Name regrets... ?

[carole1234]

So, long story short I had my baby nearly 9 months ago and we called her Amal Sophia. We have no issue ourselves with the name and neither does our family, but whenever people ask me about her name I just feel uncomfortable :/ It always looks like this: 'What is she called?' 'Amal' 'Amal?' 'Yes...'
What do you think of the name? Have you regretted your decision ourselves and changed it later?

I came close to changing my 4th child's name but I'm so glad I didn't.
My older 3 have traditional old English names, but with my 4th I fell in love with a name that was a different style and more modern.
People gave me a hard time over it and it really got to me.
He's seven now and his name suits him perfectly.
I can't imagine him being called anything else.

I don't have any personal name regrets but I do really like Amal! It makes me think of Amal Clooney and she is beautiful. No negative associations for me.

It sounds like it has Asian origins.... I'm guessing you don't hence the reactions.
It's not my cup of tea but there's nothing awful about it just possibly that's it's from a totally different culture? That's me guessing....

Are you sure they’re not just saying ‘Amal?’ to make sure they heard right? Surely better to do that than say ‘oh lovely’ without being sure they heard correctly.

I get this a lot with my first born as his name sounds a lot like another more common name. He gets a lot of Josh and weirdly John (name to me does not sound like John!). I’d rather people question it in order to remember the correct name, than be too shy/not bothered to ask and then call him Josh/John/Idontcarewhatyourecalled

I definitely see where you’re coming from, but that could be an explanation?

Amal is a lovely choice.

I think Amal Sophia is beautiful.

It's a beautiful name op. It is unusual though so people are probably just checking they are saying it correctly. I have an unusual name and people are always saying it back to me to check they are pronouncing it properly.

Thank you all for your support and lovely comments! I am just worried because we chose this name specifically for its simplicity and it seems like people are struggling? The name is Arabic and none of us is of Arab origin, but we travel a lot and didn't want our girl to struggle with her name like we do.

Lovely name. Don't regret it!

A school mum is called Amal and I think it’s lovely.

People often repeat uncommon names the first few times, I wouldn’t take it as a negative! More just making sure they heard correctly I think.

IME the m/n sounds can be tricky to distinguish so people like to check. Both my
DCs have fairly standard names that could go either way with an m or an n and people often repeat them. Eg ‘Mick’. ‘Mick?’

Tbvh, I think if you don't share the origins of the name it is a bit of an odd choice. It does sound a bit as if you named her after Amal Clooney. Sophia is beautiful and very international - why not have her known as that?

Amal is lovely!

If someone tells me their name or the name of their child and I'm not familiar with it or it is uncommon then I repeat it back just to check - better that than get it wrong! I don't think you should read anything negative into it

Amal is beautiful. Most names are not purely British and who cares?! Not me!

I would've thought Amal would be fairly well known thanks to Amal Clooney. It's lovely, I'd rather be an Amal than another Eva/ Ava/ Ellie etc.

I taught an Amal. She was a teeny Somali girl with a beautiful face, the most perfect skin and the sunniest personality. She was just the loveliest child. So when I think of Amal, I assume the child will be just lovely.

I think it's going to be difficult to avoid those reactions when you've said you have no Arabic roots, but the name is clearly Arabic (not like the name Layla, which is Arabic but widely used in western countries).

It probably would've been easier all around to name her Sophia Amal, because Sophia is recognised in just about every corner of the planet.

But if you love the name, it doesn't really matter. Amal is perfectly reasonable. It's easy to spell and pronounce.

Everyone thinks my son's name is Arabic. It's not, although it's really similar to a common Arabic name (which I also love).

We're clearly a white European family so we get a lot of double takes but it doesn't bother us.

Amal is a very Arabic name to me (and very beautiful) so I'd be intrigued by your choice. Amala might have led to less confusion.

I regret my 4yo's name. It took days to name her because XH wouldn't agree to anything I suggested but wouldn't suggest anything himself, and when I finally found something he'd allow I just went with it. I regret it to this day but she's always complimented on it, so I never changed it because it's obviously just my opinion and there's no problem with the name itself.

I like Amal! Don't change it because of others - and like PP's have said, they may not be reacting negatively, they may just be confirming what you said. A lot of people repeat my name back to me because it's unusual.

My daughter is 10 months and I still sometimes get doubts over her name but it seems to be like you when people ask what her name is, I think Amal is a nice name though OP :)

I had to sign two declarations for birth registering as I regretted daughters name within 24 hours of naming her - soooo glad she is not Carrie!!! Got my Savanna instead

Because it was a declaration outside of the birth district, no original birth certificate was issued with the wrong name - thank goodness! So our original has Savanna and no Carrie whatsoever.

Amal is beautiful and according to wikipedia it's also apparently a Celtic name meaning water, as well as the Arabic name meaning hope. A lot of names work cross-culturally and I think this is one of them.

I didn't regret my ds' first name. But I wanted to hypinate mine and his father second names.
I was bullied into only using one. And a year later we went back to hypinate it.
I still hate my partner to this day for our sons brith certificate not being accurate.

I love the name Amal. So beautiful.