How to get the daddy to be to approve of a name???

BethP321

I had a huge long list of all my favorite names, boys and girls, and he shot down ALL OF THEM. So now I have given up and my biggest fear is that our child is going to nameless when he/she is born because he won't approve of a name. And the worst part, he won't even LOOK for names. I feel like if he's not going to contribute or even be supportive that I'm currently creating his child, then I should just name it whatever the hell I want. He makes me angry. When did your SOs start picking out names? 6 months in? 9 MONTHS IN? I feel hopeless.

mollyj931

Give birth and then he gives in to whatever.
Our daughter wasn't named until she was 12 hours old because we couldn't decide. Plus I was convinced she'd was a boy so that didn't help. When the birth certificate lady came he just said "you decide!"

We each made a list of 10 names we liked and looked for similarities which helped.
Good luck!!

Edited to add:
It's still pretty early. You have plenty of time. If you are going to wait to find out the sex, wait until then.

BethP321

I ask him if he likes one, and then he's just like "yeah sure, whatever" and blows me off. I'm thinking to myself we don't have forever. It's only six months away, and it's going to fly by faster than we think. I'm also too picky, so I know I wouldn't like any of the ones he picks out anyway. Give him a taste of his own medicine.

Knottie1433440300

Maybe he's just not ready to think about names. Men often don't feel very connected until they can actually start feeling the kicks and see your belly grow, in the first trimester its kind of hard for them to imagine a baby. Give him some time, he will come around. Make a list of names for now and then come back to it in a few months.

jordans_wife

Ask him right after you give birth....who could say no then??

GhanimaAtreides

It's not fair when you do ALL the footwork and the other partner denies without reciprocity. You're not a maid with a serving platter to be waived off. My rule is that if he shoots one down, he has to offer another valid option. I also try to only approach once a month or two. It helps to pin down some general guidelines he likes... My DH is more flexible on girl names, but ridiculously rigid on boys names. My search got easier when I got him to narrow down to the following criteria:

1.) Names that were popular in the 70's/80's and are on the downswing (buh-bye Greyson!).
2.) Names that have a nickname option.
3.) Names that look respectable on a resume or CEO placard.

Also, you don't have to narrow it down any smaller than 3 or 4 options per sex, sometimes it's easier to wait until baby is here and it becomes clear which name is best.

steph_pegasus

We didn't really talk about it a whole lot until we knew dd's gender. Just sharing ideas but nothing serious.
DH actually picked her first name, then we gave her my maternal grandmother's first name for her middle. We had a back up just in case but didn't use it (and won't now that friends of ours just named their daughter that).
With this one we're waiting again to see if we find out the gender at the anatomy scan and then decide.

Heron422

I kept DH really involved when picking names. We sat down at the table and went through a ton. We decided on middle names years and years ago (family names). Now we've got one for a boy and one for a girl

tuitwo

If you're going to find out the sex, wait to discuss names again until at least then. It cuts your disagreements about names in half.

He may be more interested in talking baby names when you're further along. It starts to feel a lot more "real" as you grow and progress.

sherks11

I have tried to give options for names too. DH doesn't really want to talk about it until we know the gender. He also refuses to look up names on his own. At this point I have done a lot of work and have my favorites, so now it's up to him!

Again I think this falls into the boat of men not being connected to the baby until later on whereas women are right away. I'm in no rush so im ok with putting of the name arguments until we know what we are having!

bkc92

I agree that men don't feel as connected this early. My husband didn't get super involved in my pregnancy or excited about the baby until after the anatomy scan last time, and I'm sure it will be the same this time. I guess it feels more real to him when he can feel the baby/see my bump/etc.

mamaksweez

This is my 2nd pregnancy. For our first my husband wouldn't even think about names until we knew if it was a boy or a girl and then he still dreaded it. We went to the hospital with 5 names. Once our baby was born we still didn't agree, but I really liked Norah and kept saying she looks like a Norah, he just let me have my way because I just gave birth...
In conclusion, ha, don't worry about it now. You still have a really really long time to decide. Also, even though everything you think and do revolves around your pregnancy, it's still not real to your SO. It didn't really hit my husband until the baby was born!

SummerOH

We didn't start talking about names until we knew the sex.  Even then, we didn't start talking about it til about 7 months.  I had a list of names I liked that he found when I was gone one day.  He picked one from it, said he loved it, and that is our son's name! 

I think it's very early to stress too much about it.  He'll come around.  If he doesn't, then you get to pick the name!

MissMheMhe

It could be that things don't feel real for him yet. It might be best to put the name debate aside until he can feel baby kicking and you really start to show. He might be a little more open to discussion once he has that physical connection with the baby.
Luckily, DH and I have always discussed names and have a pretty short list. That said, our tops have changed a few times. We plan on going into delivery with two or three names in mind then deciding after baby is here.

smkerr14

We're waiting until the gender scan to really focus on picking out names. No reason to stress now!

bananers

Agree with all the others. It's way too early to stress. Last time DH and I didn't even really start talking about names until after the a/s, and even then he was pretty ambivalent. He shot down pretty much everything I suggested, but never had any good ideas to contribute. Super helpful. About a month before our EDD, I told him unless he came up with a better name, we were going with my favorite. Guess what happened? I got the name I wanted, and he suddenly weighed in at the last minute with an opinion on the middle name (after his grandfather), so I let him have that.

This time we won't start talking about names again until after the a/s. Like others have said, it cuts the fights in half.

sck601

Don't let it get to you. You sill have plenty of time to decide on a name

Mommyduclos

My husband is the same way- he says no to everything I say! We don't generally discuss names until after the anatomy scan since we find out the sex then so it just saves us the trouble of discussing extra names that will just not even be discussed after that, but what I've learned to do is tell him to make me a list, he came back with a list of 7 or 8- I vetoed a couple and then we hashed over the last 4 or so for a week or so. Worked on middle names to see what worked over all and such and then came to a decision. This was much less frustrating then me getting excited over every name and then getting shot down lol

daninikicoli

My husband and I never agree on names. Thankfully we both wanted to name our son after my dad. Jackson, but we only call him Jack or Buddy (sounds like a Sheryl Crow song). My husband prefers traditional names as where I like "weird" names. So I say he got the traditional with Jack now it's time for the weird.

ChipMonster

Last pregnancy, I made a list of names and DH didn't like any of my boy names. Of course we had a boy. He went for 5 days without a name! We tried out a couple on him and we actually ended up with the one that I liked even though I was willing to let DH have the name he liked in order to just give "baby boy" a name!

I hope we can agree on a couple of boy names before this LO arrives in case it is a boy! Although I'm sure no one would be surprised with us if he didn't have a name for a couple of days.