Everyone is getting my baby's name wrong

Ugh how annoying. That line on thinking it often trotted out to minorities who have ‘different’ and ‘difficult’ to pronounce names that reflect their religion or culture, should they all change them to conform too?

I'm not one for far out there names but I actually think it's really nice and pretty. You'll have to correct people a lot but once people know they'll learn it fine. Only shorten it if you actually want to use the shortening, otherwise use the full version and let her choose when she's older

Mill-uh? M-eye-la? Me-la? It doesn’t help.

Did you honestly not see this coming OP?

Soon enough she’ll be telling people what her name is.
I would’ve read it out as em - ih - lah
Mila is a really cute nickname too.

Is it better though, when she will potentially go through life being called Amelia and having to correct it? Is Amelia more or less boring than Olivia, and how boring is it going to be to make the same corrections repeatedly over several decades?

Go with what you like, OP, but I just wanted to say that I really like Mila (although people are still likely to pronounce it 'wrong', as in Mia).

Emila is a pretty name but yes, so close in sound to very popular Amelia/Emilia and in look to Emilia/Emily that I would have thought it would be obvious that if you are UK based there would be issues 🤷‍♀️ It happens with lots of names that have very similar sounds - peoples brains usually default to the sounds they hear most often, it’s just something you have to consider when naming a child.

Thanks to people like Mila Kunis, Mila is now a Top 50 name so you could easily use the nickname Mila for her and I think most people would know that it’s usually pronounced “Mee-la”. BUT similar Mia is Top 20 and has been for years, so you will probably get a few people calling her that instead 🤣

Look it’s just something you have to live with - just like Lila/Layla/Lyra, Milly/Lily, Ellie/Elsie/Ella, Eva/Ava, Ada/Ayla, Evie/Ivy… we could be here all day as about a third of the girls Top 100 names sound like each other! The girls themselves mostly don’t seem bothered and the parents have to learn to let any annoyance about it go as well.

Just remember if you do have another DC to consider all the soundalike names as well as how popular a name is on its own. Your example of Olivia doesn’t really have many soundalikes (apart from Olive which is much less popular in comparison)- so it actually feels less well used overall imo than it actually is, simply because the sounds stand out more.

This is basically what happened to me too. Also agree that it's easy to miss the second 'i'. Loads of people's brains will do that thing where they see most letters and then fill in the gaps based on their knowledge... which won't be of the name 'Emila'.

You need to think "month of May" then add the a.

If you need to explain to people how to say the name, you have picked the wrong name. When your baby grows up they will spend the rest of their life correcting people just like you are now.

Just leave the name as it is - it's lovely. I swear there are more names that need spelling out than not - even Jane can also be Jayne, and then there's Claire / Clare, Emma/ Emer (that's Irish, before the spelling police start on me). Your daughter will be absolutely fine.

It's a lovely name.
As frustrating as it is, correcting people is something you'll all just have to contend with.
People saying "poor baby" etc are being ridiculous.

But it’s like calling your child Oliva and getting annoyed that everyone thinks it’s Olivia - it’s pretty predictable as an issue!

Fwiw I wouldn’t know whether to pronounce it like Emilia without the second I or like Emily with an a instead of y, so I would probably annoy you 😄

Unfortunately it’s bound to happen. It’s an unusual name and looks similar to Emilia. I would recommend going with Mila. It might help realise the name is Emila, although don’t be too hopeful.

(I naturally read it as Emilia in your OP and auto correct keeps changing to Emilia too).

It's one of the pitfalls of having an unusual name, I'm afraid: a lot of people won't have a clue how to pronounce it. I totally get why people would think it's Emilia with the second "i" omitted.

It could be worse. I used to know someone who had a German parent and had been given the German name Beate. She reckoned that over 50% of English people pronounced her name "Beattie".

Sadly, too outing to share the various mangulations of her German surname!

No one has ‘slacked’ (sic) the name off they’ve just said it looks so much like Emilia that mistakes are bound to happen. No need to call people dicks.

I think you are missing an I out of her name. I read it as Emilia

We know several Emilias that exclusively use Emmy if that would be any good as a nickname and she could always starts using Emila again when she’s older and confident enough to correct people (if she wants to).

Not the first on this thread to make that mistake either 😂

I mean, you've written babies (plural of baby) when you should have written baby's (possessive of the baby).

People read (and write) too quickly and see what they think is there, without checking very carefully.

ETA I just made a typo from what to that and had to fix it. Didn't see it on first glance.

I think it is a lovely name!

Her name is beautiful. Pp slacking the name off are dicks

Suspect she'll end up going by Em as soon as she's old enough anyway.

I had to reread to check her name wasn't Emilia, I would pronounce Mila as Mill-a so I'm not sure that would help

@BunnyLake , I've only knowingly met one Olivia. I know a lot of people who used the name for their DD (e.g. colleagues and acquaintances).