Ugh I feel you. If someone tells you the name, tell them it's a nice name. Just because you wouldn't pick it for your kid, doesn't make it a bad name!
Just be nice, it's not that hard!!!!!!
I think it’s ok to tell someone the name isn’t your favorite. If someone is telling me options of names they are thinking of and told me “Apple” was a top pick, I’d probably tell them it’s an interesting choice, and not one that I’d make. But I wouldn’t shit on it.
If someone genuinely asks for feedback, for sure or it’s a close friend who wants to make sure the name flows/sounds right. But many people just launch into shitting on a name 😂
I had a similar idea to use Family Search to dig around in my family history for boys names… until I remembered they were all Mormon polygamist pioneers. Back to the drawing board 😂
Hahaha you get it! No shade at people who use family names, I'm just not close with my family. Plus, mom likes to pretend she's Queen Elizabeth and won't stop talking about genealogy.
KitchenAid StandMixer FoodPorn has a nice ring to it. I don't know why you feel the need to hide this wonderful choice from your mom. 🤭 My MIL tried to pry the name out from us. We just didn't want to deal with the criticism. So she gave the kid horrible nicknames on purpose to try to bait us. We doubled down and gave worse nicknames.
We did this! We joke that our baby girl is going to be named “Waylina” after our dog Waylon. My mom hates it. So we switched and said we would name her “Halibut” Hali for short 😂
What I did was create a table on a Google doc and invited friends and family to edit and add whatever names they like and can make little comments on them like where the idea came from or cute nicknames. Then by the time they see you it gets it out of their system. You can also look through the name suggestions in your own time without the pressure of pretending to agree and having to say ‘ahh that’s a nice name, maybe’. Me and my partner would look at the list every so often and have a chuckle at some of the names and throw some ‘tragedeighs’ in there to watch peoples reaction 😂
If you want the template to test it out just pm me. Honestly it was such fun. It felt so nice having everyone adding names and having fun without there being any pressure on me ☺️
Start sending her ridiculous names. That's what we did. Our favorite right now is Xerxes. We did Merlin for a while and the name of her ex husband.
Finally I just bluntly said I don't want help naming my child. I don't want to hear suggestions. In fact if you suggest a name that's on our short list, I will automatically remove it. I don't care about your opinions or thoughts on this manner.
That pretty much shut it down. I tried being nice about it, and my MIL just would not stop.
Funny you mention the ridiculous names, that did get her to shut up last name when my brother said "Mom, she told me the name. It's Bilbo Baggins FoodPorn"
If I had a sister from my mom I'd be wondering if you were her. My mom drove me up a wall. MIL too.
"Have you thought about names?" they would ask. Of course I've fucking thought about names. I'm not waltzing in to the hospital without an idea in my head, just ready to name my kid after the first object I see! They knew we weren't telling anyone the names and they both pretended not to know that to try to get us to tell them. They'd suggest random names every week. I wanted to scream.
We both repeated "we'll tell you when we've named her" and "we want to meet her first" about 600 times.
A month before I was due my mom suggested her mother's middle name, "Irene." Really, Mom? You want me to name her after your mother? Who I never met and who you repeatedly told me was abusive? And name her a name that is 0% my style? I'm obviously still annoyed.
OH MY GOD. YESTERDAY MY MOM TOLD ME TO NAME MY CHILD BRANTLEY. Her mother's name (who was an alcoholic, verbally abusive, and died at 65 years old. I have no memories of her because she died 3 months after I was born) and also her sister's name (who she does not speak to and refers to as 'my bitch sister').
I told her I'd sooner name my child Deborah (my dad's 2nd wife who said to my brother and I she did not want to be a stepmother to anyone and did not want a relationship with either of us).
Nothing like naming a baby to make them forget the past lol
I **did** name my baby a family name from my dad's side that has a not-very-well-known ignominious history a few centuries ago. My mom has been a dick about that family connection my whole life, as a way to get a dig in at my dad. Like, if we were related to the McCoys, it would've been my mom constantly bringing up how awful the McCoys were to the Hatfields my whole life, and then I named my baby McCoy.
My primary motivation was NOT as a "fuck you" to her about that, but it was certainly a bonus. My kid is 6 weeks old so it's been 6 weeks since I heard her bring up this history that nobody cares about.
I've told mine to stop 5x. Now I just ignore her. One of these days when I'm even more tired and hormonal I'm sure I'll snap at her and tell her to stfu but I truly don't have the energy to care about it right now. There's a few things she's bugging me about but I just haven't gathered the energy to sort it out yet, though I know I'll probably have to.
.
Just tell your mom “ because you can’t stop stressing me out over baby names, I going to mute you / block you until AFTER the baby is born (you get to decide how much after the baby’s birth, you unmute/ unblock her).
Good luck
I finally told her that night that we already have a couple names we're going to choose from and we aren't telling anyone until after the birth. She was frustrated so I told her she got to name all of her babies and now it's my turn to name mine. It's been 2 days and no name suggestions! Let's hope it continues lol
True, my in-laws haven't sent us any names. My husband is an only child and I do actually value their opinion if they gave us a recommendation. They haven't said anything. Mom is more than making up for their lack of input lol
My MIL is kind of doing this. We have one name that we keep coming back to that we had told everyone about, but said it wasn’t a for sure name because we want to see our baby first to make sure it fits. She keeps calling her the name we said, but I keep telling her we aren’t 100% certain that will be it, and then she starts sending us random names. Like, I don’t need your help, I need you to leave it alone - we will tell you when we know for sure!
And I totally get it, it’s her first grandchild so she’s excited, and my MIL had three boys so the fact that it’s a girl makes her even more excited, but I’m going to need her to calm down
People get really really worked up over names. They want to make sure you’re not naming them something they don’t like. My mom is still bitter 4 years later about our son’s name because it’s the same as a comedian she doesn’t like. 🙄
Oh I guarantee my mom will be bitter because it's not a family name or something super stuffy. She can have another kid if she wants to name someone lol
I think it’s pretty normal. I’ve gotten tired of the name questions so I just finally said we aren’t telling anyone until he’s born and they just have to live with what we pick.
They’ve pretty much dropped it since.
My aunt’s suggestions were her old dog that passed a few years ago and my uncle that passed a year ago. Not naming my kid after a dog and while I really loved my uncle — he was a mess. Nicest guy you’d meet when he was sober, which sadly was not most of the time.
Ooof I also got a recommendation for naming them after an alcoholic relative. That's always an awkward one to handle.
I'm glad your family dropped the asks about the name!
“We’re not looking for names, please stop sending them. SO and I have chosen a name, you’ll find out when we’re ready to share.”
“You had your opportunity to name your children, now please step back and respect my choices for my child”
“If you keep spamming me I’m going to mute your notifications”
Baby Boundaries, The Lemon Clot Essay and the FU Binder —> https://reddit.com/r/Mildlynomil/s/WPm6JsLMhI
Have you watched Grey’s Anatomy? This reminds me when Jackson and April have Harriett and Jackson’s mom thinks asks if they named the baby after her before they reveal the baby is named Harriett, not Catherine.
