September 21, 2007
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~A Rose by Any Other Name Would Smell as Sweet~
I don’t know how to tell people this without sounding snarky or embarrassing anyone in person, but my children’s names are NICHOLAS- not NICK and Maria~Angelica- not MARIA. Maybe by posting this here people in my real life will read it and spread the word. As a rule of thumb I think people should call you the name your mother refers to you by. Children, young children, easily say Maria~Angelica- they never cut her name. Adults hear me refer to Nicholas as Nicholas and then speak to him using Nick. Why? I always let it go but it is very odd to hear your children called by a name that you don’t identify them with; It takes me a second to figure who in the heck Maria and Nick are.
Comments (18)
Amen!!!
I am by no means advocating this (I never agreed with it)… but the way my parents handled it was my father told me that he would spank *me* if he ever heard anyone call me “Becky” instead of Rebecca.
It was effective, but well … Our own DD’s name is similar (hyphenated), but we have trouble enough getting people to pronounce the first half – kids and foreigners/immigrants do it without a thought, but middle age and older American refuse to even try (and it isn’t that hard!). Honestly, though, a modified form of what my folks did might work … if you teach your child to very respectfully make the correction … “I’m sorry Mrs. _____, could you please call me Nicholas? It is what my parents and I prefer.” I always respectfully made the request and it has always worked. Blessings! 
This always baffles me as well. My Sophia regularly becomes Sophie, even though she tells people that is not her name. My brother Andrew always has gone by Andrew. A soccer coach once called asking for Andy. My brother, who had answered the phone, told him he had the wrong number! He didn’t realize it was a nickname for Andrew. I usually tell people “Oh, Sophia goes by Sophia.”
Oy, I know what you mean. I didn’t name my child “Josh.” (HE prefers Joshua too.)
Oh I’m so with you!!! Within hours of Jacob’s birth he was already being called Jake, and as the weeks went on I was very emotional about it. If I wanted him to be called Jake I would have named him that! I LIKE Jacob. That’s why we named him that. I never understood why people would refer to him as Jake when I referred to him as Jacob. It was weird. As time went on people caught on when they noticed we never called him Jake, and some would ask me specifically. Once Jacob got older if someone called him Jake he would even think that was weird, and he would say to that person (even a family member) “Please don’t call me Jake. My name is Jacob.” People caught on. Maybe you should have Nicholas say something, politely?
For the record, I always wished my parents called me Rebecca instead of Becky. But when they named me Rebecca they always knew they would shorten it. I always felt I had this great name that I didn’t get to use!! I think Rebecca is really pretty….Becky, not so much…
Exactly! It is polite and considerate to ask someone their name and use their name the manner in which they say it. And if there is a nickname of a child, it is usually provided by mom and dad as well.
Nicholas is a dignified name and Maria Angelica is spectacular. You have every opportunity to continue to protect their name, and it is not rude or presumptious at all.
I would be looking around for who TJ was if someone else shortened my oldest son’s name…stick to your guns. Yu are very right.
Absolutely. For some reason people call Gabriel “Gabe” right off the bat. He never responds just as I never respond to “Liz” ((yes someone tried that with me–said “Beth” sounded too white :wha:))
I can’t tell you how many times people have asked me if Christina’s name is Christina or Christine, and when I tell them it is Christina, they persist in calling her Christine. Oy. We do use pet names at home, though.
Sounds like most everyone has a similar problem. A lot of people call Niki – Nick! Um, she’s a girl. Doesn’t look like a boy. Niki is already a nickname for her – the nickname itself doesn’t need to be shortened. I understand!!! :love:
Mara is really into nicknames now, trying to find one for everybody. She called friend Simon “Sy” for a while, and his sister Lillian was reduced to “Lil.” It’s funny. What would people call her? Mar? Ma?
I had a boss who called me “T” because he couldn’t figure out if I’m Tah-mare-uh or the one that rhymes with “camera.” (BTW, I rhyme with camera.) I always thought “I’m not your friend–don’t call me T!”
