I was quite shocked by a conversation I had with an elderly lady when out and about with my rainbow baby. Perhaps she didn’t like the name Aurora but what do you think?
The conversation
This lady stopped me in a supermarket to coo and ahhh over her asking as most people do whether she was my only one or not. I said no she is my third baby but unfortunately her sister and brother died.
The lady said she was sorry to hear that and what was her sister called. When I said Violet she remarked about how pretty that name was. Then she said “so is that what this little one is called then Violet”. I said no she was called Aurora but she did have her sister’s name as a middle name thinking maybe the lady had gotten confused or misheard me perhaps.
She then said “what was Violet’s middle name”. I said Elizabeth and she said “oh that’s a shame as Violet Elizabeth is such a beautiful name I’d have used it again”. I was stunned. Why on earth would I name my second daughter exactly the same as my first as though she’s a replacement? I was dumbfounded. I didn’t know what to say and just smiled then walked off.
Where has this come from?
Then I decided to do some research into why she even had this belief and discovered during the Victorian era when child mortality was very high then giving a child the same name as a deceased older sibling was in fact quite common, especially if the child had been named after a parent. If you look through archives you’ll often see multiple children with the same Christian name in a family. I assume perhaps this elderly lady came from a family that had done just this so she felt it was a normal practise.
Some people are weird
I also think that some people are just weird. I remember someone telling me that as a child her family’s dog was called “Ben” and today her family’s dog is still called “Ben”. There have in fact been 6 Ben’s altogether. To me that is very strange but even more so to do that with a child.
What do you think? Would you give all your pets the same name? Would you use the same name again and again for a baby?
Love Sarah
Always Violet Skies x
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Before having our daughter we lost a baby girl at 22 weeks and a baby boy at 36 weeks. We gave a lot of thought to their names as we felt that it was important that they were honoured in the right way. When our daughter was born we gave her a middle name which was linked to the daughter who we had lost as we felt that this was a nice tribute. However, we felt that giving her the same name would have been disrespectful. As you say, it would have felt like we were just replacing the daughter who we lost.
Exactly we also gave Aurora her sister’s name as her middle name too to honour her but never to replace. I’m sorry for your loss too. Thanks for taking the time to comment. Lots of love xxx