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Adoptions
: How do you deal with it when your adopted children have truely AWFUL names?
(118 messages)
Yes, I know that in the grand scheme of things it maybe shouldn't really matter after waiting all that time to finally get your child(ren)... but have heard this weekd of a couple I know through a friend who are adopting siblings who have names they never would have chosen in a MILLION years. The kind of names that may severely prejudice the children in later life.
When I was adopted (donkeys ago) changing a child's name wouldnt have been that big a deal - my first name was kept the same although my parents changed the spelling but my middle name was changed. These days, with the way adoptions are conducted to give much more knowledge and access to a child's background and even their birth parents, I can't see that changing a name would be recommended maybe?
dd goes to school with a girl whose name was changed. dd knew her from being two and a half (nursery) and she had her original name then. then they joined the two together and then the old name was dropped. by three and a half/four she was known totally as the new name and dd does not remember that she had another name so i think it depends on the age of the child.
My name was changed when I was 7. When I was about 10 I decided that I hated my new name and was known by a nick name, which I still use. Sometimes I think I feel like I don't really have an identity and which my original name had stayed. It was nothing to do with adoption though.
I think name changing is a good idea where the original name is culturally and/or socially at odds with cultural and social environment of the adoptive family.
Ideally the new name should be neutral in either culture / social segment, so as not to distance a child unnecessarily from his/her origins but also to ensure that he finds his/her place in the adoptive family and its environment.
Yes, these names are certainly NOT reflective of their new cultural or social environment. But the new parents seem to think they are stuck with the names from what my friend said - they are trying to come to terms with it. The children are under 5. I think if it was me, I'd do my best to try to chnge them
For example, when choosing a name for my daughter I needed one that "worked" in all her cultures: English, Christian, French and Jewish, and didn't mark her out as particularly any one of those cultures but was acceptable to all of them, and would help her on her way in later life.
Parents, not just adoptive parents, have to deal with these issues every day in our multicultural world.
My brother and SIL adopted 3 children all with names they wouldn't have chosen. They gave them an extra middle name when they were atised but, other than that, they are their names so that's what we call them.
It doesn't matter what thaey are called, but it would be nice to be able to use a name they don't hate! Re cultural differneces, a girl at the local infants school was called Nactia - it's russian and pronounced, unfortunatley, Nastier. She changed it herself when she went to juniors, to Anastacia.
I still call her Nastier, as it suits her. [bitch emoticon]
DO you really believe that Tommy? Even if you truely think so, there are plenty of people who discriminate and judge because of a person's name. You onyl have to look at the opnions banded about on the choosing a baby's name thread.
And it's actually been proved that children with certain types of names do not fare as well as childrne with more traditional names (yes I know that will probably tie on with the socio-economic background if the child stays in that environment) but still...
It's nowt to do with me anyway, I don;t know them well enough to speak about it with them, just know from our mutual friend that they are a bit worried about it (amongst all the other million things they must be feeling at the moment). Don't think it's 'poncey' either.
Have to say as an adoptive mother with three children with "chavvy names" i truly sympthaise (sp), ours have names that i would never have chosen in a million years, but their birth parents have and what right have i to take that away from them. Ours eldest is also spelt quite strangely as well. We have given them new middle names and in time hope that they might choose to use them.
Anyway most Social workers don't like the names being changed unless it is posing a threat to the children ie highly traceable, living close to birth family.
Will say that we did have a few names that i just wouldn't consider so therefore refused to look at children with those names.
On the other hand we live in a v small village and no one else has children with our names and at school with 90 children again no one else does so makes labelling uniform easier and no mixing up alike the 4 girls called milly.
Yes, good points mway. I guess the point you make about the social workers is just why this couple aren't considering changing the names. My thoughts were that they could change middle names and also maybe adapt the existing 1st names into nicknames that aren't as 'distinctive' (for want of a better word).