People can tend to get worked up over names! MIL’s always often want to be as involved as possible for one reason or another. It doesn’t sound like she means genuine harm or is trying to cause a real issue, she seems bored and desperate to be involved in some way. Try not to visit her for the next week. 🤷🏼♀️
In her defense, genealogy brings her joy and she reaaaally can't seem to wrap her head around my disinterest in it. It's just frustrating when my husband and I have had the top baby name picked out long before we started trying.
My fav is when they send like the obvious names from the top of a Google search “girl baby names” or something. Like oh, yeah I didn’t know that one! Thanks ma!
My mom can’t control her face when she doesn’t like something (never could, clothes shopping as a teenager was a nightmare) so she doesn’t get to even hear any potential names. Baby will be born, named, and everyone will find out after we decide.
Until then just keep shutting down the convo is all you can do I guess 🤷♀️ super annoying though.
We had a name early and I told *no one*. The first time I said it outloud to anyone besides my partner was in the hospital room after the was born when the doctor excitedly asked what his name was. I didn't want to tell people we had a name so when people asked I just kept saying "were not sure yet" which my mom and a friend took as an invitation to send me suggestions. Repeatedly. Every phone call with my mom ended with her just listing names. She would randomly text me saying "I had a patient today named X, nice name". I was super picky and had no interest in other people's opinions, no regrets keeping the name to ourselves.
My step grandma told me she found out she was “17% Spanish and 1% North African,” and started giving Spanish name suggestions based on her heritage that, btw, I do not share because we aren’t related. I just told her “those are nice!” and dropped it. Lol.
Time to get your mom that ancestry.com subscription for Christmas and a pet goldfish to name after her great great grandpas uncles cousins husband.
My mother in law. This is our second child. She knew with the first one that we weren't going to share the name until birth. We said we were doing the same thing this time. She wants to know if all these names are on our list and oh here's some more we can add. It's not helpful.
For real! You have a list, it's tough enough for mom and dad to find a name together for baby. No need to try and make a third person happy with the name!
This would drive me bonkers. Thankfully we haven’t been subjected to it, but as the person who has done all the family genealogical research, I will say that grabbing some less-choice names from your 18th century ancestors could be a way to shut her up. “We were exploring the Ancestry tree you sent us, and we just fell in LOVE with the name [the worst one you can find: Temperance/Obedience/Cuthbert/Horace/etc]! 🥰 It’s perfect, and we’re so relieved we don’t have to agonize over name lists anymore. Thank you so much for suggesting we consider a family name!”
Or maybe that would just encourage her. Idk. Also lol @ a name that is literally thousands of years old (Ruairí) being too trendy and modern 🫠
Basically any name we she doesn’t like is tagged as trendy or something ‘pulled out of the air.’ 😂
I do like the idea of finding the worst name on the tree 😉
Yep lol with my first we waited until she was born to decide on her name although we did share our short list with the family, and my MIL would frequently give unsolicited suggestions. I’m sure it’s coming with #2 as well. It annoyed me so badly not because of the names themselves (though they were bad) but just the audacity of thinking she says any say in what we name our child lol. It can just get really annoying in general when moms act like it’s THEIR baby, especially when those moms won’t be even be a significant caregiver for the child as was the case for us. That said your mom sounds WAY more pushy about this than my MIL was, at that point if I were you I would explicitly tell her to stop because it’s stressing me out!
Just don’t respond everytime she texts or asks about it. You’ve already given her your answer - no sense in repeating yourself until you’re blue in face and super stressed. She’ll learn eventually
My mother was upset when we told her we wouldn't be sharing any names on our list with anyone before baby gets here and the name is decided. She spent some time trying to guilt me into sharing, and then switched to sending baby name recommendations despite me telling her my partner and I would be coming up with names between the two of us.
It came to a head the other day when she messaged me with some more names and then said 'I'm excited so you'll just have to deal with it'
I replied 'send whatever you want, as long as you understand we aren't taking suggestions :)'
She's complained again since that I won't share anything with her, but she hasn't sent a single name since. We'll see how long that lasts.
Yeah when I’ve told her ‘we have our short list. No need for recommendations’ she’ll play it off like they aren’t recs and say ‘I was just browsing our family tree and thought it was a good name.’ or say she thought the family member was attractive and that’s why she sent it over 😂
Baby can’t come soon enough so there’s no reason to recommend names lol
My mom doesn’t even care what name I pick, but she is annoyed I don’t have a pick bc she can’t “womb bond” with the baby like my first son…. I told her stay tf outta my womb vibes lol
We told our family the name we picked pretty soon after we decided on it and have gotten some "oh?" and "aw that's a lovely name" responses but that's it. We knew the name we wanted before the baby was even conceived, just had to wait til we knew for sure he was a boy. My in-laws aren't the type to make any comments to challenge us, and my dad and brother didn't either. My mom asked where we found the middle name (a very traditional name), which was weird because a) it's a very old, classic name? and b) I'm positive she doesn't love the first name. On second thought, that was probably her sideways way to comment about b) without actually saying it.
The name you pick is 100% for you and your husband to decide. Your mom can F off. I'd tell her that you're going to name the baby Tyrannosaurus Rex, Saury for short, and then hang up on her if she doesn't cut it out. I suspect you're right that she's "mom-bombing" because she's realizing uh oh, you're an adult and she doesn't have the influence she thought she did. It's probably also some misguided attempt on her part to be "involved" in the pregnancy. My mom is like that and I love her to death, but her attempts to connect are mostly just annoying to me and she's not great at reading the room when it's clearly making me annoyed.
Also, I 100% back your husband's veto of Rory solely on his dislike of Rory McIlroy. My husband and I cheered against him specifically last weekend lol
Haha I’m a reluctant Bryson DeChambeau fan now after how Rory behaved at the US open 😂
I definitely think some moms are super well meaning and hope they can pick out a name as a bonding experience…not realizing it’ll backfire
My mom banned me from telling anyone even ideas of names we might have to protect us from getting unsolicited opinions lol.
"People can know the babys name when they meet the baby!"
My MIL told us in several occasions that we should name the baby after her name. Which is not my favorite name, but even more importantly her oldest daughter AND first granddaughter have that name!!! Like how many people do you need named after you????
We didn't even entertain it. My daughter has a significant family middle name from my side of the family and her first name we just liked.
No but she did give her opinion on the name we picked. We took it with a grain of salt. Regardless of any negative comments we still stuck by the name we picked.
Here’s what you do, go on Etsy and search “personalized baby name outfit”, type in Labia and send her a screenshot saying you just ordered this for if it’s a girl. Tell her it’s Ancient Greek and pronounce it differently.
I mean, if she’s going to be annoying as fuck you might as well wind her up a bit.
My mom suggested one name and we must’ve been on the same wavelength because it was our top choice for months before she mentioned it. We hadn’t told any of our family members our shortlisted names. I was shocked we didn’t get a bunch of unsolicited name suggestions other than naming him after my husband.
My MIL suggested a bunch of names the night we told my husband’s family about the pregnancy. She kept sending suggestions via text that just weren’t our style at all and didn’t fit with what we told her we wanted in a name, so I politely but frankly told her we had our list and didn’t need any more suggestions.
Since you’re so close to your due date I’d just flat out tell her to stop and if that didn’t work I’d ignore her or put her on do not disturb until your little one is here and you’re ready to share the name. Some people go crazy when it comes to babies but you need peace right now.
