[rottymom]

I was thinking we might change f-baby's name if adopting becomes a possiblity. I am worried though about everyone else that knows him as his name now. Espescially my kids. Has anyone fostered for over a year and changed the name at adoption? How did your family and friends adapt to the name change?

[reapingjoy]

We have friends who just finalized their adoption about a month ago. They had all 3 boys for almost 2 years (maybe the 2 older boys longer than that even). They changed all of their names completely. They are 2, 3 (almost 4), & 5. The older boys wanted their names changed & even the 2 year old began responding to his new name in just a couple of days. I think everyone has been very positive about it so far. It is difficult to remember to call them by the new names sometimes just because I'm used to calling them the old name, but it doesn't take too long to change over in your mind.

We were going to change our daughter's name had we finalized the adoption....mainly because her name is so odd that I am always getting weird looks like "how could you name her that?" (I think esp. because I am Caucasian & she is AA & they think I did it to be really different or something, esp. when they hear all 4 of her names).

Hope that helps :-)

[vernellinnj]

I've fostered the same child for over two years and have thought about changing the name if I am blessed to adopt. Honestly, I think it would be too "weird" to change the name now as the child is an older toddler. If the child was older and could participate in the decision to change the name I would think about it but I think people would think I were nuts if I said, "this is now XXX name".

Good luck!

[carlychan]

Hello, We have a 10 month old placement who is concurrent. We will probably be able to adopt him and we call him a different name than his "real" name. His birth name is spanish and we gave him a similar english name.

Carly

[jalapeno]

We transitioned with a nickname. We actually brought our daughter home at two days old. The name given to her by her birthmom was too weird for us. We tried it for a while but it was really akward when people asked us how she got that name. So we started calling her by a nickname when she was a few months old (Dee Dee). To be honest, I wasn't totally in love with the name Dee Dee at first. But it's REALLY grown on her. So when the adoption was finalized we chose a "D" name so that the nickname would still fit. We finalized the adoption at 17 months and she's over 2 years now. People still call her "Dee Dee" often but her "new" name has also really caught on. When I ask her what her name is now, she tells me her first name rather than her nickname. But she also points to herself if I ask her where "Dee Dee" is. We also kept her original given name as a middle name. People were really good about the name change. It was strange even for me to call her by her new name at first, but I think the more people heard it, the more it stuck. Good luck!