Lol about the 'nice' names being so common - spose that's one advantage!
my dd came with a name i strongly objected to, i could never call it out loud, had to fight social services tooth and nail to get name we chose, we had to keep original as a middle name. she was only 14 months though, a couple we know have a 4 year old who is refusing to change hers, at that age i wouldn't push it. they could start with nick names or abbreviations and hopefully they will stick. because of their backgrounds many come with very weird names, dreading our next one. with our dd the foster carers called her a double barrelled, foofoo hifi, then dropped the foofoo.
I think that it is a real problem. I can see that it is not good from the child's point of view to change and I know that Tommy was quite right in the message that it doesn't matter but it would matter to me. I wouldn't mind if I was neutral on it but there are a lot of names I positively hate and I don't like names with the wrong spelling. I think that I would find a nick name and gradually move over to it or if they had two and the second one was better call them both and gradually drop the first. I expect that posters will say this is wrong-I know it is but I can't help being fairly snobbish on names! I know someone who adopted 2 children aged 6 and 4 but they had lovely names so she was lucky.
Think of the worst possible chavvy names you can think of; the type that would be given to the children of Vicky Pollard as a p-take and you'll be in the right ball-park. I know it shouldn't matter, but to many people it would. Including me - I don't think I could stand it
The adoptive parents are going to be making all the major cultural and social decisions for their children - if their first names (the first cultural/social decision we take for our biological children) are at odds with all the other cultural and social aspects of their life, that in itself will be a problem.
We changed our DDs' names from those given by the birth mother in one case and the orphanage in the other. The names were Vietnamese and Cambodian and felt culturally inappropriate for their new lives. DD1 was only 4mo when we adopted her so it wasn't much of an issue. DD2 was 12 mo but her given name was rarely used in the orphanage as she was known by her nickname 'Pixie'. We used 'Pixie' for a while and then transitioned to her new name. We have retained their given names as second names (somewhat modified) and we would be perfectly happy for the DDs to reclaim them as first names should they ever want to. Had the DDs been older, we wouldn't have changed their names or if we had done so we would have slowly transitioned to modified names or usable nicknames as other posters have suggested.
I think we all know that certain names sound chavvy whilst others sound posh (or at least middle class, I hope no one is trying to deny that. But it IS just a name after all. Does it really matter?
Sorry Harpsi - posted before I saw your post. I think in our case they really were culturally inappropriate. Hard for us and anyone else to pronounce correctly and in DD1's case phonetically very similar to 'tea towel'. Our view and that of our social worker was that the DDs would have to grapple with enough difference without adding to it with a 'difficult' name. Nearly all children adopted inter-country under the age of three or four have an 'adoptive' first name and original second name.
It's a really interesting question though. I'll have to ask the DDs for their views in a decade's time. Did we undermine their 'cultural heritage' or do everything possible to ease their transition into a new life?
I feel that if your adoptive chikdren come from another culture/ethnicity, changing their name to one that fits more neatly into your culture or ethnicity does remove them from their ethnicity.
I think it is hard enough for children from the diaspora to hang onto cultural identity/roots/sense of belonging, even if they live within their birth families, and it must be much harder if you are ethnically/culturally different from your adoptive family.
I remember reading extracts of a book by a journalist Hannah Pool, discussing her experiences of being an adopted black child in a white family, and the difficulties she had. They really resonated with me, and names are strongly linked into this I think.
our friends changed the name of the baby son they never met (he died 11 months through the adoption process and was buried under both names) but the 2 they are waiting on now will be keeping their names. One is 4 suits his name perfectly. His(non bio) baby brother is at the same orphanage so he knows his name too. It would be pointless to add more confusion to his life by making an unnecessary change.
Yes of course it's about class. So what? We all choose names that we feel will reflect ourselves (and that includes history, family, culture and class I spose) and names do matter otherwise we'd actually call our childen dd1 and dd2 in RL as well. The names are as out of place as they would be if they were called Arabella and Quentin and living in a council flat or whatever.
