Help! We can't agree

[MrsMeSeeks]

I don't need name suggestions, I need a methodology.

DH and I don't agree on girl's names, and we have 6 weeks to find one (well, 12 till she'll need to be registered, but I don't want her to arrive nameless - and definitely don't need the pressure of a registration deadline poured on top of this failure of accord!)

We have now been through the ENTIRE list of baby girl names registered in 2017. We have a "shortlist" of about 5 or 6 - but all of these are names that one of us loves and the other thinks is okay. So none feels like a compromise, it's always one person 'winning'. I think I'm struggling to give in because DH keeps pushing for a particular name saying "it's the one we agree on most". It isn't, it's just the one he likes best - we also pronounce it differently, and I'm less keen on his pronunciation and on the nickname he'd want to use. But I can't really expect him to just give in and accept one of 'my' names when I won't accept his.

So how do we find one? Is there a way to select from the shortlist, or do we need to scrap those options and pick something we both like (but neither of us love).

HOW do we do this?! It feels like we're just going to have to name her after the midwife, and end up with a name we both hate equally! It's getting ridiculous...

I am absolutely in love with Albertine.

Nothing like your other names. But I just wanted to put it out there.

If it's not pronounced A-nay then I'll be very perplexed

Apologies in advance diddlediddle...

www.youtube.com/watch?v=aCnKd7RqM3A

I'm in London and know three Anaïs, but as I said they all pronounce it differently (and according to you all three pronunciations are wrong, although one is right according to the link above!)! I don't know that it 'registers' as an unusual name, it's just mispronounced a lot!

I've actually heard of the perfume 'anay anay', just never seen it written down! I guess that's where the parents of the 'A-nay' I know got it from!

My grandmother was EVE-ln
Was she Bertrand, that's nice.

You said 'Ah-niece' 'An-aye-eese' and 'Ah-nay'’

It’s An eye eece. As in Thaïs. (As above).

Who chooses a name without bothering to find out the pronunciation? (Quite a few by the evidence of these boards).

@LarkDescending @BertrandRussell

WHAT THE

I feel like my life has all been a lie

K I'm taking it off my list 🤣🤣🤣

AnusAnus

All these perfume names that never got past the drawing board stage, so sad.

“I feel like my life has all been a lie“

I think it’s the accent over the i that does it. Not sure what “it” is, though!

'It's An eye eece'

An-aye-eese is the same phonetically.

Aye and eye are the same phonetically.

Eese and eece are also the same phonetically.

At least in my accent they are!

'Who chooses a name without bothering to find out the pronunciation?'

I think a lot of people think they know, they just don't. It's all those illiterate, no french O-level, one language people!

The thing is if something is mispronounced enough eventually both pronunciations become acceptable, see Evelyn for an example!

"It" (the effect of the diaeresis) is the separate pronunciation of the second successive vowel - it indicates that it is not blended with the first vowel into a diphthong sound.

See also: Zoë, naïve, etc.

I think you should individually come up with a big long list of names that you like well enough and then pick 4 each off each others lists to create a shortlist of 8 names then decide on the exact name when she's born.

I really like Isadora and Ingrid, not so keen on Evelyn and I think that needs to be taken off the table due to the pronunciation disagreement. With Anais, I do like it but just can't make it easy to pronounce - it just doesn't seem to roll off the tongue at all (I have a fairly average south UK accent). It feels like there are too many soft vowel sounds in a row somehow.

Ah you mean aye like a Scottish aye. Well at least one got it right!

The parents of Anaïses I mean...

The dieresis makes it Anna-EES. Without it it would be Ann-EY.
I can remember An-ey An-ey being very popular at school.

I love the suggestion by a PP of Clemency. How about Roby? I believe it's traditionally a man's name but I have a female relative who has it as a middle name and Iove it.

Feel this thread is diverging a little off topic but for what it's worth: I swear to FUCK I read a Just Seventeen article on the 90s that instructed you on how to pronounce difficult words, and they said the perfume was Anay Anay (and suggested you might mistakenly think it was Aneese Aneese). I didn't know that wasn't correct until this thread. Although I knew how to pronounce the name correctly. But I'm not sure how or where I'd have heard it. I don't have French O level. Or indeed any O levels. I am too young - GCSE generation (and took German).

Just Seventeen - ah, the memories! I am not sure it quite qualified as an official journal of record, though. Rumour had it the agony aunt letters may not have been all they seemed, either.

How’s the list-making going today, OP?

We've got one new one on the new shortlist, so some progress. Might just put that one in a hat and tell him he can choose!

In the 70s, the TV adverts for Anais Anais definitely pronounced it Anay Anay.

I know two Evelyn's. One (probably in her 80s) is an Eve Lin. The other (60s) is an Ev Lin.

Agree that it's best to avoid both those names.

What's the new one?

Also, India, Astrid, Melissa?

My husband and I aren’t agreeing either. We get to the point where we think we have a name and then one of us, or both of us, change our minds.
We are having a boy.
I have a long list, he has one name. 🤦🏻‍♀️
I felt like I settled on DDs name, and it took me a while to get over it, so don’t want that to happen again. Especially as this is likely to be our last!