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Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Unreasonably irritated that only about 8 people call me by my correct name?

286 replies

Imnotcalledthat · 18/02/2020 08:36

It’s unusual, granted but I didn’t choose it. Still, it isn’t hard to say.

A handful of friends and my sister are the only ones who say it correctly. Everyone else says a similarly spelled but very differently pronounced name.

Imagine if your name was Joan and everyone said Joanne ... it’s that sort of idea.

It doesn’t matter how many times you correct them.

Should I just give in and accept I’m a Joanne to most people?

OP posts:
ThumbWitchesAbroad · 18/02/2020 13:20

I love the meme on the first page - yes!!
I have a very easy to spell name that people will INSIST on putting an extra letter onto. No.
As the meme says, it's RIGHT THERE in the EMAIL - just C&P it if you can't be bothered to read it properly!

I've also recently met a lady called Moana - I said that must have been fun when the film of the same name came out, and she said "no, it was a huge relief actually because suddenly everyone could pronounce my name properly!" She'd gone through school and life with only a few people knowing how to say Moana, mostly she'd been called Mona instead.

MethodToThisMadness · 18/02/2020 13:20

My sister is a Lara who gets called Laura all the time.
My friend at school was named Mariana- always Marina or Marian!
My friends daughter is an Elizabeth and gets called all sorts by teachers and others- Beth, Ellie, Lizzie- even though the girl (aged 13) tells them she prefers Elizabeth, they still all want to give her a nickname!
People just can't seem to get their heads around "unusual" names or full versions of long names!

BestOption · 18/02/2020 13:24

@Hingeandbracket

Hilariously I have started to get people of asian ethnicity laugh and say they can't pronounce that!

...and why do you find that so difficult to believe? It’s very difficult, if not impossible, to make sounds you didn’t learn in early childhood.

RachelTension · 18/02/2020 13:33

Since I took my DH last name, I'd say 9/10 people mis-spell/say it as there is one letter difference but it completely changes the name. I'm also in a part of the world where the last two initials of my first name indicate this is a masculine name (apparently) so I become Mr Rachel Bension (for example).

EstebanTheMagnificent · 18/02/2020 13:35

How the F can a working class 18 year old form Kent be thought of badly for incorrectly pronouncing Dyddanwy or Gwylfai

Well said.

userxx · 18/02/2020 13:35

Julie/Julia So annoying.

WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll · 18/02/2020 13:37

Unfortunately that is the risk of using a unique name.

I don't think Emma/Emily, Marie/Maria, Sara/Sarah etc are particularly unique names, and PPs have mentioned people not knowing how to pronounce them.

Even if you do have a unique or foreign name, there's no issue with people asking you how to spell or pronounce it and then even having a couple of tries with you there to verify it. It's the people who know your name, but just don't think you important enough to respect by calling you it. And as for the arrogant thickos who tell you that you're pronouncing or spelling your own name wrongly....

Even so, people do like to invent different pronunciations of other people's names for some bizarre reason. British people tend to pronounce the name of the famous Dutch painter as Van Goff. Granted, he's not around to care about it any more(!), but it should be more like Fon Choch (with 'ch' as in loch). Americans usually say Van Go. I can understand if a foreign sound is difficult for you, but why wouldn't you approximate rather than just making something up randomly or missing sounded letters out?

If you struggle with the Scottish 'ch' sound, surely you would say 'Lock Ness', wouldn't you - not just decide that is must be Low-ash Ness or something? Wouldn't you just call the painter 'Fon Cock'?

The weirdest one, I think, is when well-meaning non-Welsh speakers attempt the place name of Llandudno - they'll do their decentric best to approximate the 'Ll' - the unfamiliar sound - as 'Fl' or 'Cl' or just an indistinct back-of-throat retching sound(?!?), but then ignore the correct sounds for the 'u' and the 'o', when if you can say 'tin' and 'dog', then you're fully able to pronounce them. I get it when they don't know that Welsh vowels are pronounced differently from English ones, but I'm talking about people who have heard somebody say the name clearly and correctly and just ignore it.

