Did you love the name you picked?

[Toastiecroissant]

And if so - what was it?

I’m due a little boy in may, I’ve got a long list of names that are all ‘fine’

i don’t love any of them and they all have something that puts me off a bit. For example their popularity, or I know someone with the same name, or I dislike the nn or some other reason.

did you love the name you picked?
or did you pick something ‘ok’ and grow to love it?

I really love my little boys name - Rowan. I wasn't completely sold when we decided on it but only because I had three other (very popular) names i'd always loved and discounted for various reasons. I was also dubious about a unisex name.

I'm pregnant with no.2 and I can't think of another boy's name I love as much as Rowan. It's so hard!

DS1 was always going to be Adam. 21 years on its still my favourite boys name.

I have 4 kids and only one has a name that I was never 100% about. It’s his granddads name so I went with it for dh’s sake. It’s fine but I don’t love it. My other kids have really good names. I have a Charlie which has to be one of the best boys names ever!

My husband isn’t British and we wanted to use a name that worked in both cultures. So my kids have names that I’d ever imagined I’d use, and I couldn’t use my favourite names. I love their names now. I probably still love my lifelong faves more, but they wouldn’t work for my children as they don’t translate easily.

I know what you mean. No name is completely perfect. Or at least it wasn’t for me anyway (e.g. I have a Henry and find the hoover connection really annoying). Plus I found the same as @Mols93 that once I had one boy, it was hard to find another name I liked quite as much.

Overall though, I am pleased with both mine’s names and would still choose the same again if it were possible to put the clock back.

Hope that helps.

Yes, I did love it. It came to me in a vision, and I never seriously considered any other name.

DD's name would have been Malcolm. It's a family name. Funnily enough she's hated every Malcolm she's met and is very glad she was a girl

I love DS1 name. It was always his name from our very first scan. DS2 we went back and forth with names and called him a name for about an hour after he was born and then I was like that’s not his name. Picked another name that we hadn’t even thought of before and now when I look at him I can’t imagine him as the other name.

I think a name can grow on you over time. DD1 and DS have names I loved straight away and was completely set on throughout (still love them now). DD2 I had 2-3 names that I liked a lot (but didn’t love) and chose one of those almost at random when she was born. However I’ve grown to love her name over time as I now associate it with her and I can’t imagine her being called anything else! So I think if you choose a name you really like, you can grow to love it over time.

I had twins. Love my DD's name - it was one I'd loved since childhood. There was a boy's name I wanted for DS but DH didn't like it so he chose and I agreed because I was tired and hormonal. It's OK and similar to what I wanted, but I don't love it, if I stop to think about that. But I think once you get used to a name you don't question it any more.

The names felt 'right'. They were very popular at the time, which we hadn't foreseen but I still like the names as do they.

I had this with my girls name. It’s a perfect name. I think that’s why I’m struggling so much with just not feeling as strongly with a name now for my boy

This is what I’m struggling with. I think there are about 10 names that work in both languages and that I don’t hate. I’ve scoured name sites and I can’t find any more. So I need to choose between those names and they’re all just ok.

Yes, I do love the name I picked as it fitted my personal criteria of timeless, easy to spell and say and I like the most common shortening ( I would probably caution against going for a name where you hate the most common nn, but I don’t think it matters if you don’t like all the nn’s for a name - some have half a dozen!).

And no name is perfect! So don’t try to find that 🤣 I personally think popularity and meaning are the least important attributes - is it really a big deal that you/they know another Thomas, James or William etc? And few people who aren’t name obsessed, know or care about a names meaning.

I think “fine” is, well, absolutely fine 🤣 (I’m guessing you’ve gone for something fairly popular/ well known/ classic so you aren’t sure it feels special enough? Better commonplace than something he might find embarrassing!) I think personally you’ll grow to love it over the years as you’ll associate it most with your boy rather than anyone else - just wait till he refers to himself by his own name for the first time, it’s a magical moment ❤️

I understand how you feel! Especially with boys names. We could only come up with two boys names that I quite liked, and that worked in both languages. At first it felt a bit odd introducing my son - his name is big and obviously “foreign” in its spelling/pronunciation and I felt clunky introducing him. I sort of regretted that I hadn’t been able to call him one of my favourite names (think very popular choices like Edward, James, Harry). Now he’s three and I feel like he’s totally grown into his name. To the point that I can’t imagine it being anything else!

My boy is Isaac Jacob, both names we absolutely loved and it was so hard deciding, although originally I was going to shorten it to Zac.
I'm pleased we went with isaac as he has recently started high-school and is the o ly Isaac there out of 250 in his year group. 18 Jacobs though (that he has met so far!).

I have a Jessica Maeve. It was the first name that came to me when I found out I was having a little girl. (I used Jess, Jessica and Jessie interchangeably so she has the choice when she's a bit older)There were other names I really loved before I was pregnant (more than Jessica) but nothing else sounded right - I must have tried out 20 others in the weeks before she was born..Her name really suits her. It was as if the name chose her! I was very unsure about it, especially the Irish connection with Maeve (I'm Welsh!) but now she is here it is my favourite name of all time. I'll keep the traditional Welsh names in my back pocket in case I have another girl! L

I had a list of four boys names I'd loved since childhood. 1 got used by another family member, 2 were vetoed by DH. We went with the final one: Owen.

Still love it. Unusual enough that he's the only one in the class but normal enough that nobody ever mis-pronounces or misspells his name. Fairly timeless and classless.

I did not love either of my children’s names when we have them (compromise names between me and husband) or at the time they were born. I now absolutely love ds1’s name, couldn’t imagine any other name on him - he is 2.5 now, and think it is my favourite name now despite definitely not thinking this before.
ds2 is now 6 months and I don’t dislike his name but still don’t love it and often think maybe something else would be better (although no obvious name standing out). I am hoping that it grows on me more.

Just to add I also had the two language issue that meant we ruled out a lot of names as they didn’t work in both/ had major pronunciation issues as a result. It definitely makes it harder.

Yep! Our son is Gilbert. We loved it then and still do three years later.

Second child is due in a few weeks and will be either Conrad or Marcella.

My son has a name that I almost didn't pick because I knew someone with that name that I disliked. But the name was nice so we used it anyway. A child takes up so much space and their name becomes them so much that I don't still look at my child and get reminded of that knobhead I went to school with because that name is my child and he is my 'main' person with that name. Like unless its a really significant person they wont matter.

My DS’s name is my favourite ever name and I just adore it. As soon as I found out I was pregnant I knew he would be a boy and have that name. We didn’t find out the sex but I didn’t even bother thinking of girls’ names when I was pregnant.

With DD we found out she was a girl but massively struggled to name her and eventually went with a compromise that we agreed on the way to register her at 6 weeks old! I still considered changing it and felt unhappy with it for months but suddenly realised that she recognised it herself and then it became her name. Once she was responding to it there was no way I could change it to anything else. And now I love it because it’s hers.

With our daughter, we had a short list of names we loved and she just was her name when we met her.

we’re expecting a boy shortly and we knew that it’d be a challenge from the start. We’ve landed on one which is ok, goes well with DD name and has a diminutive that we like, doesn’t get too much hate from anyone. My concern is that it’s very much a bible name and we’re not religious but we can’t come up with an alternative after 9 months so that’ll probably be it.

Neither of my children have my favourite names but I LOVE LOVE LOVE both their names