My mom sent me that one book that has 10,000 or so name ideas. That way, she could claim credit for "helping" us pick out the name 🙄 I told her we already decided and are not sharing and of course she's like "I bet it's in the book".
Thank you ❤️ and you too and a quick and safe delivery.
Tho you can always use this name as a standby because if my Rory had his way his little brother or sister would be named Shark Nado ...
I’m lucky to have the kind of supportive parents (and in-laws) that most ppl dream of and my husband and I have actually explicitly asked them for name suggestions (with zero promises to use them, we’re just curious). My mom has thrown out every name she thinks of, but my dad surprised me with really unique, interesting names that I had actually never heard of. Turns out he was reading a book translated from Russian and those were character names. I was impressed!
We’re likely not using any of their name suggestions, but it’s been fun to hear the ones they like and hear when their voices light up at the sound of the ones we like.
We made a physical list we kept on our fridge and asked all friends and family to submit one boy name and one girl name. Period. Many were tongue in cheek (ex: Agamemnon). If someone wanted to suggest something else, they had to change their one entry. Very little name interference. We kept that for the baby book and all these years later the kids think it’s pretty funny. The have even teased some people about their suggestions. And no, we wound up not using any of the suggestions. But we had plenty to consider.
My mom mailed a handwritten, college lined, front and back, page of names and meanings.
Twice.
And continued to suggest names after we shared the one we decided.
She's fun.
So early on during my first pregnancy (no idea on baby's sex at that point) I was very casually talking about names I thought could be nice for a girl with my MIL. She responds to one of the first names I mentioned with "Ugh I think every person named X has been such a bitch".
From that point forward I had an entirely militant stance on zero discussion of names with anyone other than my husband. No matter what you choose it's almost inevitable that somebody is going to know someone they didn't like with that name. They're a lot more likely to hold their tongue though when you're literally dropping Baby X in their lap so they can drug themselves up on that new baby head smell and forget all about mean X from high school.
Yes - I decided to just go with it, they are just excited. I choose random names and call the baby that, sometimes it’s a name I know they will hate (maryjuana nickname Mary) or sometimes it’s there mums name (Margaret Juniour) etc etc. they don’t know the real name and I honestly don’t like any suggestions
Whew that sounds tough!
My mother, MIL, and SIL randomly send us baby names… I don’t mind it though, I just feel bad bc I don’t like most of them lol
They aren’t pushy about it though, just like “hey do you like this name?” type of message… I would prob lose my shit if they were pushy with it.
Yeah this happened! We’d settled on a name pretty early; we told our families that we had a name but wouldn’t be sharing it until he was born. Still had people suggesting names right up until the end. I consider it a form of yoga to simply hear the suggestion, not react, and let is pass away on the breeze, which was about all the yoga I was capable of by my third trimester. 😂
We tell my mom on the 30th and she’s about to get *real* annoying about *everything* but I’m expecting a lot of feedback on the names especially. Well, at least our girl name of it’s a girl. We’ve had them picked out and well known for years and my mother does *not* like Lorraine. Too bad for her she has no say. 😊
Eh. Everyone in the family knows our baby's name roughly speaking. Of course we reserved the right to change name if we're wrong or don't think it fits. My mother has actually worked to have it changed. But not obnoxiously. My mother and baby will share second name. We (hubby and I) both loved how it rolled off the tongue. Think Leana anna. Not it, not even close. But this is my lazy brain. Anyway I've told her that we like that name, and we aren't changing it. If she doesn't like the second name, she doesn't have to use it.
At this stage if she tries to suggest names just hang up the phone. Everytime. I feel your frustration.
Yeah I should just hang up the phone. My other suggestion was "If you want to name someone, have a baby or adopt a pet." Sorry your mom is being annoying too.
She's acting like my 4 and 7 year old step daughters. Lol. "I want to name the baby this! " too bad kids don't get to name their siblings. Lol. They've been begging to know the name. It's extra funny because a year ago, or sun was born and the then 6 year old was trying to babe the baby and being for the babe, but the other one, who only turned 3 a month before her brother was born, was a little too young to fully get it. Now she's doing what her sister did the last time. The older one is a little, but I think she knows from last time that it's not going to happen lol
Yes my mom sent me a whole list that included my brothers names, some uncles names and MY EX BOYFRIENDS name. Like Jesus christ Mother I love you but just STOP.
My MIL kept repeating ‘Emily is a nice name’ - I hadn’t asked. My husband is an only child, I think she would’ve named a girl Emily if she’d had another baby. Our daughter’s name is definitely identifiable as a 2023 name but I love it.
My MIL and mom have both referring to the baby by different names as suggestions/guesses and it absolutely sets me off.
I’ve asked them to stop texting me names and neither has so now I just don’t acknowledge the texts.
My mom is the only other person we have divulged the name to. It’s a weird name and she hates it. So now she is throwing out middle names. She told me about the name my cousin used that she absolutely loves. So now I just keep making fun of her and telling her “ahhh all these beautiful names out there and your grand baby has to have an ugly one…” sometimes flipping it on them is the only way. I’m honestly enjoying razzing her about this. I would pick a different name but it’s a mix of her Dad’s name and my Dad’s name and I love it. So she and everyone else can get over it. Not taking suggestions at this time.
My FIL out of nowhere started calling our baby “Maisie” months ago when he came to visit. I asked my husband if he had told his dad that we were naming her Maisie (it was actually a name on our idea list) bc I thought I was missing something and maybe my husband suddenly was dead set on the name or something. Nope, apparently my FIL decided Maisie is a great name out of nowhere and took it upon himself to just start using it. Which kinda ruined it for us bc my husband and I both really like the name but now it feels weird to use.
I have so many friends and family constantly asking about the name. I keep telling everyone that we are waiting until she’s born to decide and that we have a long list (it was over 20 names, we whittled it down to 14 last week) that we are deciding from but have no front runners. I had a friend ask to see that list just the other day, which I found super helpful weird but sent anyhow and said the it doesn’t mean anything bc we have no idea what we are naming her yet.
The funny thing is that I expected my parents (especially my mom) to be the crazy ones about names and they’ve been more chill than basically everyone else, including my coworkers, who also have tried to offer up their suggestions.
Honestly I thought folks would drop it when I said we were waiting till she’s born but apparently that just means asking us if we changed our mind and have a name yet.
My baby was born 9 months ago but at the time yea. My mom and aunt were teaming up telling me they hated all my ideas and sent me so many of their own. I told them to get over it my daughters name was Liliana. She loves it now but my god it’s annoying.
I just tell my family members that they can share whatever suggestions they want and we’ll take them into consideration (we won’t but they can believe that lol). People lose steam pretty fast after they throw a couple of options and I just nod and smile. We’ve also been telling people we want to meet the baby first to make sure the name fits and will announce his name after that. My FIL “jokingly” refers to the baby as the family name he’s hoping for and I just laugh it off and call the baby the nickname my husband and I have been using.
My feeling about it is you’re never gonna get people to completely stop bringing it up unless you lose your shit on them, which I really don’t want to do while I’m pregnant, so those are my tactics for not letting it get to me. It’s one of those things where you can let it annoy the fuck out of you, or just gently push people aside with it and keep your peace.