I never felt that I was anything but my mum and dad's daughter even though I knew I was adopted and they weren't my birth parents. But that might not have been the case if I was still a constant reminder of the life and circumstances of my birth mother through the name she had chosen for me, iyswim. I'm really glad I have and have never had anything to do with my birth mother other than a passing curiosity, but I know that's not the case with every adopted child. I also know my birth mother probably doesn't feel that way and I feel terrible for the decision she had to make, but I came out of it very well. My name is a big part of that - I remember my parents telling me how they chose (and changed it) and it makde me feel proud and loved.
I do think that if the child is older than, say, 2 though, it must be extremely confusing to have to adjust to a new life with adoptive parents AND suddenly be called by a different name. What does that do to a child psychologically?
if my friend adopted some children and they had names i knew she would not have chosen i would think she was fab and brave and would just get on with the names told to us (although Im sure we would say them in a very posh way!!)
I gave DS (adopted at 12months from KAzakhstan) a new first name and kept his given name as a middle one. For the reasons ISsy gave really, you probably wouldnt even realise it was a name. I thought about it long and hard and was quite reluctant to change but I had to weigh up the difficulty he would have growing up in England with a name that wasn't recognisably a name against taking away something from him when he had so very little that was him (IYSWIM) before I met him. Almost like he hadn't existed before I arrived.
If it was an English (or a name acceptable in English) name given by birth parents, I wouldnt even consider changing them. You can't scrub an adopted child clean of their life before they came into your family. If you really object to their names, I would start using a nickname. How would you explain to your child in future "I thought your naem was too common so I changed it" ie (your birth parents were common and we had to erase as much evidence that they existed as possible).
There are people in the intercountry adoption world who don't agree with even changing very difficult foreign names. And I can see their point - I just dont entirely agree with it.
Agreed. I was adopted as a baby so it mattered not. I think it would be very hard for an older child to have their name changed and for that reason alone it's not a good idea. The couple I first posted about are aware they will have to live with it. They'll get used to it eventually I spose. Maybe it's indicative of lots of other issues when adopting a child, i.e. things aren't what you'd planned for so you leanr to compromise and adapt (could be said for having a child full-stop as well)
PS I did hear a woman calling her daugher "Shakira" the other day (in a broad Manc accent) and did find it hilarious.. I hope she goes on to be a doctor or lawyer just to confuse people.
I strongly suspect that your personality and upbringing have more to do with your path in life than your name. If you ever heard Auberon Waugh talk very amusingly about life growing up known as "King of the Fairies" in school, you'd see that if you the type to get on with things then your name is irrelevant and if you're not then, well... your name is irrelevant.
There is a whole chapter in Freakonomics on this. Conclusion is that it is a non-causal link i.e. the name itself does not lead to the life opportunities etc, but the circumstances in which the name was given do.
I accept if there are true cultural differences between the adoptive and birth families (different countries and so on) then the issue is more complicated. there has to be a balance between being sensitive to the cultural heritage of the child and her needs to have links with her birth family and fitting into her "new" life and family. hard balance to strike I have no doubt. which is a world away from - I wouldn't consider a child because his/her name sounded too common, or changing a child's name because it sounds too common. where are the needs of the child in that decision? class is not culture. it is a horrible message to give to a child about his/her birth family, and also a pretty low thing to judge a child on his/her name.
A friend of my mother's name was changed when she was adopted and she didn't find out until she was in her 50's (I know things were different then...). She's now in her 70's and says she still feels a bit like neither name is hers.
My brother and SIL changed the middle names of their two, because one was truly horrible and mean, and so they didn't make a big deal of it, they were both allowed to pick middle names. I won't say on here what it was, just in case...
Anna - be my guest if class is culture, then why do you think it is acceptable to change a child's name if that name reflects the child's birth culture?
harpsi - if you read my first post on this thread, you will see that in an ideal scenario I would choose a name that was acceptable in both/all a child's cultures (I had four to deal with ), but that didn't identify him/her more or less with any of them.
Good examples of the 'successful manipulation' of names there collison. If it works for everyone then that's the main thing.
