Everyone else has already expressed my thoughts well and don’t have anything to add.
To reiterate, I think she should choose names she & her husband loves. If she can’t find any middle ground with variants of [name_f]Ann[/name_f], then break the tradition and find another name. And kindly tell her mother in law and anyone else who may be budding in that the name is ultimately the baby’s parents decision and that they don’t want to discuss names with anyone anymore.
No. There are some people I’m very close and look up to so I would love to honor them in some way but just can’t get pass really disliking their name, even for a middle. However, I have come up with more creative ideas on how I could honor these people if SO is inclined when the time comes. If I wanted to honor someone named [name_f]Ann[/name_f] for example, I would look at variants and similar sounding names such as [name_f]Anya[/name_f] and [name_f]Hannah[/name_f]. I would look up it’s meaning (in this case means Grace) and look for other names that mean [name_f]Grace[/name_f] or just use [name_f]Grace[/name_f] or [name_f]Gracelyn[/name_f] itself. Since [name_f]Ann[/name_f] is short, I eventually realized (someone in my family has a similar name) that I could find this name inside numerous other names such ariANNa, liliANa, oriANa, adriANNe, etc. In addition, while this doesn’t apply to Jen’s case because this really only applies to honoring a specific person and not to traditions, could also look at what they valued (ex [name_f]Amelia[/name_f] if they value and demonstrated hard work; Amy/Amabel/Amanda names if valued love), liked (ex [name_m]Archer[/name_m] if they were into Archery; [name_f]Delphine[/name_f] if their favorite animal was a dolphin; their alter name they go by online or used in a foreign language class), or anything of significance like birth month and stone. But at the end of the day, if I still can’t find anything I like, I won’t use it regardless of traditions, curses (some of my family are quite superstitious so I have seen the lengths they do in order to try to avoid bad luck), and what the family wants (I may not have kids yet but my mom is very pushy and insistant in general even after I became an adult so I’m quite familiar with constantly pushing back and standing ground).
If I’m trying to honor someone still living, I would want them to like the honor name so I would probably 1. Ask if they would like me to honor them and 2. If they would like the variant I would be using.
There’s also one side of my family who’s from a culture that typically doesn’t do honors. I’m not sure if they also hold this view or willing to give an exception for this person that was vital to the family’s success so I would probably ask them but not actually say which names we’re wanting to use.
Besides that, I also have a very long name list. If future SO can’t help me narrow it down, I’ve considered getting some thoughts from family. Still debating on it as I don’t want to and recognize it may end up causing more problems but might have to if the short list is too long. I already know there’s a few names on my list that my parents like so they shouldn’t try to veto all of them anyway. If I decide to gage their opinions, I would tell them that it would ultimately be up to me & SO and not them. I’m actually currently trying to gage their perceptions on some of the names now before ttc as I feel like they might be more adamant and pushy when I’m expecting because they will suddenly become aware that I’m actually seriously considering some of those names.
However I know many others struggle to come up with enough names they like. If that’s the case, I definitely wouldn’t discuss it with family or anyone really. Could consider asking the internet if there’s any important obvious negative associations that you overlooked but that’s about it.