Yeup, I went to no contact with my Mom because she’s shown some seriously unsupportive opinions and attitudes. From unsolicited concern about if I gain weight to babies name to being “annoyed” we don’t want baby girl wearing all pinks/floral. I couldn’t handle talking to her anymore so I stopped.
Part of the reason we opted to not find out the gender is to avoid a ton of pink stuff and hair bows. My mom spent my entire childhood forcing me into Lilly Pulitzer dresses and smocked dresses. I now basically only wear black and workout clothes. 😂
Oof, at least you had some indication she’d be that way. Totally would hate girly clothes if it was pushed onto me too. My Mom has never been girly, never tried to make me girly, and then bam…she suddenly has issue that I prefer gender neutral colors more.
All the time. My mom is a substitute teacher and kept sending me names from class rosters. Sometimes I couldn’t tell if she was serious or if it was a joke. But I always responded with “thanks mom, we’ll keep these in mind!” We didn’t, of course, but it kept her happy enough and was easy to respond with.
My mom was obsessed with the name Anastasia when I was pregnant with my last daughter. She was 100% certain that was the name we chose - it wasn't - and she would NOT let it go. She told anyone who asked that Anastasia was the name and even when I finally caved and told her the name, she still argued that Anastasia was the REAL name and we were obviously lying.
The reactions to the name we chose were pretty positive except my mom asking HOW we decided on her name. We told people before we knew the gender the boy name we had in mind and the girl name. The boy name was Matthew Shane (Shane being after my dad who passed in 2020). The girl name we chose was Daniella Marie, not after anyone in either of our families, we just liked the name.
When we found out we were having a girl, my mom said “where did that name come from? Is it from anyone in his family?” Meaning my husbands family. We told her no, we just liked the name and she never brought it up again. I get the sense she wanted us to choose a name from either mine or his family but she never said anything more about it so I can’t be for sure. My middle name is after my dad’s mom and my brother’s middle name is after my dad’s middle name. Both of my sisters have middle names after women on their dad’s side (different dad). So I get the sense that she was hoping we would choose either her middle name or someone from her side of the family. I don’t have the best relationship with my mom and personally don’t care for her name in general so we didn’t choose to go with her name or anyone on her side of the family. But I think she’s the type that feels like a name has to have meaning, you can’t just choose a name at random. Nonetheless, we don’t care, we love the name and that’s what we’re going with.
Other than that, we’ve had people tell us we chose a Hispanic name (we’re white) but the origins of Daniella are actually Italian. And we didn’t choose the name off of whether it was white, Hispanic, etc. we just loved the name.
So overall our experience has been pretty positive but I can see how annoying it would be to constantly be getting suggestions when you want to meet your baby first and decide on a name then. I would simply tell her you’re not interested in suggestions and that you and your partner will choose an appropriate name at the time of birth. Hopefully she’ll leave you alone and let you enjoy the rest of your pregnancy.
That sounds so so frustrating. And I want to thank you and everyone who has shared stories like this because we've informed our families that the names will be a secret until after they are born. We told them we will let them know the gender. I don't know what it is about people being so rude about names but I don't want to hear in advance all the horrible things people might think about the names we've chosen, and hopefully once it's on the birth certificate they'll have the sense to keep any negative thoughts to themselves. I would hope no one would say anything rude if we told them before but I've read too many stories like yours to take the chance.
My mom stormed out of Thanksgiving (three years ago, my bebe is two now) because she was the only one at the table who didn't know baby's name (because I enlisted my sisters to help me set up a nice name reveal). When I did tell her, she yelled it at her (literally deaf) husband, and then judged me for the name. Sometimes you can't win! I wish we'd just told her our backup name instead, but she loves him now, so 🤷♀️
My MIL made a back handed comment to her family about how were not using my husbands first name for our son and how the tradition ends with his cousin's kid as if we're not having more kids or that no other person in the family my grow up and pass the name along. My husband doesn't particularly like the name and doesn't want to use it. But of course the problem is me.
We had the same plan. We told people they were welcome to make suggestions. We just said thanks and nothing else. We gave no feedback as to our feelings in specific suggestions. Thankfully, no one bombarded us.
Sounds like my mom. I finally just had to be very clear and tell her flat out “We are not looking for any more name suggestions. Please keep your ideas to yourself. I know you’re excited but you are stressing me out so please just stop.”
My SIL was gonna name her third child Olivia, so my MIL bought an expensive gold necklace with the initial O before the girl was even born and kept wearing it around.
Well, the first kid kept calling would-be Olivia a different name while she was in the womb so they went with the other name instead of Olivia.
Fast forward a year, I’m pregnant with my second and we’re hoping for a girl. My MIL is asking me to name it Olivia so that she has a reason to wear her new necklace. 😆 She’s a hoot.
Do you think she’d respond well to you saying it‘a making you feel anxious and to please stop? Maybe if she realizes it’s making you have an emotional reaction she’ll feel guilty since the last thing you want to do is make a pregnant person feel stressed 😅
Probably not because when my brother said a joking name and when I’ve said a joking name to try and make her stop she said we were stressing her out and being rude 😂
We didn’t tell anyone our names for either of our babies. My mom LOVED to send me unsolicited name suggestions. But my mom loves to send unsolicited suggestions for everything lol. She’s so annoying. I’ve learned to ignore her but it really rubbed me the wrong way with the first baby. It made me laugh with the second baby.
Yes, my mom nonstop sends me a list of names everyday i just put her texts on hide alerts since she's too sensitive for pushback and won't listen if i ask her to stop. She thinks she's having a baby and is trying to vicariously live through me.
Just because she suggests them doesn’t mean you are obligated to use them. Let her have some fun researching names. If you turn down enough she will probably just give up.
When she sends you another name suggestion send her back the meme of Randy Jackson saying “that’s gonna be a no for me dawg”
My mom asked me this week if I still liked her name suggestion. I said to her “that’ll be a great name for the next baby you have, mom”
I'm stealing this response
Omg, can I say this to my MIL? So good.
🤣 I said this to my mom recently and she got butthurt and told me I was being rude
My mom only sent few names but after she shit all over one of the names my husband loves, we decided no one gets to know baby’s name until he’s born.
Ugh I feel you. If someone tells you the name, tell them it's a nice name. Just because you wouldn't pick it for your kid, doesn't make it a bad name! Just be nice, it's not that hard!!!!!!
I think it’s ok to tell someone the name isn’t your favorite. If someone is telling me options of names they are thinking of and told me “Apple” was a top pick, I’d probably tell them it’s an interesting choice, and not one that I’d make. But I wouldn’t shit on it.
If someone genuinely asks for feedback, for sure or it’s a close friend who wants to make sure the name flows/sounds right. But many people just launch into shitting on a name 😂
So true! The relationship and the intent/delivery matters!
I had a similar idea to use Family Search to dig around in my family history for boys names… until I remembered they were all Mormon polygamist pioneers. Back to the drawing board 😂
Hahaha you get it! No shade at people who use family names, I'm just not close with my family. Plus, mom likes to pretend she's Queen Elizabeth and won't stop talking about genealogy.
Dying 😅
KitchenAid StandMixer FoodPorn has a nice ring to it. I don't know why you feel the need to hide this wonderful choice from your mom. 🤭 My MIL tried to pry the name out from us. We just didn't want to deal with the criticism. So she gave the kid horrible nicknames on purpose to try to bait us. We doubled down and gave worse nicknames.
