the middle name.

DH chose DS2's first name and DS1 chose his middle name.

I just did all the pregnancy and labour stuff.

unavailable · 08/05/2009 18:31

Caoimhe = cwee-vah I think

unavailable · 08/05/2009 18:32

Sorry, Late again!

LemonTea · 08/05/2009 18:33

we were in this position and I insisted that our DS had her name about 5 mins before she was born (I guess DP didn;t have the heart to argue at this point).

I LOVE DD name; however, even though DP says he likes it, he never call DD bye her name (he has lots of pet names for her), so I would try to find something you can agree on

MrsMattie · 08/05/2009 18:34

Jumping in at late stage without reading whole thread, so apologies if repeating, but...

Caitlin makes me cringe. It's the Gaelic spelling of 'Kathleen', and the Kate-Lynn pronunciation is just so fake and American to my ears. It is in the 'Ashleigh' league of names for me.

Charlotte is much better.

Caoimhe is 'Kwee-va', although some people have anglicised it to Keeva or Keavey. Nice name.

ScummyMummy · 08/05/2009 18:53

I think the power of veto is definitely evoked either parent "is not keen at all", tbh. It must be terrible to have to call your kid a name you really don't like even a tad.

piscesmoon · 08/05/2009 19:01

I love Charlotte as a name but don't like Caitlin so it is difficult to be objective!
I don't think you should 'pull rank', just keep going until you reach a compromise.

sparkle12mar08 · 08/05/2009 19:57

Haven't read all through, but have to reply because we were in exactly the same position with ds2. Thing was we had agreed on a name before he was born and I was totally on board with it, but I took one look at him and thought 'bugger that, you are soooo not a XXXX'. So much so that it took over three weeks before we finally decided what to name him (not unusual for us, ds1 wasn't named for nearly two weeks either).

We named him with the one I preferred in the end, but only after much discussion and trying to compromise on at least two other names. When it came to the crunch, it was because I was able to say that I really would always feel it was second best for me, and he felt that as he did at least like 'my' name, it was okay.

In all honesty I don't know what I would have done had it been the other way round, if he truly did feel that it was one or nothing. I suspect we'd have to find a name that wasn't either of our first choices. But you know, children really do eventually grow into their names, they really do. So give yourselves a break for a while and revisit it after the baby is born.

IwoulddoDrWho · 08/05/2009 20:05

Joy - I also had a life planned for my sweet Edie. She could've been a model or a writer, a singer or a prime minister. But DH said "over his dead body" which I gather can be arranged in certain circles.

thisisyesterday · 08/05/2009 20:06

oh OP, I feel for you and am in a similar situation.

dp has been vetoing all my boys names. yet won't suggest any of his own.
so it is actually going to have to come down to me just saying well, it's this one then.

last time we did compromise.

we had 3 names on our boys list.
Gabriel
Lars
Nico

I really like all of them, but Lars was my number one choice.
DP loved gabriel, didn't relaly like the other 2 that much

ds2 looks soooooo much like a Lars. but in the end we went with Gabriel because I felt really guilty about making him have a name he wasn't happy with. I knew the other way round i'd feel a bit gutted and I did like Gabriel, whereas he didn't really like Lars.

it's so hard though. I still think Lars would have suited ds2 soooo much better and I can't use it on db3 either cos it's ds2's "real" name lol

kitsmummy · 08/05/2009 20:13

We had just this situation and in the end had to let DH choose a girls name (which I obviously had to like, even if I wouldn't have chosen it myself) and I chose a boy's name. That was the only way we could think of doing it. We had a girl who was called Orla and now I love the name. DH got off lightly cos a boy would have been called Woody!

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