I am curious to hear your thoughts on passing on your own name to your daughter.
Would you consider it? [name_f]Do[/name_f] you know anyone who has done it?
What happens if you do it, make yourself a Sr and then some time down the road, your [name_m]Jr[/name_m] decides to get married and take her husband’s name - are you still [name_m]Jr[/name_m] and Sr? Can she pass on the name to her daughter and have an [name_f]Isabel[/name_f] III? Or does everything go out the window once there is a change in last name?
Of course, men can change their names as well and take on their wife’s name, but admittedly that’s still far from the rule.
I have one friend who did this. It surprised me and I thought it was a great idea.
Now, contemplating my own naming options, I’ve discovered that I really like my own name- so much that I’d hope to have a granddaughter with that name some day. Until I realized that I totally have the option to just do it myself if I end up having a daughter.
I don’t have an issue with parents naming their children after themselves. I find it very odd that others do. I’ll admit that [name_m]George[/name_m] Foreman took it to an extreme, but I don’t think that naming a child after yourself is an indicator of narcissism or lack of creativity or any of the other accusations I see hurled around the forums.
I wouldn’t purely for confusion’s sake ([name_f]Isabel[/name_f]! Wait, which one?), but I’d definitely use my own name as a middle name if I loved it. Unfortunately I don’t, but I do plan on using a variant of my name as a middle name for a daughter - and I plan on using my husband’s name as a middle name for a son.
I don’t even like it on guys. Your kid deserves their own identity and this cuts it off. Grandparents, aunties, uncles etc. I get because it usually honors the deceased but your own name absolutely not.
I know a mother and daughter both called [name_f]Julia[/name_f]. I always thought it was a little bit weird, but then the convention of naming sons after their father and adding [name_m]Jr[/name_m]., III, IV, etc. after the name is virtually unheard of in the UK today. I don’t know any boys or men with the same given name as their fathers, though lots (like my eldest brother and DH) have their father’s name in the middle.
I think it only struck me as odd in the case of the [name_m]Julias[/name_m] because it’s such an unusual thing to do over here full-stop. I would have been just as surprised to meet a father and son both called [name_m]Julian[/name_m]. I don’t see anything wrong with it though, especially if you actually, genuinely like your name and want to use it. I’m sure any confusion that resulted could be easily solved by using different nicknames or middle names or whatever. I think there’s a berry who has a daughter named for her father - same exact name - but they call her [name_f]Junie[/name_f] (short for [name_m]Jr[/name_m].). I thought that was very creative and very sweet!
Eh, I’m not terribly fond of it for both men and women. My grandmother named my mother after herself, same middle name and everything, just (my grandpa named her brother exactly after himself as well). It just seems tacky to name a child after yourself, unless there is a situation of that particular parent having passed away. If anything, honor names should be used in the middle, in my opinion. It’s confusing to have a child and a parent with the same name, and oftentimes, someone has to go by a nickname, so don’t get known by their true name anyway.
You pose an interesting question. I think that a male [name_m]Junior[/name_m] (or Third, etc) will always remain that, unless they change their surname. A female one will cease to be one if she changes her surname. A true junior is one that has the same first, middle, and last name as the parent he or she is named for. If you change part of that name, you change the suffix.
@southern.maple, I’ll admit, I do often think it is a bit lazy, but simply because people sometimes just do it ‘just because’, as if there were no other options. In most of the cases of juniors I know, the other parent felt a lot of regret because they didn’t get to use a name they truly liked because their choice was taken away by the ‘senior’. Not every case is like that, but many are. My own grandparents did it just out of pure laziness, and they admit it. With both children, they just didn’t want to be bothered with finding a name for their kids. My grandma figured she would just write her own name on the child’s birth certificate because she was used to it anyway and decided she may as well bask in the controversy. So when they had their son, grandpa did the same thing because “that’s just what men did”. People have different reasons and I’m not going to tell someone what they should do but I do still have an opinion on it sometimes. I just share when asked
I’m not a huge fan of naming a child after yourself period, but I know for a lot of people it’s an important tradition. It’s just not for me. Plus I’m not even a big fan of my own name - it’s alright, just not something I would give to my child, and I have way too many other names that I would love to use first!
But hey, men do it all the time (& Lorelai did it on Gilmore Girls!) so why not? If you are going to name a kid after yourself I do think it works better for everyone if it’s a name with multiple nicknames, to avoid the confusion of the whole Jr/Sr thing in everyday life. So, for example, if your name is Margaret and you only go by the full name, your daughter could be Margaret Jr who only goes by Maggie. Or Lorelai or Rory and so on.
I agree with this. Using your first name as the child’s middle name (or vice versa), yes. Exact same name, no (not just for reasons of their own identity, but also considering the practical issues of document mix-ups, etc. later on).
I think it’s confusing, and in general it’s not my speed.
Naming for deceased relatives is a very special thing to do, to perpetuate their memory and such, but naming for one’s self is a bit much in my opinion.
Why shouldn’t the new person have his/her own name???
My great grandmother’s name is [name_f]Clara[/name_f]. My great grandfather’s name was [name_m]George[/name_m]. Together they had twelve children, six girls and six boys. One daughter was named [name_f]Clara[/name_f] and one son was named [name_m]George[/name_m]. So yes, I think it’s fine.