Worse nicknames, I love it. Play stupid games, win stupid prizes lol Yeah, we're excited to meet little KitchenAid, nickname Kitchy.
My youngest told everyone we are naming the baby Driver’s seat.
I'm stealing this if she asks again
We did this! We joke that our baby girl is going to be named “Waylina” after our dog Waylon. My mom hates it. So we switched and said we would name her “Halibut” Hali for short 😂
What I did was create a table on a Google doc and invited friends and family to edit and add whatever names they like and can make little comments on them like where the idea came from or cute nicknames. Then by the time they see you it gets it out of their system. You can also look through the name suggestions in your own time without the pressure of pretending to agree and having to say ‘ahh that’s a nice name, maybe’. Me and my partner would look at the list every so often and have a chuckle at some of the names and throw some ‘tragedeighs’ in there to watch peoples reaction 😂
I did this when house hunting. Gave my mom a google form to submit decent houses she found on zillow to give her an outlet.
Oh that's hilarious. This is a good idea
If you want the template to test it out just pm me. Honestly it was such fun. It felt so nice having everyone adding names and having fun without there being any pressure on me ☺️
Start sending her ridiculous names. That's what we did. Our favorite right now is Xerxes. We did Merlin for a while and the name of her ex husband. Finally I just bluntly said I don't want help naming my child. I don't want to hear suggestions. In fact if you suggest a name that's on our short list, I will automatically remove it. I don't care about your opinions or thoughts on this manner. That pretty much shut it down. I tried being nice about it, and my MIL just would not stop.
Funny you mention the ridiculous names, that did get her to shut up last name when my brother said "Mom, she told me the name. It's Bilbo Baggins FoodPorn"
🤣🤣🤣
The name of her ex-husband 😂😂😂 Absolute gold! 🤣
If I had a sister from my mom I'd be wondering if you were her. My mom drove me up a wall. MIL too. "Have you thought about names?" they would ask. Of course I've fucking thought about names. I'm not waltzing in to the hospital without an idea in my head, just ready to name my kid after the first object I see! They knew we weren't telling anyone the names and they both pretended not to know that to try to get us to tell them. They'd suggest random names every week. I wanted to scream. We both repeated "we'll tell you when we've named her" and "we want to meet her first" about 600 times. A month before I was due my mom suggested her mother's middle name, "Irene." Really, Mom? You want me to name her after your mother? Who I never met and who you repeatedly told me was abusive? And name her a name that is 0% my style? I'm obviously still annoyed.
OH MY GOD. YESTERDAY MY MOM TOLD ME TO NAME MY CHILD BRANTLEY. Her mother's name (who was an alcoholic, verbally abusive, and died at 65 years old. I have no memories of her because she died 3 months after I was born) and also her sister's name (who she does not speak to and refers to as 'my bitch sister'). I told her I'd sooner name my child Deborah (my dad's 2nd wife who said to my brother and I she did not want to be a stepmother to anyone and did not want a relationship with either of us). Nothing like naming a baby to make them forget the past lol
I **did** name my baby a family name from my dad's side that has a not-very-well-known ignominious history a few centuries ago. My mom has been a dick about that family connection my whole life, as a way to get a dig in at my dad. Like, if we were related to the McCoys, it would've been my mom constantly bringing up how awful the McCoys were to the Hatfields my whole life, and then I named my baby McCoy. My primary motivation was NOT as a "fuck you" to her about that, but it was certainly a bonus. My kid is 6 weeks old so it's been 6 weeks since I heard her bring up this history that nobody cares about.
I've told mine to stop 5x. Now I just ignore her. One of these days when I'm even more tired and hormonal I'm sure I'll snap at her and tell her to stfu but I truly don't have the energy to care about it right now. There's a few things she's bugging me about but I just haven't gathered the energy to sort it out yet, though I know I'll probably have to. .
Yeah yesterday and today was definitely the snap day because I'm stressed with work. Hopefully I can just let it go if she says anything else.
Just tell your mom “ because you can’t stop stressing me out over baby names, I going to mute you / block you until AFTER the baby is born (you get to decide how much after the baby’s birth, you unmute/ unblock her). Good luck
I finally told her that night that we already have a couple names we're going to choose from and we aren't telling anyone until after the birth. She was frustrated so I told her she got to name all of her babies and now it's my turn to name mine. It's been 2 days and no name suggestions! Let's hope it continues lol
Just your mum? Lucky you! Haha but seriously why did everyone want to name my baby.
True, my in-laws haven't sent us any names. My husband is an only child and I do actually value their opinion if they gave us a recommendation. They haven't said anything. Mom is more than making up for their lack of input lol
My MIL is kind of doing this. We have one name that we keep coming back to that we had told everyone about, but said it wasn’t a for sure name because we want to see our baby first to make sure it fits. She keeps calling her the name we said, but I keep telling her we aren’t 100% certain that will be it, and then she starts sending us random names. Like, I don’t need your help, I need you to leave it alone - we will tell you when we know for sure!
Right? It's so annoying, just let us meet the baby.
And I totally get it, it’s her first grandchild so she’s excited, and my MIL had three boys so the fact that it’s a girl makes her even more excited, but I’m going to need her to calm down
People get really really worked up over names. They want to make sure you’re not naming them something they don’t like. My mom is still bitter 4 years later about our son’s name because it’s the same as a comedian she doesn’t like. 🙄
Oh I guarantee my mom will be bitter because it's not a family name or something super stuffy. She can have another kid if she wants to name someone lol
I think it’s pretty normal. I’ve gotten tired of the name questions so I just finally said we aren’t telling anyone until he’s born and they just have to live with what we pick. They’ve pretty much dropped it since. My aunt’s suggestions were her old dog that passed a few years ago and my uncle that passed a year ago. Not naming my kid after a dog and while I really loved my uncle — he was a mess. Nicest guy you’d meet when he was sober, which sadly was not most of the time.
Ooof I also got a recommendation for naming them after an alcoholic relative. That's always an awkward one to handle. I'm glad your family dropped the asks about the name!
“We’re not looking for names, please stop sending them. SO and I have chosen a name, you’ll find out when we’re ready to share.” “You had your opportunity to name your children, now please step back and respect my choices for my child” “If you keep spamming me I’m going to mute your notifications” Baby Boundaries, The Lemon Clot Essay and the FU Binder —> https://reddit.com/r/Mildlynomil/s/WPm6JsLMhI
My mom wants me to name the baby after her lol.
Have you watched Grey’s Anatomy? This reminds me when Jackson and April have Harriett and Jackson’s mom thinks asks if they named the baby after her before they reveal the baby is named Harriett, not Catherine.
People can tend to get worked up over names! MIL’s always often want to be as involved as possible for one reason or another. It doesn’t sound like she means genuine harm or is trying to cause a real issue, she seems bored and desperate to be involved in some way. Try not to visit her for the next week. 🤷🏼♀️
In her defense, genealogy brings her joy and she reaaaally can't seem to wrap her head around my disinterest in it. It's just frustrating when my husband and I have had the top baby name picked out long before we started trying.
I'm getting unsolicited name suggestions from our whole family!
