{"id":11170,"date":"2015-04-14T10:26:55","date_gmt":"2015-04-14T14:26:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/?p=11170"},"modified":"2015-04-15T20:33:05","modified_gmt":"2015-04-16T00:33:05","slug":"baby-name-to-consider-spero","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/2015\/04\/14\/baby-name-to-consider-spero\/","title":{"rendered":"Baby Name to Consider: Spero"},"content":{"rendered":"

Hi Swistle,<\/p>\n

Help! Our baby is due four weeks from today and we are wavering on the name that we originally loved.<\/p>\n

Our last name is Wood, which knocked out quite a few names that I had liked before meeting my husband (like Forrest, Harrison, and Willow). We found out very early from a genetic test that we are having a boy – and it’s been hard for us to agree on a name since! My husband came up with the name Spero (pronounced like Sparrow), middle name Benjamin. He has always loved this Latin word, which means “to hope”. He suggested it early on, and I didn’t like it… But it grew on me quickly! And now I love it.<\/p>\n

Along with the sound of the actual full name, the meaning of Spero is special to us; we have been through quite a few stressful circumstances just prior to and during my pregnancy, and have continually reminded ourselves that our hope is in God, above all other worries and anxieties we may encounter.<\/p>\n

My husband just recently began to worry this name is too “out there” – his name is traditionally now used for girls, and was made fun of as a child for it. He goes between saying his name made him who he is (he now isn’t insecure like he was when he was young) and then saying he wouldn’t want our son to experience anything negative based on his name. He recently said he likes the name Theodore, nickname Theo, which originally he said “no way!” to. Overall, I think he’s hesitant to name a baby before its born, period!<\/p>\n

We ruled out the following boys’ names, mostly due to being too popular or just not agreeing between the two of us: Cooper, Levi, Hunter, Beckham.<\/p>\n

We hope to have 2-3 more children, picking from the following names…<\/p>\n

Girls: Rooney, Phoebe, Ivy, Maisey
\nBoys: Rex, Theodore (Theo), Emmett, Sawyer<\/p>\n

Please help.. We are running out of time! :)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

 <\/p>\n

I have mixed feelings. On one hand, Spero is currently completely unused as a given name in the United States, and I think spelling and pronunciation issues would be much more significant than average. My first guess at pronunciation (despite three years of Latin classes) would have been SPEER-o, similar to the name Spiro. If I heard the name instead of seeing it, my first guess at spelling would be Sparrow.<\/p>\n

It sounds as if your husband is having “boy named Sue” feelings: on one hand he appreciates the positive results of the negative experiences he had with his name, and on the other hand he doesn’t want his children to have to go through the same experience to get those results. I might suggest looking for other possible ways to achieve those results. I will feel embarrassed if no one else thought of it, but I’m afraid from the similarity in spelling I was immediately reminded of, er…sperm. With your surname particularly, that feels risky to me.<\/p>\n

On the other hand, this is such a great time for pulling off an unusual name. And the meaning is special to you. And I loved Latin. And you’re having a lot of trouble finding a name. And he could go by Benjamin\/Ben if he wanted to. And maybe no one else did\/will think of sperm; it’s only the spelling that makes me think of it, and the two words aren’t pronounced remotely the same. (I do have kids in the Learning the Facts of Life stage, so the vocabulary is near the front of my mind in a way it might not be for others.)<\/p>\n

Still, my advice is that Spero would make a better middle name than first name, especially with the other names on your lists.<\/p>\n

Theodore feels to me as if it better fits your first-name preferences. It’s fairly unusual (#170 in 2013) but familiar, it goes well with Wood, and it means God’s gift. Theodore Spero Wood.<\/p>\n

I’d also suggest Jasper, the ending of which may remind you of Spero.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Hi Swistle, Help! Our baby is due four weeks from today and we are wavering on the name that we originally loved. Our last name is Wood, which knocked out quite a few names that I had liked before meeting my husband (like Forrest, Harrison, and Willow). We found out very early from a genetic […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11170","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-name-to-consider"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3iyiG-2Ua","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11170","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11170"}],"version-history":[{"count":20,"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11170\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11198,"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11170\/revisions\/11198"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11170"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11170"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11170"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}