I am not thinking of changing my child’s name, however, there has been something brought to light that has soured the honor middle name we chose. Has this happened to you?
I’m so sorry to hear that. I guess I would recommend trying to find other associations for the name or using a variation of it.
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Hello
I’m so sorry that this has happened to you! I’m very fortunate that I’ve not experienced this that’s so tough.
Regarding changing that middle name I think it depends how much this name is soured does the information that’s come to light completely overrule the reason as to why you honoured that person in the first place? Of course this is a big question to contemplate so I would really consider this before changing the name. I would also think about whether this name is associated with your child/age of your child. If your child is 5 for example Knows their middle name I would reconsider the name change.
Good luck
This is why I wouldn’t use an honor name because you never truly know everything about a person and even some of the people who I thought were the greatest people ever have turned out to be someone I would never want to honor. But since what’s done is done and you have no intentions of changing your child’s name, I think it’s just important to think of why you love the name, separately from the person you were originally honoring. You don’t have to view it as an honor name anymore if you no longer wish to honor that person. And now that name belongs to your child, so it doesn’t matter what other associations are there, you love your child so that name has a new special meaning to it.
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In a way, yes.
Both of my son’s middle names are honor names. One of the names we used is tied to a particular person. Turns out they used pretty heavy physical discipline against some family members when they were kids. That wasn’t the person I knew. I don’t regret using the name but it has become, as you said, soured. I’m choosing to focus on the good and that this person did change over time.
I’m very hesitant to use honor names again. There are some names I love in both mine and my husband’s family trees but I don’t know how these people were… we may end up using the names because we like them but it wouldn’t be anything more than that.
Yes.
We named our unborn son [name_u]Owen[/name_u] [name_u]Michael[/name_u] [name_m]Russell[/name_m] in the early part of this century. I had loved the name [name_u]Owen[/name_u] deeply since first reading the [name_u]Anne[/name_u] of [name_u]Green[/name_u] Gables books as a young girl. [name_u]Owen[/name_u] a son would be.
Many years later I taught a high schooler named [name_u]Owen[/name_u] who was epically horrible (he and his mother both).
I would say that tainted the name for me. Now, had my [name_u]Owen[/name_u] gotten to be born, maybe it wouldn’t have.
[name_u]Or[/name_u] maybe it would. I can’t say.
It is a sadness, but [name_u]Owen[/name_u] my son remains, Owny as a nn in my mind. I believe I will meet him and [name_f]Cordelia[/name_f] in heaven.
But I wish I hadn’t met the bad [name_u]Owen[/name_u]!