'To judge people on their name is pretty low' - probably, Harpsi, but it would be naive to think it doesn't happen. You only have to hear teachers looking down the class lists each Sept and predicting which kids will be the biggest PITA (and who will have the worst PITA parents) just from their names to see that it happens... and is often an accurate barometer of behaviour and attainment in many cases - although not all of course.
the names of my friends' boys are easy for them to pronounce. Otherwise they would definitely have considered changing them cos they do not have any sort of grasp on the kids' native language and would struggle to get them right (as proved with the names of the solicitor they are dealing with who they now refer to by nickname as they have given up stumbling over his real (and frankly not at all difficult) name.
I do really believe that Moomin. If you had asked me before I had children and before I met my nieces and nephew, I probably would have felt differently but knowing them, chavvy names and all, has made me change my mind. Just looking beyond their circunstances and seeing them as people
I think it's different if you are adopting from abroad than if you are adopting within the UK. With UK adoptions I'm sure it's not permitted to usually change their names although I can imagine if it really clashes with your new surname (thinking of rude initials) and the child is young enough they may let you alter it?????
Unless the child is very young indeed, under a year perhaps, I do think it's likely to be very difficult for them if their names are changed. Being adopted often brings with it huge difficulties with a sense of identity and belonging and of course one intrinsic part of our identity is our name.
I can certainly understand the difficulty the adoptive parents have in accepting these chavvy names as I am v opinionated about names myself However I think lots of children who are not adopted are known by nicknames more than their real name - I was Nelly to my mum for ages and no that is not my RL name! I think using Cassie for Casey-Mae for instance is a good way of getting around the issue a little and the it's so clearly derived from their name that it needn't confuse them I think.
I do think too though that the child will imprint themselves on the name more than your friends will realise at the moment, they are understandably focussing on the names; for instance I really do hate the name Casey, but I can perfectly well see that if a very nice, confident, happy girl spoke to me and told me that was her name, that some of the 'coolness' of the person rubs off on to the name IMO rather than the other way round.
I had Dutch friends who adopted twins with Russian names. the twins were 2, but one of the names sounded wierd in Dutch, so they found a very similar name (actually just chnage dthe first letter) so that it worked in Dutch, but wasn't too big a jump for the little girl. it worked well, and I not even sure she really noticed.
Another friend adopted siblings who had very strange names (named after mountains and stuff) but they just kept them. The youngest wouldn't have noticed, but her big brother would have noticed that his sister's name was changed if you see what I mean. I think I would find a variation/nickname/middle name that everyone was happy with. I would find it hard to live with some names that I don't like.
It is possible to change the names if your friends really, really feel that they need to, or possibly modify them. The social workers do strongly disapprove, but if your friends are adopting siblings then they probably won't be adopting again in the future, so won't need to keep the SWs sweet. Usually the children will have been living with the adoptive family for quite a while by the time the adoption hearing gets to court and by that stage the SWs are hardly going to threaten to prevent the adoption.
I have always strongly felt that I would hate to have a name that makes people need to hold back a smirk when introduced to me, and I would feel sorry for a child with that sort of name. When we were waiting for ds I remember that there were two brothers in BMP who were called Abu and Hamza and I would have been uncomfortable with that (although they would never have been placed with use as we are not Muslim, but I would have a similar problem for instance if siblings were called Jesus and Christ).
We slightly changed ds's name for the adoption to a more boyish version, although we still address him by his original name. This is because most people assume by his name that he is a girl unless they can see that he's a boy. He pre-adoption passport says that he is female for instance, even though his birth cert and the application forms said he was male. We thought if we didn't change it to the male version it would cause minor but irritating problems his whole life.
In fact, even if we had really hated ds's name it would have been hard to change it completely, it really is the only thing that he has from his birth mum.
in adoption prep groups we tackled this, i havent changed my name to dh, i like my surname and feel strongly about keeping it. they then suggested this is how a child may feel which makes sense.
Unless the name is literally embarassing (P.Nutt or something), please don't take it away from the poor child. The social workers disapprove because they know, from experience, that adopted children have enough rejection to cope with, without having their own name rejected by the people who are supposed to love them. CELEBRATE that they are bringing difference and diversity into your life.