I agree totally with your post! There are so many lovely Christian names I would love to use but for this exact reason I do not. So many of them have several nicknames! I honestly think some of it is that people are just lazy and don’t realize what they are doing. Because this is also one of my pet peeves I always try to ask the person/child what they prefer to be called if I get confusing messages from hearing peers around them. Many times I will ask the parents too to make sure! I agree with the others to politely make it known each time one of your children’s names are said incorrectly.
ryc: Lisa thank you so much for your prayers regarding my Mom. It meant so much to me to see the prayers for the sick in my comments. Please send my gratitude to Fr. as well! You are both such a blessing to our family even from a distance!
PS. I forgot to comment on the fact that you noticed about Mom’s headset she was wearing at work. They are actually looking into that as a possible concern that might be creating these tumors. The tumor was on that side! I actually noticed my Mom’s ear was a little different on that side and when I questioned her about it in the hospital she said it was from wearing the head set all the time. Her workplace is actually having professionals come in and do an aggressive study and tests (like air quality etc) of the atmosphere now that there have been four cases. She works in such a small office too! There are only about 40 employees total. Ten percent is pretty high for this to be happening.
It’s funny the way that happens, but I’m afraid it’s inevitable. When Emma Rose was born we always called her by her full name but other people never seemed to catch on. (Even now I shorten it to Emma a lot.) My brother Jon was always “Jonathan” when he was little – I remember my mom being adamant that his name was Jonathan and not Jon! Now he’s 30 and no one calls him Jonathan. My husband Andy has always been called Andrew by his parents and siblings – but he said when he started school he automatically became “Andy.” Everyone now knows him as Andy, even me – but he doesn’t really care for it.
What, so we can’t call them cool names like Ni. Chri. or Ma. Chri???
j/k
I understand too. I also don’t like it when people call my children by their nick names. That is just for us and our close friends. Some people go as far as to say oh, Tobi, when I say my son’s name is Tobias…
Some people are very considerate though and they ask what they should call him (them).
I am glad no one calls Rachel Rache… and after even our kids started calling Thomas Tom, we had a serious talk…
what is peoples obsession with shortening names? i guess growing up in the south it wasn’t uncommon for people to have two full names they went by. in my immediate family alone we have Gina Gail, Gay Nell, and Brenda Sue. these were their first names and they had middle names beside. (like Maria Angelica) And if someone was going to christen you with a nickname it was something completely besides the point like Sissy or Doolittle. Here people have managed to short Ava’s name. Its A-V-A for crying out loud!!! The call her Av. . . is it really that hard to get all three letters in? Most people ask me first though “Oh do you call her Maddie? ” to which I respond . . “No, we don’t. never. no one does.” or “Can I just call her Lily?” “well, if you absolutely can’t remember her name” or . . “Hey Sandy!” which I either ignore or just tell them not to call me that.
It is hard to go back and correct people who have been getting away with it for a long time (i usually don’t) but if it someone you have just recently met I don’t think it is rude to say “oh, it is Nicholas. we don’t shorten it.” or “Oh, its Maria~Angelica . . One whole name. Angelica is part of her full first name, not her middle name. We say the whole thing. I know it is a mouth full but say it with me. . . ” It also helps if your children prefer their full name because then you can say “he prefers or she prefers . . . ” and for some reason people respect that more.
Your children have such beautiful and important names. You and Fr. chose those names with great care and it is only right that people respect that and honor your wishes.
I like to call peoples children by their full first name… the names are so beautiful! That being said, we do call our children by their shortened names. Jacquelyn is almost always Jaci (pronounced Jackie) or Jaci Mae. Sylvia we call by Sylvia and Sylvie and occasionally Syl, like my great aunt was called. And some do choose to call them by their given name, not the shortened version, and I think it is very precious. What is awful though is one time a friend called Jaci by “Jack” :nono: , as if she needed to shorten Jaci? It really hurt, particulary since Jack is a boys name. Fortunately that only happened once!