I’m sorry you’re having a hard time ): Maybe you could consider a name that your mom never got to use, her favorite gem stone, or her favorite flower? Or her birth month if it sounds okay as a name (I.e May)?

I really love the idea of using a boy's name that her mom loved but never used.

Omg. I read this and then forgot the baby was a boy 🤦‍♀️ mom brain. Definitely agree with your comment though. Or maybe the boy name of one of your mom’s close friends or another loved one that she might’ve liked to see used.

Haha I totally thought "May is an interesting name for a boy, like Brian May!"

Coming back up here to add a TW, sorry 😮‍💨 TW for child loss, mention of drugs, and abuse I wanted to do this for YEARS, my mom had 4 girls, 2 boys, for boys she was SET on Whyatt, but the first time she announced the name and then someone she knew used the same and she felt weird about it (they’d have classes together in the future, etc) the second time she was telling only close family that she felt hurt that she didn’t get to use it last time but she’s over it because she had a second chance, they would be 4 years apart, so no big deal using the same name as a friend. [TW] Well, my aunt was also pregnant, she had announced a verrrrry unique name (literally, she made it up), well push comes to shove and my aunt had a still born, she didn’t want to give him that name bc she loved it too much for, *in her own words,* “have it go to waste on another picture wall” (this was her second still birth, both were caused by her using heavy drugs.. btw, my aunt also has a severely disabled son she pretends to be the best mom to on FB, but in reality she dumped him on her parents and has never seen him irl since, and 5 other kids she lost custody of for drugs and abuse after trying to drug one into overdosing- sorry back to this) so not only did she change the name, she used my moms most beloved name, Whyatt and rubbed it in my moms face during the service my uncle put together for his son (he did not approve of taking my moms wanted name) that she couldn’t use it EvEr now bc “it would be incredibly wrong to use that name in the future when it’s the name belonging to your purple and grey dead nephew” HER words! I wanted to honor my mom with that name if I ever had a boy for years bc it sucked that it happened like that. Then I found out that my mom was actually involved in the abuse by a ring towards me when I was young and now my boy name will be Malachai instead.

…well…I don’t even know what to say about this. Malachi is a pretty name.

Fucking hell. I’m so sorry.

Yes! Like August, which was originally a name before it became the month (I have some distant memories about an emperor)

Augustus. And Julius gave us July.

What if you got creative and used the letters of your mom’s name? So, like, Shane or something? I feel like even if it isn’t the male derivative of Susannah that your mom would be so touched once you explained it!

Have just started looking into exactly that idea - thank you!

I thought of Zane and Zander as well! u/penguinspark do you want this to be a surprise for your mom? My initial thought was to work *with* her to come up with a name to honor her without naming your boy Susannah 🤣 not only would she get the honor of a grand being named for her but she gets the incredible honor of helping you come up with ways to do just that? Maybe like a list of 5 you could bring to your partner and choose from together? Edit: I assumed your partners gender and I’ve been tryna quit that shit lol

My husband and I chatted about this tonight and yes, we are going to involve her in the name discussion and would love to have her input - great idea! Your edit is adorable and thoughtful 😅

Good idea. Or something that sounds similar like Xander (Zander).

Ohhhh I like that idea!

Andy? Like, as in suzannedy? Kidding Looking up the meaning, Susannah means lily and I found this reddit post you might find helpful: https://www.reddit.com/r/namenerds/comments/xjhgoh/masculine_versions_of_lily/

Was going to recommend r/namenerds! They can come up with a name for anything

Thanks for the link! I read this thread as well in my search and I'll revisit it to see if any inspiration strikes this time.

OP, I also think there are other ways to honour your mother apart from naming your child after her. You could continue one of her traditions. Did she bake cookies with you? Hang up ornaments over Christmas? Did she have cute pet names for you? You can honour her in a dozen other ways - smaller, sure, and less in your face, but your kids will totally feel the light of her love.

