Thursday, September 8, 2011

Just Curious...

Not announcing or hinting, but just curious,
when you name your kid, a name that has a common nickname, for instance, William->Will, Samuel->Sam, Anthony-> Tony
Are you allowed to somehow politely stop people from calling them that nickname if you don't like it?
I mean, until said kid has formed own opinion of being called whatever nickname, but until then will I have any say in that? .... did that make any sense? I like the name Harrison, but I wouldn't want to call my boy Harry... there's only one Harry in the world, and his last name is Potter.

10 comments:

  1. My mom would always stop people if they ever tried to call me Jessi. In fact, she still does. She hates that name. She didn't even want to call me Jessica, but my dad and brothers didn't really give her a choice :)Most people just think its funny, and will respect your choice...although, there will always be those who will still use the unwanted nickname...

    ReplyDelete
  2. Most people take cues from you anyway. If you introduce your child as Harrison and always call him Harrison, than that is what he will be called. If someone did try to call him something else, you can just politely say "oh, he doesn't answer to that" (which works well when they are younger). If it's a family member, just ask them to call him what you want. Case in point- I call Alex "Bubby" as a shortened form of brother or bubba. My neighbor girl (14 years old) now thinks it's okay to call him that. It's all in what you call them.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Whether you fight it or not, with every name, you have to be aware of possible nicknames. Even if people respect your wishes early on, once they're in school, there's no controlling it. My brother Jeff was known as LJ in high school (for Little Jeff, as opposed to another Jeff who was obviously bigger than him). Even some teachers didn't know his real name. So I think you have to be okay with any potential nicknames or ways of making fun of a name, though something can still come up that you couldn't have anticipated. When they're little, just politely correct people. When they grow up, nicknames are less predictable.

    ReplyDelete
  4. What Becca said. And then.... there's always the bit that you might end up giving him/her a nickname that has nothing to do with the given name. Isaac is "Ubby" and Kate is "Mouse".... Who knew? But that'd look funny on a legal document.

    ReplyDelete
  5. I agree with what everyone else says. If you refer to him as Harrison, most people will call him that. If they still try to call him Harry, I would just politely repeat Harrison. But again, there are stupid people out there that just won't listen.

    ReplyDelete
  6. When I was young, my parents tried to call me "Allie." I guess I didn't understand what nicknames were because I let them know immediately that my name was Allison, NOT Allie. After that, they never called me it again. Once I got to middle school and established my group of friends, a lot of them called me Allie and it didn't bother me as much. I think only you can control what you call your child, and if he grows up being "Harrison" at home, he'll always be Harrison--even if kids at school start calling him Harry. BUT if that still bothers you, then it's definitely something to consider when picking out your future children's names. Kimberly is "Kim" now, but I will always call her Kimberly :)

    ReplyDelete
  7. My niece is Elizabeth. We call her Elizabeth sometimes, but mostly Lizzie. Once she started school she started going by Liz and it has mostly stuck. I personally think Lizzie is cuter and I still call her that. She doesn't seem to mind any of the forms of her name, so that's good. When they are little it's easy to control what they are called. I always thought we would call Weston Wes, but we never ever have. Go figure.

    ReplyDelete
  8. It's all up to you. We have Benjamin (who goes by Ben), Tristen, and Joshua (who goes by Josh). We've had people try to call Ben- Benny, Tristen- Trist, and Josh-Joe. Each time we say that's not his name nor what we call him. Either call him so and so or don't call him at all. :) We deal with the same thing for people wanting to be called Grandma. It's lots of fun because everyone thinks they are entitled to call them whatever they want.

    ReplyDelete
  9. People call my son Kamren "Kam" all the time. I thought it would bother me and I was going to make it a point to everyone that I want him to be called Kamren, but its actually kind of cute. I now catch myself calling him Kam. Who knows, you might like when people call him "Harry."

    ReplyDelete
  10. I am Emilee's friend and am just scrolling through...thanks! AND YES! You have every right to tell them, for example, his name is Harrison, not Harry. My name is Ruth and I did NOT like it when people called me Ruthy and I told them so. Of course I wasn't mean about it. What is really funny is when people elongate names. Our son's name is Cal. Just Cal. He gets called Calvin a lot. But we didn't really like the name Calvin, nor would we ever call him Calvin, so Cal it was!

    ReplyDelete

Lilypie First Birthday tickers