We were concerned about nicknames, kids names can’t be altered real easy to make a mean one. We actually named our first kid for a shortened version of his first name. He has a second cousin in town that was two years older with the nickname also with the traditional long version so we went with a different one that actually works with his middle and last names tremendously. Because of being in the same daycare and the other kid being there also, his full first name was always used and we learned to like it better and nobody uses his shortened name. He has been called it a couple times by people and he corrects them when they say it.
With a wife as a teacher, we also had the name issue of her associating names with problem kids. My first choice for a girls name turns out to be my MILs legal name so that was destroyed. With wanted a version of her middle name, but I have a sister named that.
Along with this, make sure that the kid's initials don't spell something, especially something that will get them teased incessantly.
I remember when some classic names were old lady names and some of them are making a comeback: Grace, for example was rarely seen as a handle on anyone younger than 60 when I was a kid, now it is a trendy girl's name. It almost ended up being my eldest's middle name even though 30 years ago it was coming back a little bit but nothing like it is today. That daughter ended up with a given name that was extremely uncommon because we wanted to name her after my mother. Mom's given name didn't do it for us but her childhood nickname (most people didn't even know her given name through school) was perfect because it was also a feminine version of my ex-wife's father's name who was no longer with us. We thought the combination of given name and shortened version was unique even though the shortened version was not terribly uncommon. Low and behold my current neighbor has the exact same given name / shortened name combination. To make a long story even longer it checked the boxes of tied to family and had a name version that a CEO could have on her door and demand respect rather than snickers.
I like some of the classics like Cora.
Finally I would like to steer CG away from a client's name from years ago. I had a client whose given name was Nancy!.
Yes the exclamation mark was part of her first name. She thought it was some sort of conspiracy that her IT department wouldn't give her an email address that had her name spelled correctly. I didn't feel it was worth the effort to inform her that that was a restricted symbol in email addresses at the time. What were her parents possibly thinking?!
