Who were you named after, and was that person alive or dead when you were born? Or were you named after something other than a person? Or were you just given your own name, unrelated to anyone/anything else?
I was raised Jewish, and it’s a Jewish custom to name a child after a deceased relative. I was named (loosely) after my maternal grandmother, who died in childbirth. The baby survived and was named after her. And in my generation, there are six of us with similar names (making allowances for change in genders). Actually, our Hebrew names are closer to the original than our English names.
I wasn’t named after anything. My Mom liked my name because it came with a lot of nicknames so she figured I could call myself whatever I wanted. The weird thing is that we were doing a genealogy years later and discovered my great-grandmother’s aunt or something like that had my exact same first and middle name.
I plan to name my first female child Annette Grace, after my aunt and my best friend, respectively. The boy will be Daniel after a close mutual friend. I like the idea of naming kids for other relatives or important people in your life.
My father was Paul, I am Paula. Which is weird because I am the youngest of 4, with 2 older brothers. I never liked my name until the last few years–now I feel honored to be named after Dad.
My story is boring and I like my siblings better. I was given my totally own name, Rachel Christine. Rachel is my mom’s favorite name. My middle name is the same as an aunt my mom barely knows and doesn’t even really like, but she always thought was pretty.
My brother is named after both of his grandfathers, and the nickname from that name was chosen after my dad’s best friend. He is James Morris nicknamed Jimmy.
My sister, who was supposed to be a boy, was going to be named after my dad and my mom’s favorite brother (Stephen Richard). Depending on which of my parents you ask, “he” would have been called either Ricky or Richie. When she suprised them with being a girl, they didn’t have a clue. Her middle name would be Ellen, like my mom and grandma before her, both second daughters, but they really didn’t have a first name at all. A day or two after she was born, but still in the hospital, dad stopped at the bank and the teller was named Katrina. He thought it was cute, and asked my mom what she thought. She said that she liked it a lot, and had a friend in first grade named that. Just then the nurse walked in named – Katrina! They took it as a sign, and she is Katrina Ellen.
For my daughter, we had a first named picked out long before she was even conceived -- Anneliese (we found it while hubby was in German school and fell in love). I had always planned on using Christine, after me, as a middle, but when I actually found out I was having a girl, I realized I didn't really like it that much. So after several months of just no idea what we even liked, or what went with Anneliese, or anything seeming right, she was born.
And that afternoon, or maybe the next morning, we went with Gillian. And yes, she is actually named after Gillian Anderson on purpose. We had rewatched the whole 7 seasons (heh heh) while I was pregnant. And if anyone wants to know what we call her in fun as a nickname, it's Piper. She's five years old, and if you ask her what her full name is, she'll like as not say "Anneliese Gillian Piper Maru Lastname". I love her!
I’m not named after anyone in particular. Neither is my brother. But we both have fairly common male names. On the other hand, my mother came up with my sister’s name in a dream. While not unique, it’s pretty rare.
Like the OP, my parents went with the traditional Jewish naming convention. I was named after my my mother’s favorite uncle, Saul. She wanted to name me Solange but feared that many people wouldn’t know how to pronounce it. Thus, I got stuck with Shari, the spelling having been copied from Shari Lewis.
My parents were going to name me Peter Damien, after the famed leper priest of Molokai. At the last minute, they dropped “Peter” and gave me my father’s first name.
They kept Damien as my middle name, which didn’t bother me until “The Omen” came out.
My mother strongly wanted an “American” name that wasn’t too common. She strongly wanted to avoid any Spanish/Latin name and any Indian name. My father protested, but I would have been miserable with their other choices. So I have a top 300 name in the US that was originally Russian (guess it still is Russian, but ya know). So I was named after nobody.
My SO, his father, grandfather and great grandfather all have the same 3 initials. Different first and middle names, but all the same initials. I like that; I absolutely detest father and son having the same name. I agreed that we can keep the same initials but I get to choose the name :).
First name: after my dad’s mom. First middle name: my great aunt. Both still living when I was born. Second middle name: just because my mother liked it. It was also the only name out of the three that I liked, mainly because she didn’t spell it the normal way. In the end, however, when I had my name legally changed, I didn’t keep any of them.
It seems like every woman I’ve met in the first half of this year, whether personally or professionally or whatever, was either a Julie or Julia. In the last half of the year it changed to Jennifer and Jessica. I’m talking about a lot, like half a dozen or more each. Now it’s Laurie/Loren/Lauren/Laura. And on one day I met two new coworkers named Moddy and Maudi. It’s been confusitating.
