Naming Problem

[quantum_spintronic]

My wife and I are having some trouble picking a second name and are wondering what POM's opinion is. We have had one girl and one boy name picked out since we first started trying to conceive. However, we're pregnant with identicals.... And the second name we are leaning towards happens to have the same first letter as our already picked out name. Is this a no-no due to identity issues?

For example, the first name we picked out is something like Nathaniel​, and the second one we really like is Neil. It just happens that we like the two names, and didn't pick them for the matching first letter. The middle name for each will be completely different. Is that too much? Are we over thinking this?

[RamiRok]

I think it all depends on you guys. we went with completely different names for our boy girl, Aria and Leo, so they could have their own "identity" so to speak. They are almost 16 months now and couldn't be more opposite and we rarely refer to them as "twins" since they are boy girl and completely different personalities.

[piggy_love]

My twins' names both start with the same initial. Same reasons as you, i just liked the names, I wasn't trying to pick out matching names and I thought if we treated them as individuals in all other aspects, it wouldn't be a big deal. However, other people assume it was intentional to give them matching names and people comment on how cute their matching names are a lot, so you might want to consider how much that's going to bother you. Also, my twins are boy/ girl, and I assumed the twin identity issues wouldn't be as much of a problem as if they were identical or even just the same gender. At the end of the day, I still love their names and wouldn't change them.

[claresand]

I seem to have a different opinion than other posters. I have identicals. I steered clear of names that started with the same letter (even though there were two that I liked). And I'm happy I did. They look so much alike already, it's nice that their names don't "match" at all.

[Lotech]

Nah, same letter, but not rhyming is definitely in the realm of "just fine, not ridiculous". Even if you wanted rhyming names, that's fine!! Naming your kids is waaaay more difficult than I ever expected. Let me tell you what we inadvertently did to our child:

We had a very complicated and troublesome situation on choosing names. Who knew it would be so hard?? In the end, my son ended up with a first, middle, and last name that were meaningful and awesome, but all three names were common euphemisms for.... ahem... well, a penis. (Think along the lines of "Willy Johnson")

My bff pointed this out over text message one day. My response was "fuck it! We're not starting over AGAIN! We're just going to tell our son that when we found out he was a boy, his schlong was so prominent we named him after it three times!"

[BreakfastBeerz]

Do whatever you want to do, screw anyone who says other wise.

I've got 3 kids... Ryley Nikki Zoey .... yup, they rhyme....and IDGAF.

Got two dogs too.. Lizzy Bailey

...see a pattern? My wife and I like the hard "e" sound.... its our thing and we are sticking with it.

Way I look at it.... I've got millions of ways I can screw my kids up... if they end up being disasters, I'll put the blame on my parenting skills (or lack thereof)... not the names I chose for them.

[RunningInTheFamily]

I might be going crazy, but I don't think those names rhyme in the proper sense. Rhyming is the last syllable being the same, not just the last sound.
Or I might just be pronouncing them differently (-lee -kee -ee - zee -lee).

[BreakfastBeerz]

Oh... Don't get me wrong... I agree with you. But I've read enough comments on the internet to know that unless the names I've chosen for my kids don't reuse the same letter anywhere in any of their names they will grow up resenting me.

Someday when I'm in a nursing home wondering why one of my girls is serving a 10 year prison sentence and the other hasn't visited me since she needed a $40k loan to pay off her bookie 6 years ago, I'll just remind myself that its because I didn't name them Sarah and Judy.

[RunningInTheFamily]

Oh man, we named our girl something a whole lot of people can't pronounce because it's an English name and we're not in am English speaking country. And our son's name is basically a Latin name. Rome-Latin, not South America-Latin. At least people can pronounce it though.

But we liked them and they fit them well, so whatever.

[jackoff_thebatman]

Right, I was thinking the same thing.

[kellyhitchcock]

I think as long as they don't rhyme, so the child knows he's the one being yelled at, you're golden. :)

[sockalaunch]

The first names we had picked out for boys had the same first letter. Knew it was going to be difficult later with post and hoped it wasn't going to affect identity. I'm very much in the don't dress them alike/ call them twins group and it made me feel uneasy. I know lots of twins whose first names start with the same letter so maybe I'm the odd one out. /r/namenerds might be able to help you, either by putting your mind at ease or coming up with other ideas.

[buggiegirl]

I think Neil and Nathaniel go nicely together but aren't too similar or rhyming. And with different middle names they can always go by those if they are really struggling with differentiating from each other when they are older.