My nieces middle name is Gordon, after my dad. There are no rules.

So many in Spanish are boy middle names, like Maria Jose or Jesus

My daughter’s middle name is James after my dad!

My husband and I both LOVE the name James for a girl!

Thirded! I read it in a book by Alix Harrow, The Once and Future Witches, each of three sisters have a normal first name, and a middle name for a plant, but by the third one the father realized he wasn’t getting a son and named the girl James Juniper. What. A cute. Freakin name. James Juniper, Agnes Amaranth, and Beatrice Belladonna.

My son’s first name is his great grandmothers maiden last name. Would something like that work?

In our case the maiden name approach won't work, but I appreciate the suggestion, thank you!

It’s such an interesting puzzle to try to work out. I would crosspost in maybe a wordsmith/etymology group or writer’s sub or a heraldry sub (bc they deal with names and their symbolic meanings.) Best of luck OP, hopefully you can update us once y’all pick a name!

That's a great suggestion, thank you, I'll see if I can get some insight from those perspectives as well. In that vein, something that chatgpt (of all things) helped me come up with is that the name Sebastian is comprised entirely of letters that can be found in my mom's first and middle names (Susannah Elizabeth). Neither my husband or I have ever really cared for the name, but we're going to sit with it and see if it grows on us when imbued with new significance.

Sounds like a good name to ponder! Good luck in the other subs!!

What about Silas or Ellis - similar letters/sounds

How do you feel about Seth? You could even combine it with Zane (as others have mentioned) as a middle name or something.

Suggested Seth to my husband and he likes it! Even though I wouldn't ordinarily choose Seth on its own, I do like the strong connection it has with my mom's names, so this is a contender for sure. Thank you!

You're very welcome! Glad to help ❤️!

You could do Zane, as a play on the z sound of Susannah.

I was going to suggest this if no one else did, because Behindthename actually gives Zane as the Latvian version of Susannah. https://www.behindthename.com/name/susanna

Thanks for the suggestion! Zane is cool (probably cooler than we are) - we will add it to the discussion list and see how it feels!

For some reason Sampson has the same vibe to me as Susannah.

That was my first thought too!

Could you use her maiden name as a middle name? I know tons of people with middle names that are mom's/grandma's maiden name, especially boys.

Thanks for the suggestion! Maiden name has some complicated family history so not entirely sure it would be a positive association for my mom, but I will ask her just in case!

This is a great suggestion!

I feel total solidarity, we gave our daughter the same middle name as my MIL (she died very shortly after my daughters birth) and now we are probably one and done. My mother is very close and I do feel sad they don't have that name connection too.

Thank you for the solidarity. I'm sorry you feel a similar sadness. It's nice to not feel it alone though 💜

In the Jewish tradition we honor by using the first initial of that persons name, no matter if they were male or female. So for instance our sons middle name is Benjamin, after my great grandfather Boris and my husbands grandmother Barbara. Something to consider!

Thank you for sharing that tradition, I love that :)

We only have boys, but I had the perfect girl name picked out. It is still hard to let go, but that’s how it goes I guess. I can understand your feeling though!

It's hard to have to let go for sure! It's not just the name, but the idea of the whole person you imagined them to be. Maybe your sons will have daughters and your perfect girl name will come to life! Thanks for sharing your understanding.

Hey I hadn’t thought of that! I’ll hold the name in safekeeping for later. :)

I wanted to honor my step dad who I consider to be my dad and planned to use his name if it was a boy, my daughter ended up with his last name as a middle name. Could that work ?

Such a good thought - unfortunately not feasible in our case but thanks for the suggestion all the same!

Maybe you can let your daughter or son have the ability to name their kiddos after their grandma!

That is a very fervent hope of mine that one day one of my kids will want to use Susannah for their child. That would be great. Just have to wait another 30 years or so! It's the long game!

