What’s in a name?

Hashtag! Really? I mean really??

I often hear names that have been bestowed on beloved children and I quietly cringe to myself but having just read about this particular name, that has been allegedly given to a baby girl this week I really feel the need to say my piece. Hashtag. It is a very ‘on trend’ phrase thanks to the popularity of Twitter, but seriously how can you give a child a name like that?

Naming your children is a big deal, I totally get that. It needs to be a name that you and your partner are happy with, a name that you like. As teachers, I have to say that there is always a long list of names that are not on the table, lest they might remind us of less desirable pupils that we have taught in the past. A name that maybe means some thing; whether it is a family name or simply a name that has a particular meaning that you like, that will say something about the child.

But for me, the deciding factor for a choice of name has to be that your child will be able to live with it. That they will grow happily up with and into that name without looking back at you with great resentment and applying to deed poll the moment they turn sixteen.

I do sometimes wonder if parents consider this point when they name their offspring something shall we say ‘unusual’. Do they consider that the child will go through those all important formative years having to put up with comments, sniggers or in some cases the possibility of being called the wrong name all the time? Then there is the spelling.  Pity the poor child who has the long and difficult name to spell during those early months at school.

My four have pretty much standard names. The boys are all traditional with one spelt the Welsh or French way (depending on who you are talking to) and A has a French name. Already I have seen that for both L and A, they are going to experience some difficulties with people spelling their names or saying them wrong. L, in particular, gets quite cross when people spell his name wrong and I can why.  It’s his name and an integral part of him.  O has a different surname to me and it is Spanish so he is definitely resigned to a life of strange pronunciations and spellings of his surname; it is quite amusing to see people’s faces as they read his surname and you can see the expression change as they try and work out how to pronounce it.

So even I, with fairly safe and common names have created some problems for my children. I am not saying that we should all call our children Thomas and Olivia, not at all. It is important that we all do our own thing and that every child is unique and individual. Some original names are beautiful.  I simply think that if we are going to be creative with our children’s names, we should consider first how it will affect them as they grow up and also what our motives are for thinking up such imaginative name choices.

So if I have another baby, how does Twitter Thomas sound?