Please help me like this name!

Boy Names
1

I have a feeling this is going to be long, so please hang in there with me…

My husband and I are expecting our first child, a boy, in [name]September[/name]. We have extremely different tastes in names, and I really don’t like many boys’ names at all. We’ve discussed names on and off for years and have a name picked out for this child. However, I’m really not excited about it. My husband thinks that every name should be a family name (his family has loads of people for centuries with the same names), and family names are just not important in my family. I think that a name should be meaningful, but it doesn’t have to be found on one’s family tree. We’d agreed on some non-family names for a girl, but low and behold, we found at at 15 weeks that we are having a boy. My husband has started calling the baby by the name we picked out, and I need to learn to like this name because I think it’s sticking fast.

The name is [name]George[/name] [name]Anthony[/name], and the baby will go by [name]Anthony[/name].

[name]George[/name] is not negotiable as a first name. My husband really wanted a junior, and I hate my husband’s middle name and would never have chosen [name]George[/name], except that it’s my husband’s name. Our compromise is that the baby gets my husband’s first name but will be called by a different middle name.

However, my husband really wanted the middle name to be a family name, since he isn’t getting his “junior.” [name]Anthony[/name] was my great-grandfather’s middle name.

I know I should like [name]Anthony[/name] because it was my grandmother’s father’s name. My grandmother was sick in the hospital when I got married and passed away shortly after I got back from my honeymoon. I was born on the date of her father’s death. My grandmother and I always had a special relationship, and I wish so much she were here to see me have my first child.

I also sometimes think [name]George[/name] [name]Anthony[/name] is cute, but I’m just not excited about it like I was about the girls’ names we liked. I don’t want to have a child whose name I only have tepid feelings for. My husband says I’ll love the name when our child has it, but I’m not so sure.

I’ve even thought about calling the baby “[name]George[/name] [name]Anthony[/name]” (yes, I live in the south: double names aren’t super-common on boys, but they’re not unheard of), but I’m worried that later in life, he’ll drop the name down to just [name]George[/name] (and people throughout his childhood will be even more likely to mistakenly call him just [name]George[/name]), which is exactly what I don’t want. I know there’s a chance of this anyway, but I’d rather he not go by my husband’s name, which isn’t one of my favorites anyway (I feel terrible for saying I don’t love my husband’s name!).

So, enough rambling. Please tell me why [name]George[/name] [name]Anthony[/name], especially [name]Anthony[/name], is such a great name. I’ve got to love this name, or else it’s back to the drawing board, and onto a huge fight with the husband. :frowning:

2

I am sorry for your situation. But I have to aks, since your husband gets the first name choice, why do you not to pick the middle name? This does not seem at all fair to you. If you are not in love with [name]Anthony[/name], do not use it. I don’t imagine there is a lot we can say online to convince you of the merrits of [name]Anthony[/name] that you would already know about as it is a common name you have heard all your life. This is your chance to influence this baby’s name. [name]Do[/name] not agree now and feel name regret later.

My advice is to convince your husband that you need to wait until much closer to the birth to officially decide on the baby’s full name and that you do not want the name announced prematurely. If you do not do this, you will feel stuck and stressed.

Once you have time and ther pressure is off, then you can feel more free to consider a variety of names, some of which may have importance to either side of the family based on family names, variants, place names, shared experiences…

Best of luck!

3

Well, I can tell you a lot of good stuff about the names [name]George[/name] and [name]Anthony[/name]:

  • If you call him [name]Anthony[/name], he will probably always go by [name]Anthony[/name]. (Maybe bear in mind that if, when he’s older, he prefers [name]George[/name] or a nickname like Ant or [name]Anton[/name] he might start going by that.)

  • [name]Both[/name] [name]George[/name] and [name]Anthony[/name] are classic, casual yet respectable names that will never hinder him in life. They will be taken seriously, but they are very approachable names, [name]IMO[/name].

  • They are not spelled kreeaytivelee, they have history and endless cool references.

  • The names have stayed consistent in popularity, so they will never become “old man, can’t imagine on a child” names or “little boy, can’t imagine on a grown man” names.

  • They honour family members which is always lovely. I have never been fond of the name [name]Micaela[/name] but my grandfather is [name]Michael[/name] so I would seriously consider using it one day.

  • [name]George[/name] has the nickname [name]Geo[/name], [name]Anthony[/name] has the nicknames [name]Anton[/name], [name]Andy[/name], and Ant, and [name]Tony[/name]. Or he could just be [name]Anthony[/name].

