Navigating the Difficult Decision of Naming Baby

“The naming of cats is a difficult matter.” Yes, I’m a bit of a theater nerd, and that might have been part of the problem we had when selecting our baby boy’s name.

 

You see, I wanted the name to sound lovely and have a special ring to it and be based on something awesome. My husband? He wanted a rough and tumble “real man’s name” name. But the journey to finding the intersection of the two roads was a difficult one.

I based my top baby name picks on the gorgeous names of the powerful characters in some of my favorite TV shows. I mean, what better way to get great inspiration than a fictional character brought to life in a visual way?

I wanted names like August (inspired by the brilliant and resourceful secret agent who is super successful despite being blind, from Covert Affairs) and Greyson (blue-eyed reason for the show Drop Dead Diva, anyone?) and similar names of unique characters.

My husband, on the other hand, thought my name suggestions were superficial and wimpy. He was hung up on the name Colton for the longest time and did not want to budge. Well, neither did I. I had a difficult time with the “tough” guy names that my husband suggested because none of them sounded good to say, and I wanted my baby’s name to sound right in my mouth. Does that make sense?

I didn’t want to feel like I was barking orders at the kid every time I said his name (even though, in hindsight, that seems to define parenting).

We switched tactics and researched historical and cultural meanings of names to help us add more options to the list. That did help expand our discussion, but we still had a difficult time finding a name with both absolutely loved. And don’t you want to both love the name like you love your child?

Maybe that was pregnancy hormones talking, but I was very picky at that point.

Eventually, we picked a name. ONE name. Just one that fit both our requirements. I got a nice sounding name that also embodied a few TV characters that I admired. My husband got a name that had a strong meaning and could be turned into a tough sounding nickname.

The name we chose was Henry (like the boy from Once Upon a Time who finds his real mom and saves Storybrooke). The name means Ruler of the Home, with a common nickname of Hank (and yes, HankMed came to mind giving us another resourceful and honorable character to base the name on, thank you Royal Pains).

When the baby was born, we realized we did great, and the name was absolutely perfect for our little boy. I cannot imagine him having any other name. But my husband still jokes that our second son will be named Colton, and even goes so far as to call the spare bedroom Colton’s room. Guess we’ll be having a daughter. Or an only child.