Baby Middle Name

You and your partner may be dead-set on a particular first name, but not feel too strongly about a middle name. This could be a good chance to “win points” with relatives by assigning them middle-name privileges (retain veto power, of course). You could also stave off sibling rivalry by letting a future big brother or big sister pick the baby’s middle name. I know of several people who have done this.

The middle name can enter into name compromise situations.

My grandma and grandpa agreed before my mother’s birth that if she were to be born a boy, my grandma could name the baby, and if a girl presented herself, my grandpa would pick the name. They also agreed that whoever didn’t get first name naming rights could pick the middle name.

Some families attempt to “keep the peace” with pushy family members by rejecting their name suggestions but allowing them more pull in the middle name. (You know, the old “four generations of boys in our family have been named Eric! How dare you mess with tradition!”)

Another situation I’ve occasionally seen is when parents aren’t married and don’t plan to become so. The baby takes the mother’s last name as his or her last name, but the father’s surname is the middle name.

Making the mother’s maiden name the middle name can be an alternative to hyphenating. Hyphenating names is popular and, of course, up to the parents, but it could eventually pose a problem when a girl with a hyphenated name grows up and marries a boy with a hyphenated name. That’s a lot of names to contend with!