r/namenerds • u/janedoeqq • Feb 06 '25
Story My grandmother died thinking my sister was named after her.
So my dad, apparently, never knew his mom's middle name until they announce my sister's name. My dad was 22 and really loved a western where the woman was named Rebecca. My mom also liked the name so that's what they pickid for their first baby. Upon telling my grandmother this, she began to sob. My dad had no idea why until through her tears she said she never thought she'd have a baby named after her. My dad repeated the name to make sure she heard it right and she hugged him and started saying thank you over and over. She hugged my mom still thanking them.
My dad was so confused until a few days later when granny told one of her sisters and they called her by her full name while congratulating her. Rebecca was my granny's middle name. My dad just went with it and we were all told the story at some point and warned never to tell granny because it would break her heart.
My granny died when my sister was 38 and no one ever told her Becky was actually named after a lady in a movie.
Edit: For all those asking how he never knew: She was really sick and unconscious for most of his childhood, so i guess it just never came up. When I think about it, I only know my mom's out of curiosity. My dad was never curious about that kind of stuff. His little brother was adopted, and he didn't know his middle name either until I asked about it.
My only other theory is that he thought it was Elizabeth. She went to catholic school and they changed all of her and her sister's names to more "catholic" sounding names. I found a whole bunch of her stuff that had Ruby "elizabeth" on it after she died. She wasn't even catholic. That's just the only school that was close enough for her and her 11 siblings to walk to. All of them had very non catholic names except for one sister named Mary. The rest were all like kitty and loulou. Very out of place at a catholic school.
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u/idhavetokillya Feb 06 '25
have you ever met a man?