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FYI this post was sitting in my drafts, written months ago.
Choosing your baby’s name can either be easy and quick or a little stressful, especially if you and your partner find it difficult to agree. You’re essentially picking a huge part of your child’s identity, how people may perceive them. You know we still live in a very prejudice world, where a person can be judged solely on their name alone. As a black woman with a black son, I definitely took this in to consideration when choosing my baby’s name. The moment you decide on the name for your little one will undoubtedly be a very special moment.
This past week I took my son back to playgroup again – after the summer break – and I was asked a question I knew I would be eventually asked at some point.
“Are you a fan of the X-Men?” For some context my son’s name is Xavier.
I’d never met this woman before and I was feeling a little anxious with the environment being busier than usual so she caught me off guard, I just replied “Me and my husband just really liked the name, we picked it before he was born” Do people really name their children after fictional characters in movies? I guess they do.
Before me and my husband got married, we already had both a boy and girl name picked out to use for whenever I may get pregnant in the future. We wanted a name that was unique and went well with our last name, something strong, basically a cool name. So, when we chose my sons name, we wanted something different but not too out there. I’ve had people misspell and mispronounce my name all my life so I didn’t want that for my son. Unfortunately, this has been happening since he was born; who knew Xavier was so hard to pronounce.
Once we announced we were having a little boy, I had family and work colleagues all asking what our baby’s name would be but we decided to keep it a secret until he was born. Several people said to me “What if he doesn’t look like his name once he’s born?” I said “Well tough, that’s going to be his name” Lol I truly meant this, but thankfully his name suits him perfectly.
I will say picking our babies name before he was born helped me bond with my bump more, which is something I struggled with, I would talk to him and use his name. We even went as far as giving him a nickname, my hubby said it one day and it just stuck.
If I have another child and it’s a girl, we already know what we will be naming her. We are yet to agree on another boy name – but there’s plenty of time for that. If that time does come for us.
If you’re finding it tricky to choose a name for your child, the list of books below will offer some inspiration:
2. 100,000+ Baby Names, The Most Helpful, complete and up-to-date name book
3. The Name Book – Over 10,000 Names, Their Meanings, Origins and Spiritual Significance
What are your thoughts, did you or would you wait until your baby was/is born to name them? Or should you have a chosen name or list beforehand?
I’m intrigued to know, lets discuss in the comments.
Lerissa x
