To find it so wearisome constantly being called the wrong name

I absolutely hate this. All my life people have got my surname wrong.

Let's say my name is Botham. I get Bot-ham, Bottom, Bothingham, Boat-ham. It drives me absolutely mad.

Recently at the opticians I arrived and told the receptionist my name- "I'm Emma Botham".

2 minutes later she calls me " Elaine Bottingham?"

I correct her and she replies " Well, it's close enough"

At the hospital I am on a list on a white board. Nurse says she can't find me. I say "there I am, Emma Botham".

She replies, "No, that's Bot- ham".

I know how to spell and say my name for God's sake!

I’m Leila said Lee-luh and so I’ve had this my whole life!
TBH I’m just grateful when people try and say it how I pronounce it 🤷🏽‍♀️

Is it your first name or your surname that folk keep on getting wrong? I have to confess to being blunt and correcting the person every time that get my surname wrong as it's unusual but very local to the area in which I live, and because I have a regional accent markedly different from the city where i live. Only family members get it right first time!

I have a 'foreign' name (Irish) and I find that people generally make no effort to find out how to pronounce it correctly. I don't generally correct them though. It doesn't bother me, apart from one dickhead customer when I was working in burger king who wildly mispronounced it and thought it was hilarious and laughed with his mates while I had to stand there like an eejit. He was early morning pissed though so wasn't that surprised.

I have an Irish name, it’s common in Ireland but unusual in UK. I used to get called the wrong name all the time but as soon as I moved to the NHS for work everyone makes a real effort to get people names right and if said wrong, they will be corrected by others. I work with African colleagues with much more unusual names than mine, people get on with it and just make sure they use their brains to try pronounce it right. My children will have names in line with their heritage and if people pronounce it wrong they’ll learn to correct them confidently. Not all language is phonetical and why should it be? It’s boring.

Also, I know a Madison who constantly gets called Melanie in emails and a Lauren who gets called Laura, it’s not only people with unusual names, people just don’t know how to pay attention.

Example

My email is Danielle, I signed it off with Danielle

No, my parents gave me a perfectly common name. Even if it wasn’t a common name, it’s basic respect to learn and use someone’s name properly.

No people get my name wrong a lot, I get Kate, Katy, Kathy, Caitlin, all kinds of nonsense over the years. Usually by older co-workers and it's never bothered me.

Yes....

I get it a lot. Say I have booked for a blood test, they will walk out and shout "Daniel (some variation of my surname which is usually wrong too)"

I introduce myself as Danielle to customers who say "hi Daniel"

I do pronounce it as Dan yell though, not Danni L but it's clear it's not Dan yull (hard to show in text!)
It's been bad enough that I've looked at changing my name

My daughter gets this with another -el/-elle name. I spent quite a long time choosing her name and vetting it against all sort of criteria; it never occurred to me that people would simply call her the masculine version! I did consider that people might randomly put an -a on the end instead of an -e, which they also do. What I hadn't counted on is needing to correct the same people multiple times: get it wrong once, no problem; keep getting it wrong, I'll think you're just not even attempting to remember.

You say it wouldn't bother you. So does that mean it never happens to you but you assume you wouldn't mind if it did?
Because you might feel differently if you had to put up with it constantly for years and years.

@loriginale yes, I NC to post

People often put an "in" in my surname. It doesn't work when everything is digital.

Eg Dickinson instead of Dickson.

It's not helpful though if say like I have you're in hospital and someone shouts "Daniel" instead of Danielle
I have no idea they mean me

I completely understand the desire to do this.

This wouldn't bother me tbh, I can usually tell when I'm being addressed.

One day I'll end up sending this

I lived in the US for a while and my actual name is pronounced nic-o-la. Of course the French version is pronounced ni-col (silent e). I was called ny-cola for 3 years. Nicoles were never called Nycoles. And men of Italian origin always Nee-co-la which at least sounds closer! So I do feel your pain!

Yes it’s annoying. Especially when you correct them again and again and they keep doing it.
Or my fave, I sign my emails as (similar to) Anna, my email address is AnnaCharacter @ whatever.com, they reply “Dear Anne”…. and persist in doing it even though I keep saying it’s Anna.

I know some people say they just can’t remember names, but surely if the name is right there in front of you in an email you should use that name!