We had a discussion about possible future children and decided to try for another in 2.5 years, circumstances allowing, and agreed on names for each gender. I know it’s a very common thing to do, but I was adamant that we not fully settle on a name before meeting the baby the first time around. It was also pretty heavily anxiety based. This time though, I feel like it might make it easier to connect with the baby before it’s born. It happened on its own with [name]Ivan[/name], which was terrifying for me.
I’m really happy that we waited to name [name]Ivan[/name] because we were pretty attached to [name]Odin[/name] before we met him. I know that if we had been calling my bump [name]Odin[/name], or worse, told people, I would have put so much pressure on myself to use it regardless.
Has anyone switched the naming process? Did you end up using the name you chose way ahead of time or renaming them when you met?
By dint of cultural tradition, I knew as soon as I agreed to marry my husband that our first son would be named [name]Antoine[/name]. It’s funny, for a lifelong onomast, my first pregnancy was rather anticlimactic from a naming perspective as the decision was ironclad.
For this second, I feel free to be completely capricious and change my mind at the last minute, though I’m a very decisive person and likely will not.
Whatever you do (choose the name ahead of time or wait and meet the baby), you probably should NOT tell anyone the baby’s name before he/she is born.
My sister told everyone she was naming her first son [name]Colin[/name] (my dad was seriously introducing her bump to his friends by name), and then she and her husband changed there minds and named him [name]Daniel[/name] so he would have the same initials as his dad. They’re both nice names, don’t get me wrong, but we weren’t expecting a surprise. She also ended up feeling like she couldn’t use the name [name]Colin[/name] for her second son because of the whole situation, so she named him [name]Cole[/name] instead (similar, but different) and our mom still doesn’t like it.
My best friend also asked for tons of naming advice/opinions while she was pregnant with her daughter. Literally EVERYONE she asked was singing the praises of this one name, and then when the baby was born she named her something completely different (that she had told me her boyfriend had already vetoed). Everyone said they loved the name, but you could just tell they were a little disappointed that she didn’t pick the name everyone was so excited about at the baby shower.
When we were expecting our daughter, we didn’t know whether we were having a boy or a girl. We had names picked out for both (a boy name that is pretty much set in stone and a couple of girl options), but if anyone asked we told them we were still thinking about it. We’re considering finding out the gender with baby #2 just to have a different experience, but we probably won’t share any names until the baby is born even it’s a boy. I’m 99% sure we would use the name we have had picked out forever, but you never know.