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Original poster

To not want to call DH a different name...

125 replies

RedSpottyKettle · 05/03/2019 19:24

Name changed as this is outing.
I think DH has lost the plot. Last night he told me for some time he has been considering changing his name. He would like something more formal. His (current?) name is traditionally a nickname and there is no more formal equivalent. He was a musician but is training to be a secondary teacher this year. I love his name, and can’t imagine calling him something else but if it’s his name...

OP posts:
MissKittyBeaudelais · 05/03/2019 20:13

It’s a big ask when he’s an adult and well, everyone knows his name.

I understand though. I have a “second hand” name (my older sister was called Eliza as a baby and then my mum changed it). When I came along....Eliza was given to me 😐. I desperwanted to change my name and use my middle name but haven’t, for the reasons above.

Jezzifishie · 05/03/2019 20:18

I'm not really seeing the issue here - quite a few of my friends and family have changed names. One was known by a nickname and wanted to change to the more formal version, and three of them just didn't like their names and changed to something really different. It's odd at first, but I promise you get used to it!

lisasimpsonssaxophone · 05/03/2019 20:20

Like Zowie Bowie changed his name to Duncan Jones?

He didn’t. He was born Duncan Jones misses point

But anyway. I know someone who changed her name in her 50s because she’d just never liked it. Loads of people thought it was incredibly weird, but I thought why not?

I’m guessing his name is something like Buzz or Spike. Does he really want you to call him by the ‘new’ name? Even if he officially changes his name to something else it would surely be fine for you to keep calling him by the nickname-sounding name you’ve always known him by?

wizzler · 05/03/2019 20:24

My hairdresser had to use a different name at the salon as they already had a stylist with his name. That was 25 years ago and he has one name at work and another outside work. Sometimes the two worlds collide but we all manage somehow.

OlennasWimple · 05/03/2019 20:26

This is just weird. Lots of people are known by different names at work and at home, particularly in the performing arts.

I bet David Furnish calls his husband Reg, not Elton. The first Mrs Ringo Starr was actually Mrs Maureen Starkey, and I bet she called her husband Richard. Etc etc etc

ReanimatedSGB · 05/03/2019 20:33

I'm another one with two 'identities' - the name I use for one side of my working life is not the name on my birth certificate and, for a long time, the only people who called me by my legal name were official people (eg medics or the bank) and my family (who used a short version of it).
Nowadays I do some of my jobs under my legal name, which is quite useful as it's good to have that identity seperate to the other line of work. (I'm a writer. No, you haven't heard of me.)

Let your H change his name for work, if he wants to, and hopefully he won't mind you using his actual name at home.

Adeste · 05/03/2019 20:40

I’ve known a couple of people who changed their name, admittedly to an alternative version of their given name, or to a middle name. It’s weird at first but after a while you get used to it.

singwhenyoureswimming · 05/03/2019 20:47

@RedSpottyKettle

Is his name Harry?

Original poster
RedSpottyKettle · 05/03/2019 21:06

No his name isn’t Harry

OP posts:
AFOLNerd · 05/03/2019 21:08

My partner uses a nickname that stuck from school in his personal life and his real name for work.
I met him at work so knew him as his real name. It was strange for a while trying to get used to using the nickname when we got together but I couldn’t imagine calling him his real name now.
It also works well as in his line of work he wouldn’t want the people he works with finding him on social media.

choli · 05/03/2019 21:15

I suspect there will be a lot of Billy, Freddie, Teddy and Charlie’s doing this in about 15 years time!
I know. Every time I see a post about a cutesy nickname as a given name I feel sorry for the kid and wish Billy's parents would at least put William on the birth certs. The current fashion for using nicknames instead of real names is all about the parents and not at all about the future adult.

PissOffPeppa · 05/03/2019 21:20

Every time I see a post about a cutesy nickname as a given name I feel sorry for the kid and wish Billy's parents would at least put William on the birth certs. The current fashion for using nicknames instead of real names is all about the parents and not at all about the future adult

I’ve done alright for myself with my cutesy nickname as a given name Hmm

I was a teacher too and, remarkably, it had no impact on my career.

EvaHarknessRose · 05/03/2019 21:29

I confess I am going through a similar thing as your dh. I always preferred and used a common shortening of my name, which I now can’t abide, and I would like to be known as my formal version. Annoyingly I would also like to change how I spell the short version, but its on all my work accounts etc so would be too confusing. I’m phasing it in and if I change jobs I will change. DH has been understanding and calls me another shortening altogether which has always been one we used.

