The Name Game

Like a lot of women, I've fantasized about the details of my future as a wife and mother since I was a little girl. What kind of wedding would I want, what would my husband be like, how many kids would we have. Many of us think about these things long before we are faced with the situations that require our actual decisions.

Sometimes what we think we might want when we are children or even as teenagers turns out to be different than we actually want when the time comes, and there are usually a good number of choices to be made that we had never even considered.

The nice thing about fantasies is that they can change and grow and evolve in your mind as often and for as long as you'd like, and you never have to pick just one. When the actual moment of truth is staring you in the face, when you have to pick apart the dreams and the musings of your youth, it can be very difficult to arrive at one definitive conclusion.

In my case, I can honestly say that picking a name for my child is one of the hardest decisions I have ever had to make.

It's not that I couldn't find plenty of names that I like. On the contrary, I have compiled a fairly extensive list over the years (which I will share with you in a future post). The problem is picking a first and middle name combination that a) sounds nice and flows well, both with each other and with his last name, b) is kind of unique and different but not too unique and different, and c) has what I call "positive nickname potential" - meaning that it provides for at least one or two good possible built-in nicknames, while at the same time offering few potentially embarrassing variations or other situations that could warrant ridicule from other children. Hey, this kid is going to have live with this name at least through his high school years (until he's old enough to legally change it, if he so chooses), and kids can be brutal. They will find plenty of ways to give each other a hard time, I don't want to give them extra ammunition by giving him a crappy name.

At the moment, we have reached a bit of a stand still. We have picked a first name that we are pretty definite about, but the middle name is giving us problems. My fiance and I have literally spent entire 45 minute car rides just saying names out loud, hoping to come across one that really "wow's" us. I am so desperate, in fact, that I have now posted a poll on my Facebook page listing all the possible middle name choices to let my family and friends vote on their favorites, in the hopes that their influence will at least help us narrow it down to a few. I will probably let the poll run until the end of April and see what we come up with.

I realize that technically this decisions does not have to be made until the baby is born, but for various reasons I would like to get a name picked sooner rather than later. I hope to have this baby named in full no later than Memorial Day.

Of course, I will keep you updated!