Wednesday, January 20, 2010

Nicknames

I never really ever had a nickname growing up. My parents called us by the names they gave us at birth. I didn't get my first nickname (which I am only called by a small precious few) until high school from a best friend, "Annie". I remember that I felt special in a sense to have been given a nickname. Other than that I am just plain ol Anne Marie. Jonathan on the other hand seems to have a million and one nicknames, over half dubbed by his family, but even friends make up nicknames for him all the time. Im not sure he really cares much about a nickname either way. All this to say with a baby on the way, these things come across your mind. In the name selection process you pick names that you fall in love with for one reason or another. Jonathan and I both adore the names we have picked out for our little angel, but I have found when you tell others the names you have picked they seem to think they can start making up nicknames. It is the strangest thing. I guess it falls right in line with "everyone is going to give you their opinion so you can let it go in one ear and out the other." But I feel like names are important and play a role in the person that you are, after all it is part of your identity. If you have seen the names we have picked you would probably have picked up on what people may try to potentially pull with their names. For our daughter her name will be Emersyn. I just love this name, that is why we chose it. I do NOT like the name Emmy. If I did I would have chosen that name. We love Elijah for our son, I HATE ok don't like that word, STRONGLY dislike the name Eli. Again, if I did I would have chosen that name. So I guess I would love to know your thoughts on nicknames, are they fun or is it annoying when people call your child by something you didn't name them? I don't think we will have as hard of a time with Emersyn, but I have a feeling with Elijah, people may try to shorten it. How do you go about kindly making sure people call your child by the right name? I guess this REALLy hits home for me because all through my childhood I was called by the wrong name. That is mainly because my birth certificate read Anne as my first name, Marie as my middle, and Farmer as my last (my dad says mistake on the hospitals part, we did have it corrected my senior year in high school). However, Anne Marie is my first, no middle name, and Farmer was my last. So all my teachers called out Anne Farmer. Every year I had to correct them. I even had some never correct it and call me Anne the entire year. What does that say about someone who does not even take the time to get your name right. That doesn't include the times I was just called Marie, or Anna Marie, or Anne Maria, the list goes on. I don't want my children to go through that and I am confident we chose names that are not that difficult for even someone who has a brain the size of pea. Ok, we know God doesn't make people with brains the size of peas, but we do know people sure can act like their brain is the size of a pea.

5 comments:

  1. Well, I have a feeling you'll have to deal with nicknames. It happens. Just being realistic. As you know, I didn't want Jonathan being called Johnny. It was never really a problem. His just got shortened to Jon. Like you say, Emersyn will probably not be a problem but, I feel like you'll get a lot of people calling Elijah, Eli. Just my opinion. :)

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  2. Hey Girl! This makes me giggle since I am the one who named you Annie!! hehe
    It's funny Chad and I both go by our nicknames, given by our parents. Of course, just a few people call me "kate" and its like your "annie" - a term of endearment! And both of our children go by nicknames, given by us! Of course, our family has given them about a hundered other nicknames over the past few years too! I however, will never call a child anything but what their parents have named them. I think the main thing is you continue to call them WHAT you WANT them called and it will stick. My dearest friend in LG has a son Elijah and in 4 years, I have never heard him called "Eli". Just don't worry about others. Like my grandma told me she wouldn't call MK by a double name she would just be Molly-- fine by me! It really isn't too big of a deal!
    No worries!

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  3. I don't think you it's family or close friends you're gonna have to worry about when it comes to calling the baby by a nickname. I think it's gonna be the baby's friends when they get old enough. Most people with nicknames have them because their friends call them that. So I'm not sure how you would stop that from happening. We will call the baby what you want us to but I think it's other people that are going to be the one's giving out the nicknames. I just know that personally me and Jonathan's nicknames all came from friends, not family.

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  4. No worries sis, Elijah will be Elijah and Emersyn will be Emersyn to me:) I think the biggest thing is that you and jonathan call your children by the name you give them and want them to be called.....I couldnt really tell you why people have this nagging desire to nickname people, ESPECIALLY babies! Anyways, I had a nickname of "Judy" ;) but when it comes down to it, if you and Jonathan stick to always referring/calling your children by the name you give them, that is what they will identify with, and want to be called, even when they are 75! I love you sis, and so cannot wait to me my neice/nephew who I just love so much already!

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  5. First of all, CONGRATULATIONS! Now that Carter is here and I'm the mommy of 2 that works full-time, my time spent in blogland has been drastically cut! I am so very excited for you! I have been praying for you to be a mommy for so long and am so excited for you!

    As another "dobule-name" girl, I, too, was very opinionated about our kids' names. My full name is Mary Elizabeth- Mary as my first name, Elizabeth as my middle name, and I go by Mary Beth... Difficult and confusing to say the least. I've been any combination of Mary, Beth, Mary E., Mary B., etc.- you name it. And, because I go by part of my middle name, I couldn't legally drop it, so when Garrett and I married, my legal name became Mary Elizabeth Pelt. My maiden name- Carter- was gone. I've said for a very long time that if we ever had a son, his name would be Carter, and I got my wish.

    I always said that our kids' first names would be what they went by, and that will stand foreve as far as I'm concerned. Our Saralynn is Saralynn Elizabeth, but she gets Sara or any spelling of Sara Lynn as a double name. Poor girl- I cursed her with the same issue I've had all my life. Oh, well- hopefully she'll forgive me one day. The one piece of advice I would give you is to politely correct people. If they say, "oh, what the name?" and you say Emersyn/Elijah and they say, "hello, Emmy/Eli", nicely say, "it's Emersyn/Eli". People will ask the same about Saralynn and then call her Sara, and I'll just say "Saralynn is all one name- she goes by Saralynn". It works.

    I don't know that people who've never been through the whole double-name thing understand, but I know exactly where you're coming from. Just know that you can control it for a while, and then it'll be up to Baby E to fend for him/her self. And you can bet they will!

    Enjoy every second! It goes by too quickly!

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