You could always get away with tweaking or nicknaming, use your imagination (says the person who came up with "Tiger Lily" last month!).
For some reason, our DC's birth parents chose beautiful names for beautiful children, (Phew!).
Have to be perfectly honest and yes there are some names i cannot bear One in particulary is "Spike" and there was quite a few called that belive me.
As i said before my children do have chavvy names and they certainly stand out in our school.
One of my good friends is a school teacher and she admits that she often judges pupils on their names and has admitted that mine are "right up there", but hey we love our children to bits and where possible have given them nick names.
Again i apologise if i offend anyone i don't mean to, but there are certain names that i don't like.
Anyway my social worker fully understood and used to make up names on purpose just to wind me up.
I am not posh in fact hubby was in army he is now a postman so is nothing to do with class and as for cultural then hubby is a scotsman.
Anyway as said before i have not chnaged my childrens names and we gave them middle names that fit their first names. I respect why their parents gave them their names and it comforts me to be able to explain to our children why they are called what their names.
Adopting kids does not give them a whole new identity. Their names are their names, they aren't pets. I agree with what people are saying, I can't imagine my daughter being called Ebony-Fallulah or something, but if she came to me named that you just have to deal. Sorry, but these kids may be confused enough already. I despised Angelina Jolie for asopting a boy of 4 who spoke no English and changing his name immediately. What a %^&$ing thoughtless thing to do.
This is a really interesting thread. I knew it was considered really bad practice to change a child's name, so when looking at children needing adoption I'm afraid I didn't look long at any whose names I couldn't happily live with .
I was really shocked by some acquaintances who changed their adopted 2 year old twins' names when the originals were perfectly acceptable.
DeeRiquer - I know, it IS sad and it feels awful to admit it, but I am talking about names like 'Chardonnay', to give you an example. There were not many that I thought 'no way', even if I didn't particularly like the name.
I feel sad reading this too. You long for a child and finally find one you can call your own and are panicked that it has a chavvy name!! This shows the extent of the class problem we have in this country, where people actually believe their childs name will effect their chances in life. A name becomes the person, as far as I can see.
Although I have argued against chanigng names for children where possible - I do think that non-adoptive parents don't appreciate the small pleasure of mulling over names for your as yet unknown child, which adoptive parents rarely have. In the grand scheme of things it does gain perspective over time but at the time I did find it sad that I wasn't picking names whilst knowing I was about to become a mother.
I applied for adoption a couple of years back, via my London borough council. I pulled out for various reasons but at our workshop the question that came up again and again was: can we change the name? During the weekend we met three different couples who had successfully adopted and they had ALL changed their children's names. They all said the social workers had advised against it but they just couldn't live with the names the offsping had been given and they were all under two years. If the child was under two years then its something I wouldn't hesitate to do - names do matter and it's naive to think that they don't. If two women apply for a job with a firm of lawyers - one is called PomPom and the other is called Charlotte - which do you think they are going to want on their letterhead? yes, I know in an ideal world people shouldn't be judged on: looks, weight, name, class, accent but this isn't an ideal world, it's the real world. if you simply don't like the name but it's inoffensive then I would say, tough, you have to live with it. but a name that is truly awful, that is going to blight the child's life and that you are (as the parent) going to feel embarrassed to use - then it has to go. I stay in touch with everyone i met on the workshop and one of the women successfully adopted a four-year-old with the most TERRIBLE name. Effectively, the poor mite had been named after an alcopop. The woman (adopting as a single mother) knew she just couldn't change a 4 year old's name. However the little girl said she was being teased at nursery school and wanted a 'new name' - so she chose her own name.
I think older children chossing to change their own new name can be a good thing - gives them some control in a very out of control situation. No doubt a socail worker would disagree with me
I think there is also a problem when there is still some contact with one or both of the birth parents.
I know someone who adopted boys with appalling names (they were children of hippy drug addicts, so think names like Bark and Mud) but weren't able to change the names because the natural mother still had occasional contact.
