I’ve chimed in on here lots throughout the last few years and birth of my two daughters.
My first born is named Leni. We AODRE her name. I have so much pride in it and it’s one of those names I never thought twice about.
We STRUGGLED naming our second. It honestly consumed me in a way that caused so much stress.
We had decided on Frances early on, which we’ve always loved and right away was an easy agreed pick. Halfway through my pregnancy, a friend of mine (who I’m no longer close with, to boot) told me essentially I shouldn’t use Frances. That she was seeing it pop up a lot amongst her work clients and friends and it was such a common, cliche name. Me being me, I immediately nixed the name and told my husband we couldn’t use it.
We also always loved Lou. It was the second contender to Leni, but I was adamant not to have two back to back L names. Leni and Lou sounded a bit too cutesy to me. My husband really wanted this name and tried to fight for it. I felt really attached to it and sad to let it go, but also sure that I would regret it later next to Leni.
I then found Ines and thought it was the one. My family is from Spain and I liked the fact that it was a Spanish name, but also unique and beautiful. My husband tried to get on board but ultimately it wasn’t really his vibe and I have to admit, he kind of butchered it every time he said it 
“ANEZ.”
Basically a few weeks before birth, I stumbled upon Ruth. I liked that it was one syllable next to Leni (two syllables). It had this like old, Jewish lady vibe that I thought was cute in an unexpected way, even though it’s not really the style of name we personally are drawn to. I liked that we could call her Ru for short and thought that was such a fun nickname.
When our second was born, we waited a week and went back and forth between Lou and Ruth. In the end, we picked Ruth, but clearly told everyone to refer to her as Ru.
After two weeks, we (aka me**) started questioning Ruth. I noticed I wanted everyone to only use Ru, so then asked myself what the point of Ruth was. We decided to officially name her Ru. My husband gave me Ines for her middle. Ru Ines is her name.
Ru is 7 months now and I fixate on her name relentlessly. I teeter weekly; some days, I really do love her name and think it’s super unique and special without being too over the top. Other days, I hate it and think it’s so silly and I question why out of all the names we could have given her, we picked Ru. It was kind of impulsive and last minute and I was grasping to find something.
I ask my husband all the time if we can change Ru’s name to Ines Ru, and that way we could keep calling her Ru as a nickname and no one would even have to know. He gets really upset when I ask and says he loves Ru so much. His name is Kevin and he always says he wishes he had an interesting name with character to it. He thinks her name is so fitting for who she is. Plus he doesn’t love Ines as a first.
We knew we wanted three kids but of course didn’t know what we’d end up having, gender wise. We are now expecting our third, another girl. I’m 17 weeks and due early September. We’ve decided to name this baby Frances Mars, which we both feel so good about.
I find myself now regretting not naming Ru, Frances. I regret so badly listening to one person who’s opinion shouldn’t have mattered, and ignoring my own feeling, which was knowing I love the name, regardless of if it’s popular or overused or whatever (which it also isn’t even any of those things 
). Had we used Frances in the middle, for our second, as initially planned, then I could have named this third baby Lou and gotten to use two of my fav names and all would have worked out perfectly fly. I still would love to use Lou, I just didn’t want it directly beside Leni.
I don’t know what to do. I’m extremely indecisive so my husband often says this is just what I do and I’m fixating but will get over it. But I find the fact I’m still thinking about it now is for a valid reason and I don’t know if I’ll ever confidently love her name.
We are moving to a diff province in two weeks and I feel like it would be a good opportunity to change her name, since we could just introduce her as whatever we want to call her to new people there and not have to explain. But I also feel self conscious and like I would be so embarrassed to have to tell all our friends and family. Not to mention, there’s now Leni to think about and we would have to explain to her that her sister isn’t Ru anymore, which would be confusing. Leni, who is almost 2, calls her Ruru and it’s very cute.
The easiest thing would be keep it as Ru, or change to Ines Ru and only tell people we want to. But Kev isn’t okay with Ines.
The hard thing but what would make me happiest would be to change her name to Frances, and name the third Lou. But is that crazy?
Will this pass? Sometimes I adore Ruru and her one-of-a-kind name. Kevin thinks it’s the best. I’m unsure…
I’m equal parts wanting reassurance that Ru is great and not a millennial mistake like “Starship” or “Blueberry”, but equally wanting validation that changing her name would be fine and people would forget in no time and move on like it never happened.
What would you do?
