[Niscie]

Hello all I am new here and have a ???
My husband and I are foster parents to a wonderful baby boy T. He was placed with us when he was 4 weeks old, He was born 8 weeks early, and was in NICU for 4 weeks. We actually brought him home from the Hosptial.
We are adopting him and our CW asked us if we are chaning his name, we assumed she meant to our last name and told her yes. She then said what about his 1st name.. { his current 1st name and our last name rhyme} We had not even thought about it, but know we think about it alot. We have formed a good relationship with his bmom, will be having a semi-open adoption and we have thought about asking her how she would feel about it, we have even thought about giving him 2 first names the one we will chose and his birth name.
We are just so confused and would love your opions.
Thanks !!

[kennasmom]

This topic has come up again and again. I understand your feelings completely. You have to consider his future. While his Bmom's feelings are important, equally important are his feelings of his place with your family and NOT dealing with grief over a silly name (I keep thinking Julia Goolia from The Wedding Singer ). Can you keep his given name as a middle name or use the same initial for a new first name? Our bmom wasn't thrilled that we wanted to change her daughter's name but when I explained the importance of certain names in our family, she was supportive of our efforts to make her daughter "one of the family" by giving her a traditional name. We kept her birth name as a middle name. Just follow your heart and remember that you are his MOTHER...

[mrsred]

It seems a lot of names have another that is a form of it - Like Mitchell/Michael, Joshua/Josiah or really close like Daniel/David or Jason/Jacob. His his one that could be changed without it being a huge change? Rhyming names are not something anyone wants to be saddled with for life. When a child is older and knows their name it is a harder decision to change the name, but when they are babies it is more common than not. You may want to post your question in the birthparents room and get feedback from some birthparents.

[Niscie]

Thanks for you advice!!! Its nice to know people are out there that are willing to lend a ear, and give you the support you need.

[jen1mac]

We changed our first daughter's name and kept her birth name as her middle name. Birthmom didn't really like it but she understood. We now have her birthsister who it looks like we will adopt. Birthmom named her very similiar to our first daughter's name that we named because she wanted the sisters to have similiar names. We will keep that name but we have shortened it so we have some claim to the name and we will change her middle name.

[Niscie]

Hi, again thanks for the advice, I work with a teenager who was adopted from foster care and his parents changed his name, I asked him about it and said he was happy they did it, My husband and I aare pretty sure we will change his name and keep his 1st name as his middle name. Thanks again!!!

[jennyg1982]

Hi! We are foster and adoptive parents in Florida. With our "first set" of kids, ages 19- 28 we kept their first names and changed only the last. But with our second set of kids, ages 4- 18, many of THEM wanted to change their first, middle and last names. It was alittle confusing at first to remember to call them by their new names but now we are all used to it. My 4 year old wanted his new name to be "Benjamin Micheal Batman King Goff! He actually told the judge that! Sometimes it is a matter of belonging. Most of our kids wanted a whole new fresh start. And we wanted to respect that. Most of the birthparents were not happy that they wanted to change their last names let alone their first and middle names. But after adoption we have little contact anyway. Hoep this helps!
Jenny

[Cristi727]

We are adopting our children, ages 4 & 10, whom we've had for 3 years. Our ten yr. old was happy to change both his first and last name. I would have never thought about changing his first name, however the sw brought it up a year ago, and he was excited to change his name. My hubby and I went through a list of boy names we liked and which were appropriate, and let him choose. It was weird calling him by his new name but now I can't imagine calling him anything else. He changed with his new name and gained so much self esteem. He had alot of negative memories associated with his birth name. He also choose his middle name.

My four year old however would be too confused if we changed his first name. He loves the letter "K" for some reason so we choose his middle name based on name that stared with K.

Hope that helps.

[5starday]

When our Little A came to us, her birth name was so long that it was difficult for our bio son to pronounce. He decided we would call her a shortened version of her birth name for simplification. The shortened name just stuck and we've called her that for nearly 2 years.

We never thought she had a middle name because none of the CPS documents listed a middle name. We chose a beautiful middle name (that had meaning to us and her) and decided we'd add it to her shortened version of her birth name when we adopt her.

We just found out, when completing the petition to adopt, that she did actually have a given middle name. We were right to decide to change her name because using her first and middle birth names, along with our last name, makes her sound like a porn star. I am not kidding. It's really bad.

We are definitely changing her name! Since she was 4 months old, she's been called by her new name and doesn't know any different.

[MamaTo6]

Our son was placed with us at 15 days old. At 15 months old we changed his name. He wasn't confused at all, and adjusted much quicker to the change than we did. We kept his FULL birth name as middle names and added our own new first name and last name. Yes he has a very long legal name, but we felt it important to keep his original names as well as adding our own names.

Whatever you decide to doIm sure will be in the best interest of your son.

Congratulations mommy.

[h518may]

We picked up our FD from the hospital and changed her name from the start. Social workers were not real happy that we change her name, but didn't have to many problems with it since TPR was expected. Now I just have to decide if we add her first name as her second middle name, the two first names are very similar.