KristinaM- kids do change their surnames when they are adopted. We are talking about first name. Imagine being 5 years old, your whole world has gone to hell, you get placed with a new mummy/daddy, life is really confusing and scary, you might miss your old family, feel sad for the life you don't have, and your new parents decide you aren't called Kristina anymore, you are called Jane. Imagine how that would feel?
"Imagine being 5 years old, your whole world has gone to hell, you get placed with a new mummy/daddy, life is really confusing and scary, you might miss your old family, feel sad for the life you don't have, and your new parents decide you aren't called Kristina anymore, you are called Jane. Imagine how that would feel? "
That's exactly what happened to a child an aquainance of mine adopted. She was so traumatised by everything that she regressed completely to babyhood for about 6 months. Language, would only drink milk, toilet training, everything. Her parents changed her name immediately to something more 'socially acceptable'...I'm not saying the name changing was the sole, or even major, cause of the trauma, but since she refused to answer to it, it was clear that it didn't help.
Another family we know - friends - had decided that they would change the name (which answers many people's judgements about names on this thread...) in the end din't, taking the line of 'she is who she is, her name is her name' - and amidst many other happy factors, she settled without a fidget.
I would think (have no experience) that it needs to be approached with extreme sensitivity and dependent on the child's needs.
We were chatting about names with the DDs a couple of days ago (perhaps inspired by this thread). I told DD2 that although her Cambodian name is her second name, nobody in the orphanage used it because they called her by her orphanage nickname 'Pixie'. DD2 is now insisting on being called 'Pixie' which we're doing sporadically; it's hard to remember after 4 years of calling her by another name. I'm not sure if this is a 5yo quirk or an attempt to reclaim her past, or maybe a bit of both. I've no problem using 'Pixie' as a family nickname as it suits her to a 'T'.
Our three have names I wouldn't have chosen (especially the eldest which is misspelt), but I also wouldn't change them. We did want to change their middle names but even that got a strong objection so we will leave them as they are, just adding our surname after theirs.
I think it does depend on the age of the child - at 4,6 and 8 they are too aware of their own identities to change ther names.
I think (especially for a child) it is more significant to change the first name. Surnames tend to only be used in formal and offical circumstances. Your first name is used/called dozens of times a day but how often is your surname used by other people? Anyhow I do think it is a tricky and emotive subject and I think it's pretty cruel to change a child's name once they are aware of it and answer to it - but if we are talking about a baby and the name is bloody horrendous then I think it could be a case of being cruel to be kind. I briefly emailed a woman in Australia that was adopting. The little boy was called WIKKID. First off it's a terrible name but secondly what a horrible connotation for him to grow up with.
interesting in intercountry adoptions - where the birth mother is known eg in Russia where many mothers will have to show ID when they go into hospital to give birth, the childs surname will probably be their birth mothers but their first name most likely picked by a doctor who met the child once or twice.
People still wouldn't think twice about chaging the surname evenm thgouh in very many ways it means more than the first name.
Interesting KewCumber. DD2's name was picked for her by the orphanage director, although her nickname was always used. Her surname was 'Rath' which we were told is the name given to all 'found' Cambodian children in orphanages and means 'Child of the State'. No compunction about changing that!
Thinking about my own names - as I said previously, when I was adopted my parents kept my 1st name but changed to spelling to a lightly more unusual version (nothing outlandish - just changed one letter!) and changed my middle name completely. I've never liked my middle name - I think it's pretentious and horsey, but that's nothing to do with it being a change from my original middle name: in fact my original was a bit 'common' (as in popular and plain).
However, I have been very presious about my surname all my life and I'm very rpud of it. I've been married twice and both dhs have not minded one jot that I haven't changed my surname. Both dhs' (ha! that sounds so funny) had/have perfectly good surnames but I simply couldn't countenance losing my family name - it just felt all wrong. And I'm pretty sure that comes from loyalty to my adopted parents really and the fabulaous family they adopted me into.
I have fairly strong views about not treating an adoptive child like a cat, and rather support the gradual shift/nickname approach in the case of an older child.