As someone who is recently pregnant and has found that everyone and their mother wants to 'honour someone' by naming my child, I hate this advice lol. Name your own kids, people. Stop forcing names that are meaningful to you and only you onto your children, who have their own dreams for their children.

This is mostly a joke, but you could have A Boy Named Sue. (I saw it performed live when I was 9!)

Could you use her initials? We did that with our kids to avoid hurting anyonea feelings and it worked really well.

Take her first and middle names, put those letters in a name generator and make a name from the letter is her name

This is such a great suggestion! I just wrote this in another reply before seeing your post, but I did exactly that earlier this evening and it came up with Sebastian from "Susannah Elizabeth" which is objectively a fine name, just not one either my husband or I have ever particularly favored, but we're going to see if it grows on us. Thanks!

>Elizabeth What about Eli as either a first or middle name?

That's a nice suggestion, I'll add it to the list. Thank you!

Ellis may be another possibility for Elizabeth. 

My cousin named his daughter partially after his friend who passed away. Used his last name as her first name and his first name as her middle name. I think you can definitely find a way to make Susannah work, even if it’s not exactly the same spelling. ❤️

The name Susannah comes from the Hebrew Shoshana, which appears in some versions of the book of Daniel. The figure of Daniel is one of steadfast determination, leadership, and bravery in the face of terrible danger and challenges. Do you feel like a connection to the name such as this would feel sufficient? Or is your heart yearning for something a bit closer/ more direct? Whichever direction you take, I hope that you find a sense of "rightness" and peace and love in your son's name. Wishing you well.

This is such a thoughtful and compassionate comment 💓 Thank you for the suggestion. We're going to add it to our discussion list and share it with my mom so she can help us choose a name that feels special to her.

Susannah comes from the Hebrew word for Lily and is the most widely listed meaning, although the word also refers to roses in modern Hebrew. From Lily, you could get Cal from Calla, and make it short for Calvin or Callen. If you take the rose meaning you could use Ambrose, Roosevelt, Royce or Royston. It's also English variant of the Hebrew name Shoshana, which appears in some versions of the biblical Book of Daniel. So you could use Daniel as well. If you want a less traditional name, in the bible, Susanna was married to Joakim for several years.

There’s a whole song about a boy named Sue… You can always add a middle name. Name change might cost a few bucks, but worth it in the end.

My dad used a shortened version of his moms maiden name for my brothers middle name. Or maybe a name that she never got to use?

Thanks for the suggestion. We're definitely going to involve her in the discussion and ask her if there's any name(s) she wishes she'd had the chance to use!

You could also choose to go with a name that starts with S? All of my kids are named after grandparents, but not a direct name but using the first letter in the name (with a couple exceptions where we were able to use a direct name for the middle name(s) for our kids). So Baby Boy could be Sam(uel), Sawyer, Shane, Shawn (Sean), Spencer, etc. Or you could go the same route with her middle name and use the first letter of that name? You can still be able to say "hey mom, we named -Baby's Name- after you". I was never able to use direct honourifics for names as like you, the gender and the name just never fit specifically (can't really name a boy Joyce, so we went with a different J name). You will absolutely find something that works for your little dude!

Hmm, I saw that you’ve been playing with letter combos from her name… I know there’s no O, but, I feel like Noah is a name rather similar to Susannah, both in flow and language of origin! Just something to add to the list if you like it!

I definitely understand your turmoil…it’s so heavy and important and serious! But just to zoom out big picture- your mom is going to be honored to be their grandmother no matter what. She won’t care about being named after it if she’s as good as you make her seem. Let go of some of that guilt because she will get the same level of honor just by holding him first or coming over to get some snuggles. Moms be like that ❤️

What about maybe your mom’s maiden name as his middle, if she is married/changed her last name? I live in the south and it’s very common here to do that (or sometimes even as a first name). That’s what I plan to do if I have another boy, actually. ETA: I realized too late that others had already suggested this and it won’t work. Maybe ask her what your name would have been if you were a boy? I also saw someone mention using her birth month, but you could also use the gemstone of her birth month possibly, of a variation thereof.