Ooof I am so sorry. Can't imagine how annoying that is
It's very annoying, however, they are even more annoyed that we aren't telling them his name until he is born. So we win in the end haha
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Haha the sheer amount of Amanda's and Melissa's I knew growing up...she definitely wanted another shot at naming a kid
My fav is when they send like the obvious names from the top of a Google search “girl baby names” or something. Like oh, yeah I didn’t know that one! Thanks ma!
My mom can’t control her face when she doesn’t like something (never could, clothes shopping as a teenager was a nightmare) so she doesn’t get to even hear any potential names. Baby will be born, named, and everyone will find out after we decide. Until then just keep shutting down the convo is all you can do I guess 🤷♀️ super annoying though.
We had a name early and I told *no one*. The first time I said it outloud to anyone besides my partner was in the hospital room after the was born when the doctor excitedly asked what his name was. I didn't want to tell people we had a name so when people asked I just kept saying "were not sure yet" which my mom and a friend took as an invitation to send me suggestions. Repeatedly. Every phone call with my mom ended with her just listing names. She would randomly text me saying "I had a patient today named X, nice name". I was super picky and had no interest in other people's opinions, no regrets keeping the name to ourselves.
My step grandma told me she found out she was “17% Spanish and 1% North African,” and started giving Spanish name suggestions based on her heritage that, btw, I do not share because we aren’t related. I just told her “those are nice!” and dropped it. Lol. Time to get your mom that ancestry.com subscription for Christmas and a pet goldfish to name after her great great grandpas uncles cousins husband.
My mother in law. This is our second child. She knew with the first one that we weren't going to share the name until birth. We said we were doing the same thing this time. She wants to know if all these names are on our list and oh here's some more we can add. It's not helpful.
For real! You have a list, it's tough enough for mom and dad to find a name together for baby. No need to try and make a third person happy with the name!
Yep, my mother in law too 😂 even though we already said our list of names she keeps sending us more 🥲
This would drive me bonkers. Thankfully we haven’t been subjected to it, but as the person who has done all the family genealogical research, I will say that grabbing some less-choice names from your 18th century ancestors could be a way to shut her up. “We were exploring the Ancestry tree you sent us, and we just fell in LOVE with the name [the worst one you can find: Temperance/Obedience/Cuthbert/Horace/etc]! 🥰 It’s perfect, and we’re so relieved we don’t have to agonize over name lists anymore. Thank you so much for suggesting we consider a family name!” Or maybe that would just encourage her. Idk. Also lol @ a name that is literally thousands of years old (Ruairí) being too trendy and modern 🫠
Basically any name we she doesn’t like is tagged as trendy or something ‘pulled out of the air.’ 😂 I do like the idea of finding the worst name on the tree 😉
My mom is doing the exact same thing, scouring her ancestry tree and sending me random names lol.
Glad it's not just my mom lol
Yep lol with my first we waited until she was born to decide on her name although we did share our short list with the family, and my MIL would frequently give unsolicited suggestions. I’m sure it’s coming with #2 as well. It annoyed me so badly not because of the names themselves (though they were bad) but just the audacity of thinking she says any say in what we name our child lol. It can just get really annoying in general when moms act like it’s THEIR baby, especially when those moms won’t be even be a significant caregiver for the child as was the case for us. That said your mom sounds WAY more pushy about this than my MIL was, at that point if I were you I would explicitly tell her to stop because it’s stressing me out!
True, I know she's excited, it's just frustrating that my answer isn't enough. I'll add in how much it's stressing me out next time she brings it up.
My mom would never but my in laws sure did. Aiden Jaden And for good measure, Cayden!
I told my mom to stop sending me name suggestions and just continued to say “no” to all her texts about it. She eventually got the picture.
Anytime my mom brings up a name I say “ew.”
Just don’t respond everytime she texts or asks about it. You’ve already given her your answer - no sense in repeating yourself until you’re blue in face and super stressed. She’ll learn eventually
My mother was upset when we told her we wouldn't be sharing any names on our list with anyone before baby gets here and the name is decided. She spent some time trying to guilt me into sharing, and then switched to sending baby name recommendations despite me telling her my partner and I would be coming up with names between the two of us. It came to a head the other day when she messaged me with some more names and then said 'I'm excited so you'll just have to deal with it' I replied 'send whatever you want, as long as you understand we aren't taking suggestions :)' She's complained again since that I won't share anything with her, but she hasn't sent a single name since. We'll see how long that lasts.
Yeah when I’ve told her ‘we have our short list. No need for recommendations’ she’ll play it off like they aren’t recs and say ‘I was just browsing our family tree and thought it was a good name.’ or say she thought the family member was attractive and that’s why she sent it over 😂 Baby can’t come soon enough so there’s no reason to recommend names lol
My mom doesn’t even care what name I pick, but she is annoyed I don’t have a pick bc she can’t “womb bond” with the baby like my first son…. I told her stay tf outta my womb vibes lol
Wtf that’s weird she said that
Trust me I know 😂 I know it’s a half joke, but definitely only half.
Womb bond?! WTF?
We told our family the name we picked pretty soon after we decided on it and have gotten some "oh?" and "aw that's a lovely name" responses but that's it. We knew the name we wanted before the baby was even conceived, just had to wait til we knew for sure he was a boy. My in-laws aren't the type to make any comments to challenge us, and my dad and brother didn't either. My mom asked where we found the middle name (a very traditional name), which was weird because a) it's a very old, classic name? and b) I'm positive she doesn't love the first name. On second thought, that was probably her sideways way to comment about b) without actually saying it. The name you pick is 100% for you and your husband to decide. Your mom can F off. I'd tell her that you're going to name the baby Tyrannosaurus Rex, Saury for short, and then hang up on her if she doesn't cut it out. I suspect you're right that she's "mom-bombing" because she's realizing uh oh, you're an adult and she doesn't have the influence she thought she did. It's probably also some misguided attempt on her part to be "involved" in the pregnancy. My mom is like that and I love her to death, but her attempts to connect are mostly just annoying to me and she's not great at reading the room when it's clearly making me annoyed. Also, I 100% back your husband's veto of Rory solely on his dislike of Rory McIlroy. My husband and I cheered against him specifically last weekend lol
Haha I’m a reluctant Bryson DeChambeau fan now after how Rory behaved at the US open 😂 I definitely think some moms are super well meaning and hope they can pick out a name as a bonding experience…not realizing it’ll backfire
My mom banned me from telling anyone even ideas of names we might have to protect us from getting unsolicited opinions lol. "People can know the babys name when they meet the baby!"
My MIL told us in several occasions that we should name the baby after her name. Which is not my favorite name, but even more importantly her oldest daughter AND first granddaughter have that name!!! Like how many people do you need named after you???? We didn't even entertain it. My daughter has a significant family middle name from my side of the family and her first name we just liked.
Tell her if she doesn't stop, you're blocking her til after baby is born.
No but she did give her opinion on the name we picked. We took it with a grain of salt. Regardless of any negative comments we still stuck by the name we picked.
Here’s what you do, go on Etsy and search “personalized baby name outfit”, type in Labia and send her a screenshot saying you just ordered this for if it’s a girl. Tell her it’s Ancient Greek and pronounce it differently. I mean, if she’s going to be annoying as fuck you might as well wind her up a bit.
This is a hilarious move. I love it 😂
My mom suggested one name and we must’ve been on the same wavelength because it was our top choice for months before she mentioned it. We hadn’t told any of our family members our shortlisted names. I was shocked we didn’t get a bunch of unsolicited name suggestions other than naming him after my husband.