The women in my father’s family (his mother’s side) were big fans of this. Aunt [name_u]Bernie[/name_u] named her daughter [name_f]Bernadette[/name_f], Aunt [name_f]Mary[/name_f] named her daughter [name_f]Mary[/name_f], his cousin [name_f]Mary[/name_f] (who goes by [name_f]Honey[/name_f] who was named after her mother [name_f]Mary[/name_f]) named on of her daughters [name_f]MaryAnne[/name_f], and his cousin [name_f]Sheila[/name_f] named her daughter [name_f]Sheila[/name_f]. [name_f]Mary[/name_f] and [name_f]Sheila[/name_f] were called [name_m]Little[/name_m] [name_f]Mary[/name_f] and [name_m]Little[/name_m] [name_f]Sheila[/name_f].
My grandmother was one of 6 girls so they named daughters after each other. There are a lot of Annes, [name_f]Marys[/name_f], and Margarets in my dad’s family.
I really dislike reusing the parents first names for the children’s first names on both genders. However- I love the idea of giving your child a name that honors you in some way. I personally love looking at birth months/ stones/ flowers/ colors to draw inspiration from. I also love names that mean “descendant of (insert strong word here)”. I think children should be allowed the opportunity to form their own identity without being so strongly associated with other people. I also think its an outdated and unnecessary tradition that causes extra confusion.
I can’t see why not! I don’t see any problem with that. I just wouldn’t do it. I [name_u]LOVE[/name_u] my name, [name_f]Carolina[/name_f], after my great-grandmother, but I would never call my daughter the same, mostly because I love so many other names and I’m not big on repeating names… My family already has lots of repeated names (mainly because I live in a very traditional country where there is not much variety), it’s not confusing nor problematic, it’s just boring.
If you can do it for boys, why not for girls? I personally don’t love the idea of the exact same name but I do like the idea of honor names or similar/same middles. My boyfriend is a [name_m]Junior[/name_m] and he wants a [name_m]Kevin[/name_m] the third bad. He’s always explained it to me as that the fact him and his father were both named [name_m]Kevin[/name_m] made him feel closer to his father and he would love that for him and his future son. It does cause a lot of confusion, but it does really mean something to him so one day I may consider it if he is really something that is that important to him. I would probably call him by a different nickname though to differentiate between the 3.
I’m not really a fan of giving a child the same name as either parent, just because it makes things confusing sometimes. We have shared family names on both sides of the familu, and there’s always confusion! I also don’t love using names of deceased relatives, but I understand that more. That being said, I’m tentatively planning on giving my daughter my middle name, but I feel like I’m passing it on to her instead of naming her after myself, if that makes sense. I don’t mind family names at all in the middle, but I feel like my child should be entitled to their own unique first name that they don’t have to share with anyone.
Interesting! Thank you for all your comments so far.
Some thoughts to add:
When my friend named her daughter after herself, I believe there was a sort of feminist motivation behind it. It still seems pretty common for the men I know to do it, but she was the first woman I’ve met who has done it.
Another friend of mine named her son after his dad, so the [name_m]Luke[/name_m] line would be carried on. The baby is now [name_m]Luke[/name_m] IV, which I really like in a way. But they gave him a different middle name and call him by that, so there is no confusion. Although I do think they’re kind of breaking the rules here with the mn, no?
I’m not really a fan, on a practical level, for paperwork, etc. My husband would absolutely refuse to have a child named after himself, but would be happy to honor a grandparent or parent.
I’m not a fan. I love my name, though, and it is difficult to avoid names like [name_m]Julien[/name_m] and [name_m]Julian[/name_m] and [name_f]Juliet[/name_f] and [name_u]June[/name_u] because everybody calls me [name_u]Jules[/name_u] or [name_u]Julie[/name_u], so I wouldn’t do that. Luckily, I love so many names.
I’m afraid I really don’t like it, for either gender. If the other parent wants to honor their spouse/partner with baby’s name in some less direct way, I do understand and think that can be cool. But yes I admit I do not understand the impulse to make your child have the same exact name identity as yourself. I guess many parents try to make their children be like them in a lot of ways, from food to sports, hobbies, etc. But it’s important those things are shared for pure enjoyment, and if the child doesn’t enjoy them as much as the parent and is drawn to different things that needs to be perfectly okay. I think that’s why giving identical first names (same primary name identity) doesn’t sit well with me: it’s kind of the opposite of saying “Be who you are, don’t feel you must be like me, you are a unique individual.” Instead it seems to say “[name_f]Hope[/name_f] you’re not too much different than me.” I’m a pretty independent, free-spirited kind of person so I guess it sort of figures I’d feel this way. (?!)
Let’s just say I’d be sad if I went somewhere and heard something like, “First let’s meet [name_u]Lee[/name_u] and her daughter, [name_u]Lee[/name_u]. And here we have the [name_m]Smith[/name_m] family: [name_m]Tim[/name_m], [name_f]Pam[/name_f], [name_f]Pam[/name_f] and [name_m]Tim[/name_m]…” [name_m]Just[/name_m] very little scope for the imagination, as honorary Nameberry [name_f]Anne[/name_f] [name_f]Shirley[/name_f] would have said.