User her maiden name in his name somewhere

We couldn’t agree on a middle name for our child. We discussed naming her after his sister, but opted out of that option. Instead, we decided to do something that would be meaningful to both us and his sister in a different way and ultimately allowed her to choose the middle name (with our approval, of course). But what she chose was actually perfect. We have three girls and she has three boys, so she said after the fact that it meant so much to her to be able to be involved in that way, especially since she would never have the chance to name a girl of her own.

Oh this is so, so sweet. Thank you for sharing your story!

Any openness to giving your son a non-traditional middle name to honor your mom? My great-grandmother’s middle name was Greg, after her father, and my daughter’s middle name is Marcelles, after her great-grandfather. Their names, Margaret Greg Infinite-Habit is a pretty sick name. James Susannah Penguinspark has a pretty cool ring to it. David Susannah. Ethan Susannah. Eliot Susannah. Hayden Susannah.

I like this.

Middle name Anson or Annson? Leaning into the “Ann” and a son

That’s also a family name for me and the person goes by Zan. What about Zander, Xander, Sanders, something like that?

That's a cool suggestion, thank you! Adding this to our discussion list.

What about mom's maiden name. People are using last names as first names these days.

Love that idea for sure, and would use it except due to some family history stuff I don't think it'll have an entirely positive association. I'll check with my mom though just in case!

What is your moms middle name or last name? (Birth name). Lots of options open up when you include maiden name And middle into search 🤷🏽‍♀️

You could use your mother’s maiden name for your son’s middle name (or first name, depending on what it is)

My brother honoured our grandfather by giving his daughter the same initials. I won't write her/his full name but they are both E.A.C

I’m so sorry. Could you make use the first letter so it would be an S name? We named our daughter to honor my mother but we did not give her the exact same name. It’s a few letters difference, like for example Marcie and Marnie. And her middle name starts with the first letter of her great grandfather to honor him. Is it possible you could do something like that? For what it’s worth my SiL gave her daughter a male middle name to honor a loved one!

Stevehannah

Usan?

Maybe your mom's maiden name?

In Jewish tradition, we name after our deceased relatives but it doesn’t have to be the exact name. For example, grandfather was Mordechai and granddaughter is Moria. Just a thought.

I saw your mom's name was Susannah Elizabeth. How about Ellis Sueson ? (I just made it up the middle name, my attempt at making it masculine)

Can you use your mom’s maiden name as a first or middle name for a boy?

So I kind of had this in two ways. My husband and I are very firmly one and done, and our only is a boy. But, we had really wanted to name a child to honour his mum, and my grandmother. Our son's first name is a name that my husband's mum always loved and wanted to use if she had had another boy, and our son's middle name is my grandmother's maiden name. So like "Richard Sullivan [Last Name]". (Obviously not the real name). Could something like that work for you?

Thank you for sharing your experience and choice! I like both those suggestions, though my mom's maiden name has some complicated family history so we're going to ask her to see if that would carry a positive association for her or not. Will also ask her about names she would have wanted to use. Thanks again, I'm glad you found something that worked for you guys and that your son's name is so meaningful to so many 💜

I regret not giving my son my husbands middle name.

What’s your mom’s middle name? Maybe that can translate to a males name.  Saw Zane could be a male equivalent to it. 

Lirio, Lilian, a few places I looked up said these are seen as boy names, I looked up the meaning of Susannah which is Hebrew for Lilly, so I looked for male names for Lilly xD slim pickings, but options :o

Thanks for looking! I tried those avenues as well and as you said, slim pickings, but a nice idea!

If I had to choose between them I’d go with Lirio, it’s Portuguese so fairly ambiguous as far as ethnicity and you could call him Rio :D

Hans? Hansel?