  • They are easy to pronounce and spell.

But… I would say that if you are truly uncomfortable with the name, you should say something and begin a compromise. You don’t have to argue. [name]Just[/name] discuss and compromise. Could, perhaps, a second middle name be negotiated? [name]Just[/name] an idea. I agree with Lynae that it’s not fair he gets to pick the first name yet still has power over the middle name.

4

Oh, but [name]George[/name] is such a handsome, noble name. I know a dashing young man who goes by the double [name]George[/name]-FamilyName, but when he was a little guy he was just “[name]Georgie[/name].” Now that he’s approaching adolescence, he can use the full adult version. [name]Anthony[/name] doesn’t excite me much, but [name]George[/name]… oh, now, [name]George[/name] is someone you can trust. He’s fun, he’s energetic, he’s just a good guy.

5

I agree with the previous comments. If the baby is getting your husband’s first name, shouldn’t that count as the family name? Couldn’t you pick something you both like for the middle? I know it can be very difficult to come to a compromise! Good luck :slight_smile:

6

Your situation sounds very one-sided. I agree that if the first name “has” to be [name]George[/name], you should get to pick any middle name you want. You and your husband should ideally both love the name of your baby. DH and I had a very hard time naming our boys, but we both compromised and came up with names we both like even though it took 8 months to get there.

7

OK, it seems that there’s some misunderstanding here, and it is a complex situation. Tell me if I’ve got this right: [name]Anthony[/name] is YOUR family’s name, but your husband is the one who cares about family names so that’s why you’re using it. And though you don’t really like [name]Anthony[/name], it was the name you disliked least from your side of the family, correct?

Here’s my take on the whole situation. Your husband got to pick the [name]George[/name], in honor of himself. And since [name]George[/name] IS obviously a family name, to my mind that covers that base too.

The second name is your choice, period. You get to pick from all the names in the universe, not just the names in your family. And your great-grandfather’s middle name? That’s a pretty tenuous claim to being a family name and so it hardly even counts. If it was a surname for generations on your mother’s side that was in danger of extinction, or the first name of all the first sons all the way back on your father’s side, okay, then it’s got power aside from whether you like it as a name. But sorry, great-grandpa’s middle name is just not in that class.

So I think you have strong reasons to let [name]Anthony[/name] go and to pick another middle name for your son, a name that after all will be virtually his first name. But now you’ve got to find one that you really love!!! And that has some kind of meaning to you that stands up against your husband’s feelings about names. Because I guess you didn’t have that, you ended up in this predicament.

So let’s focus on finding a better name, one you’re more excited about, and then if you really can’t, you might end up feeling better about [name]Anthony[/name]…or even going with [name]Junior[/name].

8

Yep - what [name]Pam[/name] said!

You said that family names are not that important in your family and they are in your husbands family. That does not mean names in general are not important to you as the mother of your children! Stand up for your interests in the joint venture.

9

I agree with [name]Pam[/name]'s suggestion of working on finding a name you can get more excited about but I just wanted to add that I know a [name]George[/name] [name]Anthony[/name]. Our close family friends growing up had a boy a few years younger than me named [name]George[/name] [name]Anthony[/name]. [name]George[/name] was his dad’s name and he was NEVER called [name]George[/name], that I heard. He was always [name]Anthony[/name] to us and sometimes his parents or siblings would call him [name]George[/name] [name]Anthony[/name]. Never [name]George[/name], though. Now he’s all grown up and I think he just goes by [name]Anthony[/name] (though his family might still use “[name]George[/name] [name]Anthony[/name]” from time to time).

[name]Just[/name] wanted to add that in! I like the name because [name]Anthony[/name] is a great kid so it conjures warm feelings for me but if it’s not for you then I completely understand looking elsewhere!

10

I completely agree with [name]Pam[/name]. If [name]George[/name] is the first name (which I love, BTW), then you choose the middle. A possible compromise is to use a middle name that begins with the same letter as an important family name (this is done frequently in Jewish families).

What style of names are you fond of?
blankigirl

11

Thank you all so much (especially [name]Pam[/name]!) for your help and for better articulating the way I’m already feeling about the situation. My husband and I have already agreed not to announce baby’s name anytime soon (we might even wait until birth…), so that is not a big issue. I don’t want to feel like my baby has already been named even though I’m only 19 weeks. As I mentioned, I just don’t love many boys’ names, but I’ll list a few that I like (they are all over the place!) and mention any hesitations I have about them.

