Any regrets?

[gg5891]

So I'm 32 weeks today, only 8 weeks until my little one is due to appear. We have just about decided on our baby names (we don't know what we are having). This is a random question but...

Does anyone have any regrets about the name they gave their child? Anyone got tips for choosing a name for their little one?

Sounds obvious but try to not let others influence you and be brave with your choice.

We didn't tell anyone the sex of our dc or sound off any of our favourite names after 20 weeks with anyone. We both love her name and have absolutely no regrets. My only slight regret is that we are struggling with dc2's name as we love dd's so much we can't find another we feel the same about!

No.

I didn't 3/4 of my children's names when we chose them (after birth). I only loved one because it had sentimental meaning behind it, and because I'd had it in mind long before I even met DH.

But your child becomes their name. That's why you can dislike a name, but if someone you love names their baby that, the name will often grow on you. I have experienced this several times with other peoples' children.

I love all of my children's names now, and I wouldn't change any of them, but it was a while before I felt like they were their names.

My only regret is that we chose a middle name that sounded good rather than having a particular meaning to us. Whenever I see it (which is rarely), it just strikes me as a random name we agreed on at the time, & I feel no connection with it. It's almost as if we shouldn't have bothered.

I love th classic names I chose for my son’s. However, they turned out to be very popular. In those days, we didn’t really have the Internet, so you didn't have access to top ten names lists etc.

Like Lomg, I wish had chosen middle names with family links. I wish I was braver and used unusual names you don’t routinely hear, even in my ‘unusual boys lists’.

I did get to get Welsh middle names, though.

In a similar position to you OP. Due DD very soon.

We have a name picked out that my family hates. I too have reservations. It's a name we both had on our lists at the start of pregnancy, when we just threw names about. It's pretty, and I do love it, it's just not what I could have ever imagined naming my daughter (potentially my only child). It's mainly stuck now because we've debated about it so much. I know DD will make it her own name, but yes, I'm having reservations! Yet now I know if we chose anything different I would regret that too!

Choose a name you love. You don’t want to look back and regret not choosing your favourite name. When my mum was pregnant with my brother in the late 80s, she loved a name that was quite unusual then but is popular now. She didn’t go for it and instead went for a more traditional name, and I think she’s always secretly regretted it.

I LOVE DD's first name and would pick it again now. But I gave her my mum's name as a middle name which isn't particularly modern and I wish I hadn't, I wish I had given her the name Viola as her middle name. My mum was going through a rough time when DD was born so I think I did it to cheer her up, mum is fine now though so I wish I hadn't bothered!

Every now and then I daydream about changing it but she is 10 now so way too late and obviously would hurt people's feelings.

It took a while for DS's name to stick too, I couldn't say it out loud for ages after he was born because it didn't feel like his name! But none of the others did either.

The opposite actually.

DH wanted a German name not widely used over here. I pushed him to register DS with an extended version, which is much more commonly used in the UK. He caved in, and we use the German name as a nickname.

I now really like the German name! It really suits him, and is a very sweet little name. Even my DM, who loathed it when she heard it, likes it on him now. He’s grown into it, and it is his name now.

TBF though I doubt he’ll still want to use it when he’s 49. It isn’t Teddy or Bear, but it is pretty similar. Lovely on a toddler, less so on an accountant.

I love my 10yr old dd's name BUT when I picked it I didn't realise that it was such a popular name. I'm talking top 5 in the country for years and years. I didn't even think to check the names list at the time. It really bothers me there are so many other children with my daughters name.

However she is the only child in her year at school with that name which I was really happy about. There are 9 Sophie's in her year, now that would have sent me over the edge lol

For my next daughter I made sure it wasn't so popular.

We didn't choose a name until he was 2 weeks old. Gave us time to try our shortlist out and see which we liked best. We didn't tell anyone our shortlist either so it couldn't be influenced by others.

We chose not to name after family (first or middle names), no regrets and noone has been put out/offended that they weren't chosen/one side of the family wasn't chosen.

Would do the same again as it worked well for us.