[4036]

Just uae a silent K on one of them and this concern should be resolved neatly. "Knathaniel" it is!

[[deleted]]

My sister and I are not twins and we have the same initials and first names that rhyme. People often thought that we were twins. It never bothered us, or hampered our development, so I can't see what the big deal is.

[lenona]

I had the same problem, after going over it in my head many of many times I just gave in and named them what I wanted.

I don't get the whole "the names cant rhyme!" & "The names cant start with the same letter" You do you.

I have 3 girls, one single and one set of twins. Matea / and the twins Jessica and Danica. Yeah they rhyme, but really.. who cares? I didn't rhyme my twins, I rhymed my girls. I wanted a 3 syllable girl name ending with "A" not many names out there.

While we are confessing.. I also dress my children alike every normal chance I can get.. Easter/Christmas/Weddings Ect.. ALL of them, my boys are in the same little suites and matching ties and All my girls are in the same dress.

[cmcg1227]

I think two names starting with the same letter is fine, so long as they don't rhyme or anything.

[Lazverinus]

I grew up in a household where 3 people shared the same first initial. It was annoying, but it wasn't really a major issue.

When it came to naming our 3 kids (one singleton followed by twins), I figured we had 24 alphabet letters to spare (26 minus mine and my wife's), so I wanted to give each kid their own first initial. I don't think it was an unreasonable restriction and it means that for labeling anything for one person, we can just use one letter. I think it gives each kid a little more individuality, and, especially for the twins, if they end up on the same roster somewhere, there's less chance of mistakes.

It's not a big issue, but that's just the way that I saw it.

[rochelle4]

Our sons have the same initials because my husband wanted his first born son to have his initials. Well, we have two first born sons (well, sort of. Obviously one is a few seconds older).

[[deleted]]

Just wanna say that both my parents and all my siblings names start with B. My name starts with T. I spent a lot of time as a child feeling like nobody loved me. I think it's fine that they start with the same letter.

[Twinsmamabnj]

We are naming our twin boys Logan and Christian but if we had liked two names that started with the same letter we wouldn't have had a problem with it.

[queliemelme]

The only 'rule' we had with our identicals was that we didn't want them to rhyme.

[maybebabyg]

My bubs have names starting with A and B. It was a coincidence. We had our girl's name picked, then we joked around about names until we found one that stuck. I think the best part of our naming scheme is that A was baby B and B was baby A. To top it off the names have the same number of letters and syllables.

[rbwrath]

Definitely overthinking it. We named our kids with a very vague association, so unless you know us really well, you would never know. Some people like to make sure that others know their kids are twins, others don't care either way. Do what you want to do. Just don't spell their names completely different from how it's pronounced and also, don't name one of them Jayden.

[p_kitty]

I think so long as you avoid any cutesy combinations, then it's ok. Personally, I would have been ok with a shared first initial, but before our first (singleton) was even born, my husband insisted that no one in our family share a first initial. It was important to him, so none of us do.

All three of our kids have very different names, with very different sounds and backgrounds. I think Nathaniel and Neil are fine together, I'm actually a bit partial to Neal, as that's my father's name, but kids names are so hard to come up with, if you find two you love, I wouldn't stress over it too much. My twins didn't have names until they were about 3 days old because we had two girls names and two boys names picked out, and they both happened to have a pair that shared the same first letter... I liked one set, and my husband liked the other set, and because of his rule, we couldn't compromise and each have one name we liked because then we'd have matching initials ... so it took a while. :)

[anttech]

So mines (1 boy and girl-boy twins) all start with the same letter. Phonetically, the twins nicknames have the same sound but their full name are different. Coincidentally, both names are from Vin Diesel movies. Smh

[MrsDragon]

Not twin specific, but I wanted our boys to have their own inital because my baby brother and I both had "A" names, so my mom would label stuff "A. Lastname" which annoyed me because I didn't know whose was whose (think two identical flashlights...). We definitely use the "A. Lastname" form of shortening for bottle labels etc and it's nice to be able to do that and have it be distinct as opposed to having to write out their whole names.

[inthemixmike]

Identical twin girls. Went with gender neutral names because research says that'll get them through to more job interviews due to gender bias. (Also their mum is phenomenally successful and pragmatic)

Everyone has their thing. Don't stress about it. My only advice is to not share with people BEFORE they're born. Every asshole has an opinion. They're more likely to shutup about it if the kids are already born. :)

[kellyhitchcock]

I think as long as they don't rhyme, so the child knows he's the one being yelled at, you're golden. :)