Names that are tempting, but just too “out-there” (to me) to give a real, live human boy:
[name]Ambrose[/name] (cool, but a little clunky)
[name]Aubrey[/name] (gone to the girls)
[name]Etienne[/name] (too French and hard to pronounce for most Americans…but boy, do I love French names!)

More traditional names:
[name]Michael[/name] (so popular…and then there’s the pop star, [name]George[/name] [name]Michael[/name], so that won’t work!)
[name]Thomas[/name] (lovely, but this is my father’s name, and I don’t want to name a baby after him for a variety of reasons)
[name]Julian[/name] (husband likes this but would call him “[name]Jules[/name],” which is too girly to me!)
[name]Dominic[/name] (husband doesn’t like)
[name]Benedict[/name] (husband suggested this, but I think he will inevitably go by “[name]Ben[/name],” which I don’t like. Also, my cousin’s baby is “[name]Ben[/name],” and my family is pretty close.)

“Cooler” names (I don’t even know what to call this category)
[name]August[/name] (husband doesn’t like, but suggests [name]Augustine[/name] as an alternative. The Francophone in me says that [name]Augustine[/name] is feminine.)
[name]Hugo[/name] (love it, but think it will become trendy because of the movie. Also, I love nineteenth-century literature, so this seems appropriate, but [name]Victor[/name] [name]Hugo[/name] just isn’t my favorite)
[name]Roman[/name] (love it, but can’t get husband behind it…)

Any ideas for baby [name]George[/name]'s middle name, Berries? Thank you!

12

[name]How[/name] about [name]Antoine[/name] or [name]Andre[/name]?

13

What about [name]Augusten[/name] instead of [name]Augustine[/name]? [name]Jude[/name] instead of [name]Julian[/name]? [name]Micah[/name] or [name]Malachi[/name] for [name]Michael[/name]?

14

You say you love [name]Roman[/name] with no hesitations, so maybe try to get husband to like it. In my experience men are best convinced by a damsel in distress. [name]Just[/name] bat your eyes and effect a childlike helplessness about your despair over not using [name]Roman[/name] or [name]August[/name] or whatever your choice is. Maybe it will work.
I love [name]Thomas[/name] personally. What about [name]Julian[/name] and call him [name]Jude[/name]?

15

I don’t have this problem. I already made it clear to my fiance’ that I am giving birth to the baby so I get the first choice in names and he gets to pick from my list. Since he is such a relaxed guy, this wasn’t a problem, but from the sounds of it, your DH doesn’t seem to be very easy-going. I’d just make a point that he got to pick the first name and so you get to pick the middle name, no approval needed. That seems fair to me since you didn’t get any say in the first name. I guess if you plan on having another kid, you could suck it up and claim dibs on naming the 2nd child?

16

I have definitely thought of making the bargain that if he gets to name this kid, I should get to name #2, but I just don’t think it will work out that way. I was the one who suggested [name]Anthony[/name] ages ago (because he was so insistent about family names), though now that there is a real baby in the picture, I’m sorry I did. I have tried both the arguments that I am having the baby and that the baby is getting his last name, but to no avail. DH is usually pretty easy-going, but not about this! I think I am going to work on a list of middle names over the weekend and get back to you all for more help. I need to come up with a list to give DH if I’m going to convince him to take me seriously when I tell him I don’t care for this name combo.

Thanks for your help, everyone!

17

If you want him to take it seriously, you could threaten to just not have a baby… although that might be considered extreme and I don’t personally recommend it, but maybe suggesting seeing a therapist/psychiatrist about the issue will freak him out enough to make him talk… normally guys try to avoid those…

18

I like [name]Etienne[/name] a lot, and I don’t think it would be too hard to pronounce. I guess I did take French in school, but I still don’t think it’s too exotic. [name]Roman[/name] is nice as well. I think you should definitely do with something that you like for the middle name, especially if that’s your contribution. Since you are respecting your husband’s style (family names only) for the first name he should be able to compromise on the middle and respect your style (not necessarily family names). I was going to try to say something positive when I first saw this post, but my husband’s name is [name]Anthony[/name] and he HATES it. Sorry. He was always one of 5 on baseball teams or in class and was called [name]Tony[/name] all the time against his wishes, or he had to be [name]Anthony[/name] S. I’m sure there are plenty of guys out there who like it on themselves though :slight_smile: I think my husband just thinks he’s too special for such a common name. Btw, I do like [name]George[/name]. [name]George[/name] [name]Roman[/name] sounds very strong.