Name Regret

[PostpartumPolly]

My DS is almost 5 months old and I feel like I have serious name regret. We have two DD’s and with both of their names we chose them in pregnancy and have always loved them. We found it much harder to name DS and had settled on the name Noah in pregnancy, which is a name I’ve always loved but was put off by the sheer popularity of it. We called DS Noah for around 4 months of the pregnancy, and then I had a lot of doubts about the name so we revisited the name lists and considered others. I went into the hospital to give birth with no name set in stone.

When DS was born my DH asked what name I thought he suited. I said Noah I guess, but was still unsure and wanted to trial a few names. One of the names I had brought up when having my wobble about Noah was Milo. I love the name Milo but always had worries about the wearability on an adult. My DH shared that he actually thought DS suited the name Milo more, and we didn’t really trial Noah or any other names - Milo just stuck.

DS does suit the name Milo, but I can’t help but feel regret that we didn’t use Noah. It almost feels like I was pregnant with a different baby because the baby that was in my tummy was Noah (probably sounds really stupid 🤣). I still have the same worries about the wearability of Milo on an adult. Everyone we have introduced him to as Milo have said they absolutely love his name, and when we’ve mentioned that he was nearly Noah they say they prefer Milo, but I feel like they would say they prefer the name we chose either way as it’s polite.

Have any of you experienced similar feelings? I don’t feel like we could change his name, I feel like it would be too confusing for our DD’s (youngest is 3) and I also don’t even think my DH would want to. I know this can be a symptom of PPD, but I have had that before after my first pregnancy and other than these doubts I actually feel so much better in myself so I don’t think it’s that.

Milo is lovely!
If it helps, my daughter is 1 month old, we went with my first choice name and it still feels weird on her even though I wanted it so much. I think I don't really think of her as having any name at all still. And for me there's the finality of knowing this will be my last baby, so I feel a certain pressure to get it all "right", a sort of FOMO for the names we'll never use that makes me hesitate over the one we did. It may be that none of this applies to you, just sharing my thoughts from a similar situation.

In my experience, this is totally normal. I’ve never experienced ppd, and out of 5 kids I’ve only had one name feel perfect from the get-go. Funnily enough it was the only one where I named her something, expecting to call her by a nickname, and the full name is what stuck from the beginning. Sometimes it just takes awhile for a kid to grow into their name. One of my kids I went back and forth on was even one of my oldest, who has a name I had picked out years before she was even a twinkle, and my youngest is five YEARS and I still get wishy-washy with the name we picked, but I also couldn’t truly imagine her being anything else.

On age-ability, I think Milo is a name that can age well; I can imagine an adult, successful, networked male with this name. It might actually be good for networking because it’s not a name you hear often and it doesn’t just sound like a kiddy nickname or a shortened version of a “more sophisticated” name. But I agree with another poster that if that’s the only thing bothering you about this name and it’s not something you think you’ll get over, find a name that Milo can be a short form for and put that name on the official records.

I like both Milo and Noah (know of one Milo and three Noah’s). I bet your baby really suits the name too. It’s nice and modern sounding but not too out there. I wouldn’t worry about wearability for an adult etc - that’s his name and I’m sure he’ll own it very well.

I had some name regrets with my youngest too. We had a very similar experience, of choosing between two names, and we chose one because our family abroad mispronounced the other very sightly when we mentioned it to them. I regretted it for a while, although my husband didn’t, and the name we went with is a lovely one and I’m perfectly happy with it now, 5years later. And we put in the other name as one of two middle names.

I work with little kids and Noah’s are a dime a dozen at the moment, so I think you make a good choice. Milo is a lovely name!

I love the name Milo and wanted to call my son it - but he was born when the Tweenies were popular so we went for something different. I always wish though I’d gone for it!

@PostpartumPolly 👋 I had a similar issue in that I loved one name- let’s say Danny- which could be Dan or Daniel etc but would be Daniel on BC but known as Danny. But DH didn’t like it (his middle name) and so we moved onto a more “meh” name that we didn’t dislike but didn’t love- say, Fraser. Now the pregnancy was of an unknown sex - so we also had a girl name- Anna. So baby Fraser was born and we went with his name but for around 8/9 months I felt he was a Danny and would have suited it better and tended to call him Baba rather than Fraser. And the pregnancy I saw as Anna or Danny FFS and struggled to think of it as Fraser.

BUT. When Fraser began to respond to his name and become more of a person and less of a baby- he suddenly became his name to me. And now he is 11 and prefers his name and says he’s glad to not be “Danny”. But I deffo felt weird about it for a while…

Thank you all so much for your responses - they have genuinely made me feel a lot better! Sorry I can’t reply to you all individually. It’s funny a few of you mentioned referring back to the scan picture as that’s actually what made me realise I feel disconnected from the pregnancy. We have a picture of our 4D scan out in our bedroom, and I realised that when I looked at the scan I just see Noah and not Milo.

Sorry if I came across as just making a drama out of nothing. It was just playing on my mind a lot and it’s not something I want to share with people I know as I feel awful saying I’ve had doubts about DS’s name, so thought this would be the best place for some advice! I know people have much bigger problems so sorry about that.

It makes me feel a lot better that a few of you have experienced similar feelings. I did always think that if Milo didn’t like Milo he could go by Miles or his middle name which is a very classic, fairly popular name which some of you have suggested. You have all eased my mind regarding my age concerns, so thank you for that.

Exactly THIS!!! Completely agree with the pressure to get it right and the FOMO. It’s unlikely we’ll have another baby now, so I also think the fact we’ll never use the other names we talked about play on my mind.

Totally prefer Milo

my son is called Kellan (pronounced like helen with a K🤦🏻‍♀️) I loved it when pregnant, then regretted it for around 2 years, it’s uncommon and I was constantly having to explain how to pronounce his name and having the “ow that’s an unusual name” when I’d introduce him. However as soon as he started school, made his own friends and our wider circle got used to it his name has become so normal to us that we couldn’t imagine him as anything else and I’ve fallen back in love with his name. The issue is worrying too much of what others will think

My adult SS is a Milo and it works well as an adult name. I'm not so keen on Noah but can see your dilemma linked to your pregnancy. My husband is known as a different name to his given name so you could always have Noah as an alternative or add it as a middle name.

I'm glad we have collectively eased your mind and it's not strange for you to have these doubts
I was one who said I felt disconnected and tried to relate to the scan
When he was born, he was just " my" Lucas