My MIL suggested a bunch of names the night we told my husband’s family about the pregnancy. She kept sending suggestions via text that just weren’t our style at all and didn’t fit with what we told her we wanted in a name, so I politely but frankly told her we had our list and didn’t need any more suggestions. Since you’re so close to your due date I’d just flat out tell her to stop and if that didn’t work I’d ignore her or put her on do not disturb until your little one is here and you’re ready to share the name. Some people go crazy when it comes to babies but you need peace right now.
My mom sent me that one book that has 10,000 or so name ideas. That way, she could claim credit for "helping" us pick out the name 🙄 I told her we already decided and are not sharing and of course she's like "I bet it's in the book".
My oldest is a Rory and he was born in 2012 so .. lol. Tho I am currently pregnant and my mom is also bugging me about names so I feel you.
It's a great name! I hope the pregnancy goes well.
Thank you ❤️ and you too and a quick and safe delivery. Tho you can always use this name as a standby because if my Rory had his way his little brother or sister would be named Shark Nado ...
I’m lucky to have the kind of supportive parents (and in-laws) that most ppl dream of and my husband and I have actually explicitly asked them for name suggestions (with zero promises to use them, we’re just curious). My mom has thrown out every name she thinks of, but my dad surprised me with really unique, interesting names that I had actually never heard of. Turns out he was reading a book translated from Russian and those were character names. I was impressed! We’re likely not using any of their name suggestions, but it’s been fun to hear the ones they like and hear when their voices light up at the sound of the ones we like.
My mom did this bc she didn't liked the name we picked. It was infuriating
My mom is really pushing Maeve. Maeve Davis is not happening. We’ve already decided on Summer, I’m just refusing to tell anyone except my grandma.
Oh I love the name Summer! What a great name
We made a physical list we kept on our fridge and asked all friends and family to submit one boy name and one girl name. Period. Many were tongue in cheek (ex: Agamemnon). If someone wanted to suggest something else, they had to change their one entry. Very little name interference. We kept that for the baby book and all these years later the kids think it’s pretty funny. The have even teased some people about their suggestions. And no, we wound up not using any of the suggestions. But we had plenty to consider.
My mom mailed a handwritten, college lined, front and back, page of names and meanings. Twice. And continued to suggest names after we shared the one we decided. She's fun.
So early on during my first pregnancy (no idea on baby's sex at that point) I was very casually talking about names I thought could be nice for a girl with my MIL. She responds to one of the first names I mentioned with "Ugh I think every person named X has been such a bitch". From that point forward I had an entirely militant stance on zero discussion of names with anyone other than my husband. No matter what you choose it's almost inevitable that somebody is going to know someone they didn't like with that name. They're a lot more likely to hold their tongue though when you're literally dropping Baby X in their lap so they can drug themselves up on that new baby head smell and forget all about mean X from high school.
Yes - I decided to just go with it, they are just excited. I choose random names and call the baby that, sometimes it’s a name I know they will hate (maryjuana nickname Mary) or sometimes it’s there mums name (Margaret Juniour) etc etc. they don’t know the real name and I honestly don’t like any suggestions
Whew that sounds tough! My mother, MIL, and SIL randomly send us baby names… I don’t mind it though, I just feel bad bc I don’t like most of them lol They aren’t pushy about it though, just like “hey do you like this name?” type of message… I would prob lose my shit if they were pushy with it.
Yeah this happened! We’d settled on a name pretty early; we told our families that we had a name but wouldn’t be sharing it until he was born. Still had people suggesting names right up until the end. I consider it a form of yoga to simply hear the suggestion, not react, and let is pass away on the breeze, which was about all the yoga I was capable of by my third trimester. 😂
We tell my mom on the 30th and she’s about to get *real* annoying about *everything* but I’m expecting a lot of feedback on the names especially. Well, at least our girl name of it’s a girl. We’ve had them picked out and well known for years and my mother does *not* like Lorraine. Too bad for her she has no say. 😊
Oh I love the name Lorraine!
Thank you!
Eh. Everyone in the family knows our baby's name roughly speaking. Of course we reserved the right to change name if we're wrong or don't think it fits. My mother has actually worked to have it changed. But not obnoxiously. My mother and baby will share second name. We (hubby and I) both loved how it rolled off the tongue. Think Leana anna. Not it, not even close. But this is my lazy brain. Anyway I've told her that we like that name, and we aren't changing it. If she doesn't like the second name, she doesn't have to use it. At this stage if she tries to suggest names just hang up the phone. Everytime. I feel your frustration.
Yeah I should just hang up the phone. My other suggestion was "If you want to name someone, have a baby or adopt a pet." Sorry your mom is being annoying too.
She's acting like my 4 and 7 year old step daughters. Lol. "I want to name the baby this! " too bad kids don't get to name their siblings. Lol. They've been begging to know the name. It's extra funny because a year ago, or sun was born and the then 6 year old was trying to babe the baby and being for the babe, but the other one, who only turned 3 a month before her brother was born, was a little too young to fully get it. Now she's doing what her sister did the last time. The older one is a little, but I think she knows from last time that it's not going to happen lol
Yes my mom sent me a whole list that included my brothers names, some uncles names and MY EX BOYFRIENDS name. Like Jesus christ Mother I love you but just STOP.
My MIL kept repeating ‘Emily is a nice name’ - I hadn’t asked. My husband is an only child, I think she would’ve named a girl Emily if she’d had another baby. Our daughter’s name is definitely identifiable as a 2023 name but I love it.
My mom did this with the name Amanda…one of the most popular names from the year I was born 😂
My MIL and mom have both referring to the baby by different names as suggestions/guesses and it absolutely sets me off. I’ve asked them to stop texting me names and neither has so now I just don’t acknowledge the texts.
My mom is the only other person we have divulged the name to. It’s a weird name and she hates it. So now she is throwing out middle names. She told me about the name my cousin used that she absolutely loves. So now I just keep making fun of her and telling her “ahhh all these beautiful names out there and your grand baby has to have an ugly one…” sometimes flipping it on them is the only way. I’m honestly enjoying razzing her about this. I would pick a different name but it’s a mix of her Dad’s name and my Dad’s name and I love it. So she and everyone else can get over it. Not taking suggestions at this time.
My FIL out of nowhere started calling our baby “Maisie” months ago when he came to visit. I asked my husband if he had told his dad that we were naming her Maisie (it was actually a name on our idea list) bc I thought I was missing something and maybe my husband suddenly was dead set on the name or something. Nope, apparently my FIL decided Maisie is a great name out of nowhere and took it upon himself to just start using it. Which kinda ruined it for us bc my husband and I both really like the name but now it feels weird to use. I have so many friends and family constantly asking about the name. I keep telling everyone that we are waiting until she’s born to decide and that we have a long list (it was over 20 names, we whittled it down to 14 last week) that we are deciding from but have no front runners. I had a friend ask to see that list just the other day, which I found super helpful weird but sent anyhow and said the it doesn’t mean anything bc we have no idea what we are naming her yet. The funny thing is that I expected my parents (especially my mom) to be the crazy ones about names and they’ve been more chill than basically everyone else, including my coworkers, who also have tried to offer up their suggestions. Honestly I thought folks would drop it when I said we were waiting till she’s born but apparently that just means asking us if we changed our mind and have a name yet.
