Who Stole My Baby Name?

This past week with the birth of The United Kingdom’s new royal baby I’ve been struck by how possessive people can get over the names they choose for their children. I’ve actually seen very upset people posting on Facebook and in the comments sections on stories related to the little girl’s birth. Reality check, folks…You’re up set at a young couple who, in some cases, live thousands of miles away. You do not know these people and will never know them, yet you’re irate that the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge chose the same name for their daughter you chose for yours. You didn’t invent the name. It has been part of this couple’s family for hundreds of years. Even the Duke’s uncle, the Earl of Spencer, released a snarky tweet about the similarity between the name of his 2 year old daughter and his young great-niece. (Dude! You have seven kids. The potential for overlap really isn’t their fault.)

Her Royal Highness, Princess Charlotte Elizabeth Diana of Cambridge

I do understand, to some extent. As a parent I know how much we agonize over the selection of a name for our children. I know we did. We took a book with over 100,000 names in it and two different colored highlighters. We each went through and highlighted the names we liked. Then we made a list of the ones we both liked and started narrowing it down. Was there an embarrassing nickname that could be tagged on the child? How did it sound with our last name? Could we think of a decent middle name to go with it? If we said the name 100 times a day would we get sick of it? (This happened to me with the name Collin. Loved it, but after trying it out over the course of a day decided I couldn’t see myself saying it over and over.)

Again if you’re anything like us, we turned next to the Social Security site and checked to see how popular the name was. We wanted to try to avoid having our child be one of several kids in the classroom with the same name. For our son, the name we chose was down below 150 on the popularity list. For our daughters, neither name we chose cracked the top 100, and one of them was nearly at 800^th place. 

As it turns out all of this was in vain. We named our son, Aidan. The year of his birth it was below 150^th place. Two years later it cracked the top ten and has stayed there. And if I count in all the almost Aidan’s… Caden, Braden, Jaden, Hayden, etc., half the boys his age turn when we call his name. (In my defense, I have never watched Sex in the City.)

Our daughter Taryn’s name was 797^th place the year she was born. It hasn’t really changed, but her twin?  Have mercy! When our Sadie Jo was born, Sadie hadn’t cracked the top one hundred. This year it has risen to 50^th place and this doesn’t count the number of spelling derivatives out there. Just the one’s spelled the same. A friend of mine’s daughter even chose Sadie for her daughter. I joked that they had stolen our name, but was I upset?

Not really. A little disappointed and ego bruised that my names hadn’t been as unique and as different as I thought they would be when I chose them, but not upset. Getting angry or snippy or down right insulting about someone else using the name you chose is just ridiculous. As I said before, you didn’t invent the name. Unless you shook up the Scrabble letters and let them fall and created a name from them, someone else probably thought of the name too. And you didn’t trademark the name, which personally I think shouldn’t be legal (*cough* Kylie and Kendall Kardashian). 

So the next time someone uses the name you chose for your child don’t get snarky. Just realize it simply confirms your belief it is an awesome name.

One Battle Won...next?

You may be asking yourself what has inspired my sudden return to blogging, what has caused my absence and what it is that has me giddy and excited. I’m assuming you have a mild interest, hence your stopping here to read.

My absence: completely 100% related to health. I’ve got a myriad (sorry H, I just can’t not put the article in, it sounds wrong) of health concerns going on right now and it sucks. The FDA discontinued my migraine meds a while back and we’ve not found anything to replace them with as nothing works like that particular medication. In addition, I have a blood disorder that is currently doing backflips and has the doctor straining her brain trying to figure out what to do.

No worries about the little one. He’s just fine.

Which brings me to my current giddy and excited state which is why I’ve returned to my blog.

The SO finally caved. I’m getting my way! And yes, I’m gloating shamelessly because the SO doesn’t read this blog. Otherwise I’m handling it with sensitivity and grace. So what was the big victory? I get my pick for the baby’s middle name.

We had compromised to come up with Aidan as a first name and had originally compromised on James as a middle name. I was, however, forbidden to even discuss the idea of referring to the child as AJ. The evil glare was given and the lower lip protruded to emphasize the intensity with which my Precious hates initials for name. However, for some reason I can’t identify--temporary insanity, a sudden blow to the head which I swear I wasn’t responsible for—I have now been told I can use the middle name I’ve wanted all along.

Zarek (Zair-rik)

I know it’s a bit out there and yes, I first read it in a book. (Yeah, Anny, we Kenyon fans can be a bit intense.) While it is generally considered to be Greek, it can actually be traced to Babylonian times as the name and battle cry of a group of Babylonian generals, men who once conquered almost all of their known world. The literal meaning is "God (Lord) save the King."

Aidan means "fiery one" and St. Aidan (Aédén) was known for his gentle approach to the conversion of the people of Northumberland. He walked among them talking and sharing and with his quiet, noble and gentle spirit won the people over to Christianity. When a noble man gave him a mule to ride upon in his missions, he gave it away to a beggar and continued his way on foot.

So he will be Aidan Zarek. Together the names are strong and can be roughly translated as one of my favorite sayings: “Speak softly but carry a big stick.” Besides Zarek is just cool and masculine sounding. I am not a fan of unisex or soft names for boys.

I knew I’d won when I got the SO to laugh about using the name and after me calling the baby “Mamma’s little Z” a few times, my Precious actually used it too. Five minutes later I was being encouraged to pick out a large wooden letter Z to go on his wall. We also hung a large A. We’ve agreed he will go by Aidan officially. But he is Mamma’s little Z.

The nursery is basically done. We need to move the rocking chair up but everything else is in place. I attached the changing pad to the dresser top this morning, put up the wall decals, hung pictures and then tonight put the collapsible changing shelf up and attached it to the side of the dresser.

We also had our last childbirth class tonight and our tour of the hospital, labor and delivery, and the mother/baby unit. We still have a few things to decide, such as about circumcision. I hate the idea of them cutting a piece off my baby’s body when there isn’t really any medical need to. The SO is worried about the stigma and “teasing” that may happen in the future and just looks at me and says, “Everyone does it. It’s the norm.” I’m adding to my argument by the fact that many insurance companies now consider the procedure to be “elective cosmetic surgery” and aren’t covering it.

If there are any moms or grandmas of little boys out there who’d like to give the new mom advice, I’d welcome it too. And the guys. Is it really that big a deal in the locker room if you’re not clipped?

Don't forget, as always, stop by and read Anny Cook, Amarinda Jones, Kelly Kirch and Sandra Cox. They are much better about keeping up with their blogs and are much more entertaining.