Baby Names Are Getting Weirder, and Grandparents Aren't Happy About It

Sorry Juliet, it turns out that a rose by any other name doesn’t smell quite as sweet to today’s grandparents.

It used to be that the best baby names were the ones that were both easy to say and easy to spell—strong, unassuming, and preferably shared with a close relative. But not anymore. Today, parents seem to prefer the kind of names that stand out. Names guaranteed to trip substitute teachers up during roll call. And grandparents aren’t happy about it.

In a recent survey of 2,000 grandparents in Australia, a whopping one in five admitted they hate, or have hated, their grandchild’s name. Some 28% found the name too ugly, 17% too weird, and 11% too old-fashioned. Another 11% couldn’t get over the fact that family names were overlooked. Only six percent credit the spelling as the source of their disgust.

Some grandparents took the name drama much farther than others. Two percent reported becoming alienated from their children over the name issue and six percent claimed to have gotten “sick” over it.

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So, what’s a name-burned grandparent to do? According to grandparent expert Sally Tannen it’s very simple: keep your mouth shut. “Navigating your relationship with your adult child is really about holding your tongue,” she told Good Housekeeping.

In situations such as these, parents can be highly sensitive, and it’s best to pick your battles “The name is something you may hate, but it’s not worth making a thing about,” Tannen concludes.