Dahlietta · 05/03/2019 21:47

Lots of people are known by different names at work and at home, particularly in the performing arts.

I've never met a teacher who felt the need to have a stage name, though. Perhaps I should trial one. "Pupils, from now on I would like you to address me as 'Ms Agatha Knowledge'."

Phineyj · 05/03/2019 21:55

I am a teacher with a stage name for work. My actual name is unusual and I was worried about social media so I changed to my husband's boring name. It was quite helpful psychologically with the career change. I have had a few minor DBS issues, all easily overcome.

frami · 05/03/2019 22:00

I did this, decided to use my second name after I was told at an interview that they didn't expect someone "with a name like mine" to apply (basically too chavvie). That was nearly 30 years ago.The change a caused any problem. . I think the change was easier for DH and family because they used a Pet name anyway, only ever called me by the correct version when annoyed with me. Family switch between the 2 depending on circumstances. Only time it can can cause confusion is doctors etc and when overlaps happen eg we belong to a group, with friend who's known me since childhood and get strange looks when forgets and uses my original name.

DoJo · 05/03/2019 22:06

Every time I see a post about a cutesy nickname as a given name I feel sorry for the kid and wish Billy's parents would at least put William on the birth certs. The current fashion for using nicknames instead of real names is all about the parents and not at all about the future adult.

Well, I wouldn't bother feeling sorry for the kids if I were you - I know several people who have changed their names to the shortened version of the one on their birth certificate because they felt that it was their name and wanted it to be official.

I hated my 'full' name being used on my wedding day and cringe if I have to say it for anything official - it was in my birth plan to use the shortening because if someone's looking up my hoo-ha the last thing I want is to feel as though they are talking to someone else (namely, my five-year-old self being caught doing something naughty).

Why give a child a name you don't intend to call them? The whole name changing process works the same whichever way you do it!

daisychain01 · 05/03/2019 22:06

You haven't answered the question of why he is insisting you call him something different, when his name change is for professional reasons.

It doesn't make sense.

Maybe you've misunderstood.

SemperIdem · 05/03/2019 22:15

If he wants to be known as something more formal in a professional setting, I think that’s fair enough.

Not sure why you would have to call him that name too though?

JazzerMcJazzer · 05/03/2019 22:22

I bet David Furnish calls his husband Reg, not Elton.

Unlikely. Reg Dwight officially changed his name to Elton John, it is not just a stage name. I know because I worked at a law firm that acted on a case he was involved in and I saw witness statements signed “Elton John”.

JazzerMcJazzer · 05/03/2019 22:24

However to give a more topical example, I read that Olivia Colman is not known to friends and family as Olivia, her given name is Sarah.

Believability · 05/03/2019 22:31

The current fashion for using nicknames instead of real names is all about the parents and not at all about the future adult.

I’ve managed to get to my mid 40’s with a nickname as a first name. It never occurred to me, until I looked at the baby names thread that I should have a “formal” name for “options”. It has neither held me back, bothered me nor aroused any comments whatsoever.

Myusernameismud · 05/03/2019 22:37

DH gets called 3 different names. His surname (and mine too now) can also be used as a first name (think William Tyler) and when I met him at a party everyone was using his last name. So I assumed it was his name. And then we went out on a date and he bumped into a friend who called him a shortened version of his actual name. DH found it hilarious that I thought the friend had got his name wrong Blush. I now call him the formal version of his name, because I love it. His parents are the only other people who use it. So 3 separate names for 3 different groups of people, and when we've all been together nobody bats an eyelid or gets confused at all. Not really the same thing at all actually, but you get the idea....

Alloftheboys · 05/03/2019 22:41

OH has a nickname from childhood that a group of friends call him.
Another nickname from sports team.
Another that only I call him. And goes by his normal name at work and out in public.

My birth name is long with a few syllables so I’ve always been known as a shortened version. Also have a nickname from school that old friends and occasionally parents call me.

Why does he need to change his name legally? Can he not just say “my name is xxxx but I prefer to be called xxxxx?”

WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll · 05/03/2019 23:12

The mum of one of my old school friends had a very normal name and changed it when she was in her mid fifties. Think along the lines of Claire Phillips becoming Harvest Moon. Not as in Ms H. Moon but Harvest Moon was her first and only name and she had no surname.

She didn't have a professional career, which might (or might not) have made a difference and it took a lot more getting used to than if she'd changed it to, say, Maureen Harris, but it was what she wanted to do and why ever not? She had long been divorced and her teenage son (only child) kept his original normal-sounding name and he wasn't fazed by it at all.

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