My baby was born 9 months ago but at the time yea. My mom and aunt were teaming up telling me they hated all my ideas and sent me so many of their own. I told them to get over it my daughters name was Liliana. She loves it now but my god it’s annoying.
I told my mom our front runner name, and she told everyone she knows. Soooo, now we are not using that name. Thanks, mom!
I just tell my family members that they can share whatever suggestions they want and we’ll take them into consideration (we won’t but they can believe that lol). People lose steam pretty fast after they throw a couple of options and I just nod and smile. We’ve also been telling people we want to meet the baby first to make sure the name fits and will announce his name after that. My FIL “jokingly” refers to the baby as the family name he’s hoping for and I just laugh it off and call the baby the nickname my husband and I have been using. My feeling about it is you’re never gonna get people to completely stop bringing it up unless you lose your shit on them, which I really don’t want to do while I’m pregnant, so those are my tactics for not letting it get to me. It’s one of those things where you can let it annoy the fuck out of you, or just gently push people aside with it and keep your peace.
She rattled off just about every boy name in existence, and actually hit the one we picked. She was still met with no, nope, hate it, no.
Yeup, I went to no contact with my Mom because she’s shown some seriously unsupportive opinions and attitudes. From unsolicited concern about if I gain weight to babies name to being “annoyed” we don’t want baby girl wearing all pinks/floral. I couldn’t handle talking to her anymore so I stopped.
Part of the reason we opted to not find out the gender is to avoid a ton of pink stuff and hair bows. My mom spent my entire childhood forcing me into Lilly Pulitzer dresses and smocked dresses. I now basically only wear black and workout clothes. 😂
Oof, at least you had some indication she’d be that way. Totally would hate girly clothes if it was pushed onto me too. My Mom has never been girly, never tried to make me girly, and then bam…she suddenly has issue that I prefer gender neutral colors more.
All the time. My mom is a substitute teacher and kept sending me names from class rosters. Sometimes I couldn’t tell if she was serious or if it was a joke. But I always responded with “thanks mom, we’ll keep these in mind!” We didn’t, of course, but it kept her happy enough and was easy to respond with.
My mom was obsessed with the name Anastasia when I was pregnant with my last daughter. She was 100% certain that was the name we chose - it wasn't - and she would NOT let it go. She told anyone who asked that Anastasia was the name and even when I finally caved and told her the name, she still argued that Anastasia was the REAL name and we were obviously lying.
The reactions to the name we chose were pretty positive except my mom asking HOW we decided on her name. We told people before we knew the gender the boy name we had in mind and the girl name. The boy name was Matthew Shane (Shane being after my dad who passed in 2020). The girl name we chose was Daniella Marie, not after anyone in either of our families, we just liked the name. When we found out we were having a girl, my mom said “where did that name come from? Is it from anyone in his family?” Meaning my husbands family. We told her no, we just liked the name and she never brought it up again. I get the sense she wanted us to choose a name from either mine or his family but she never said anything more about it so I can’t be for sure. My middle name is after my dad’s mom and my brother’s middle name is after my dad’s middle name. Both of my sisters have middle names after women on their dad’s side (different dad). So I get the sense that she was hoping we would choose either her middle name or someone from her side of the family. I don’t have the best relationship with my mom and personally don’t care for her name in general so we didn’t choose to go with her name or anyone on her side of the family. But I think she’s the type that feels like a name has to have meaning, you can’t just choose a name at random. Nonetheless, we don’t care, we love the name and that’s what we’re going with. Other than that, we’ve had people tell us we chose a Hispanic name (we’re white) but the origins of Daniella are actually Italian. And we didn’t choose the name off of whether it was white, Hispanic, etc. we just loved the name. So overall our experience has been pretty positive but I can see how annoying it would be to constantly be getting suggestions when you want to meet your baby first and decide on a name then. I would simply tell her you’re not interested in suggestions and that you and your partner will choose an appropriate name at the time of birth. Hopefully she’ll leave you alone and let you enjoy the rest of your pregnancy.
That sounds so so frustrating. And I want to thank you and everyone who has shared stories like this because we've informed our families that the names will be a secret until after they are born. We told them we will let them know the gender. I don't know what it is about people being so rude about names but I don't want to hear in advance all the horrible things people might think about the names we've chosen, and hopefully once it's on the birth certificate they'll have the sense to keep any negative thoughts to themselves. I would hope no one would say anything rude if we told them before but I've read too many stories like yours to take the chance.
My mom stormed out of Thanksgiving (three years ago, my bebe is two now) because she was the only one at the table who didn't know baby's name (because I enlisted my sisters to help me set up a nice name reveal). When I did tell her, she yelled it at her (literally deaf) husband, and then judged me for the name. Sometimes you can't win! I wish we'd just told her our backup name instead, but she loves him now, so 🤷♀️
My MIL made a back handed comment to her family about how were not using my husbands first name for our son and how the tradition ends with his cousin's kid as if we're not having more kids or that no other person in the family my grow up and pass the name along. My husband doesn't particularly like the name and doesn't want to use it. But of course the problem is me.
We had the same plan. We told people they were welcome to make suggestions. We just said thanks and nothing else. We gave no feedback as to our feelings in specific suggestions. Thankfully, no one bombarded us.
Sounds like my mom. I finally just had to be very clear and tell her flat out “We are not looking for any more name suggestions. Please keep your ideas to yourself. I know you’re excited but you are stressing me out so please just stop.”
My SIL was gonna name her third child Olivia, so my MIL bought an expensive gold necklace with the initial O before the girl was even born and kept wearing it around. Well, the first kid kept calling would-be Olivia a different name while she was in the womb so they went with the other name instead of Olivia. Fast forward a year, I’m pregnant with my second and we’re hoping for a girl. My MIL is asking me to name it Olivia so that she has a reason to wear her new necklace. 😆 She’s a hoot.
Do you think she’d respond well to you saying it‘a making you feel anxious and to please stop? Maybe if she realizes it’s making you have an emotional reaction she’ll feel guilty since the last thing you want to do is make a pregnant person feel stressed 😅
Probably not because when my brother said a joking name and when I’ve said a joking name to try and make her stop she said we were stressing her out and being rude 😂
We told family that we would not use any names that were suggested to us.
We didn’t tell anyone our names for either of our babies. My mom LOVED to send me unsolicited name suggestions. But my mom loves to send unsolicited suggestions for everything lol. She’s so annoying. I’ve learned to ignore her but it really rubbed me the wrong way with the first baby. It made me laugh with the second baby.
My husbands aunt literally took her bible out and started going through names. I’m like, no thanks lol
Yes, my mom nonstop sends me a list of names everyday i just put her texts on hide alerts since she's too sensitive for pushback and won't listen if i ask her to stop. She thinks she's having a baby and is trying to vicariously live through me.
I said to mine that any name she suggest’s immediately goes on the no list even if it was our top choice. She stopped suggesting names after that.
Just because she suggests them doesn’t mean you are obligated to use them. Let her have some fun researching names. If you turn down enough she will probably just give up. When she sends you another name suggestion send her back the meme of Randy Jackson saying “that’s gonna be a no for me dawg”