However, we know people who adopted a sibling group of 3 from a dreadful situation. Oldest child had an appalling made up name while the younger siblings had more normal names- although not necessarily the ones the adoptive parents would have chosen. They began using the older child's far more normal middle name (partly at that child's insistence) and that is what she is now known as. It seems to have pretty seamless and trouble-free.
It would be nice to think it doesn't matter, but I think it does. My daughters name is quite sweet in a way but it is definitely not middle class. And I live in a very 'olivia/isabella/martha' type area. She was only wee when she came to us but she did already know and recognise her name and we haven;'t changed it. But when we go to music class or ballet or whatever and the teacher reads out the names you can see the double take and the other Mums trying to think why my daughter has such an 'odd' i.e. not posh name. I am not sure whether or not it will bother her in later life , but it sometimes bothers me when I see people wondering about it. On the other hand, I have got used to her name and I sort of like it now, it is her name and it suits her. I'm glad we didn't change it, as that would have been another loss or change for her to deal with when she was older.
Mind you, if she had been called Princess Trixi or something I may have been less accepting.
Thing is, if you change a child's name for anything other than very good reasons, you might change it something that BECOMES embarrassing or difficult in later life.
I dunno, there might turn out to be a cartoon character or even a serial killer with that name in the future...
I haven't adopted children but I can understand a new adoptive parent wanting to choose their child's name, just the same as any other new mum.
As for children being confused, we gave our DD a beautiful 3 syllable name. We didn't want it shortened but it seemed such a big name for such a little girl. So we started to call her Pumpkin. That got shortened and the shortening was what we called her after that.
Everyone else used her proper name, and she answered to both. When she was 2 1/2 we suddenly realised she probably didn't know what her real name was, and she was about to start playgroup. We stopped using her nickname immediately and started using her real name.
No confusion at all and within a really short time she had forgotten she was ever called anything else.
thats interesting evenhope, we had a similar experience in our family. My cousin Linda ( can you guess how old we are!!!!) called herself Lala as a toddler and it stuck. It was only when she went to school that her parenst thought that she might not think it was so cute when she was 15 so they started to call her Linda again . She adjusted within a few weeks and doesnt seem to have been traumatised by the experience. Nor does she seem to think of herself as a cat
Our adopted son who came to us aged 6 months, has got a really unusual name, that we would never even have thought of. Unfortuately it rhymes with our surname as well. To begin with I thought it was a huge deal, but after reading several adoption books in which adopters said they felt that everything, including their name, had been taken from them, we decided to stick with DS' name. We have given him 2 middle names (one plainish and one a bit fancier) that we would hope he might consider if he were to decide to change his name in later life. Day to day we just use a similar nickname, as do his nursery. Luckily our son is quite a personality and his slightly rhyming names really have come to suit him. The only time it bothers me now is when they call out his full name at the doctor's . I think if a child's name is proving to cause them problems they will be cunning enough to get it changed to something they can live with before the job interview stage and at school if his teacher knows he is adopted, I hope he/she will be wise enough not to make judgements based on names.
my parents changed my name when they adopted me at 6 weeks old. I was called Grace Philomena
they changed it to a more "normal" name... at that time Grace was very unfashionable and old lady type of name. I don't mind at all. I must admit when i first saw my first names i was very pleased that my parents changed it. The first thing my birth mother said when she met me was an apology for the name she gave me!
The first name was a traditional family name and the second was the name of the only nun that would help her when she was in labour- the others were too busy praying in mass to help a poor girl in agony
However I think lots of children who are not adopted are known by nicknames more than their real name - I was Nelly to my mum for ages and no that is not my RL name! I think using Cassie for Casey-Mae for instance is a good way of getting around the issue a little and the it's so clearly derived from their name that it needn't confuse them I think. 
Spike is a perfectly charming name
. I think if a child's name is proving to cause them problems they will be cunning enough to get it changed to something they can live with before the job interview stage and at school if his teacher knows he is adopted, I hope he/she will be wise enough not to make judgements based on names. 