I had a distant relative who was Polish and had married into the family as a young man, but he was very old when I first met him. I was told his name was Walter. When I commented that it didn't sound a very Polish name, I was told that his actual Polish name was far too difficult for British people to pronounce, so they'd always just called him Walter. His actual name was Waclaw. The same number of letters and not an uncommon Polish name - just tell people to imagine the 'W's are 'V's if they don't already know. It made me sad to think that this elderly man had gone through pretty much all of his adult life being called a name that wasn't his - and had come to accept it - simply because people found it easier to give him a new name and identity than to spend 20 seconds learning how to say a simple foreign name. Even giving it a try and calling him 'Whacklore' would surely have been better than completely discarding his name and replacing it. One of my family members could never get around the French 'Poi' sound and would refer to the (admittedly fictional!) Belgian detective as 'Prar-row', but at least she tried and didn't just call him 'Poy-rott' as if his name was English.

Sorry, that turned into quite a ramble there - but I heartily agree that calling somebody Emma when you know her name is Emily or insisting that it's Miriam, even though she refers to herself as Mariam is just rudeness and arrogance. I'd definitely go down the route of calling them by a completely (ideally opposite sex) name to make the point, until the penny drops and they get angry with you for doing what they've done all along.

metalmutha · 18/02/2020 13:39

OP
I have the same thing with my name. Virtually everyone says it /spells it wrong. I have had people tell me that I pronounce my own name wrong.
I correct people and say it's not pronounced this way but that way etc.....and then people apologise and then I feel like I've told them off. DP"s relation is terrible for this, it's like I've really offended her when I correct her.

WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll · 18/02/2020 13:48

My sister is a Lara who gets called Laura all the time.

I'd understand that if you lived in the Caribbean, say, where the two names sound pretty identical. When I Iived in Wales, my English surname sounds very similar to a common Welsh surname, with just one vowel different. I didn't mind at all, because people were genuinely hearing it as the name they knew well, already making allowances for the fact I had a different (English) accent. However, had people told me that I was pronouncing my own name wrongly, as it 'should' have been the Welsh version, that would have hugely annoyed me.

EstebanTheMagnificent · 18/02/2020 13:48

The weirdest one, I think, is when well-meaning non-Welsh speakers attempt the place name of Llandudno - they'll do their decentric best to approximate the 'Ll' - the unfamiliar sound - as 'Fl' or 'Cl' or just an indistinct back-of-throat retching sound(?!?), but then ignore the correct sounds for the 'u' and the 'o', when if you can say 'tin' and 'dog', then you're fully able to pronounce them. I get it when they don't know that Welsh vowels are pronounced differently from English ones, but I'm talking about people who have heard somebody say the name clearly and correctly and just ignore it.

Because those people will have seen Llandudno written down many more times than they will have heard it pronounced correctly (and I can confirm that there are plenty of non-Welsh-speaking north Walians who routinely pronounce it incorrectly). It is horrible to sneer at people who are trying.

FruityWidow · 18/02/2020 13:52

Is it Naomi and people say Nay-oh-me instead of Ner-omi

Gwenhwyfar · 18/02/2020 13:52

"Gwenhwyfar I bet you were salivating at the opportunity to make that point. "

Uh, no. Is that your way of responding when you've been shown up as an arrogant person?

"How the F can a working class 18 year old form Kent be thought of badly for incorrectly pronouncing Dyddanwy or Gwylfai"

Who has said he should? Since when was this a thread just for people from Kent???

gingersausage · 18/02/2020 13:53

@Everanewbie the OP isn’t talking about people who’ve literally never heard her name before though. She’s talking about people who she’s had to correct dozens of times already. A word that you’ve used and been corrected on multiple times is not in any way unfamiliar. They are just bloody rude and lazy.

Unfortunately that is the risk of using a unique name unique does not mean what you think it means 🙄.

OwlBeThere · 18/02/2020 13:53

@SayNoToCarrots I’m intrigued what your name is!

Gwenhwyfar · 18/02/2020 13:54

"even though the girl (aged 13) tells them she prefers Elizabeth, they still all want to give her a nickname! "

A four syllable name is quite long to be using the full form all the time.

WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll · 18/02/2020 13:56

Because those people will have seen Llandudno written down many more times than they will have heard it pronounced correctly (and I can confirm that there are plenty of non-Welsh-speaking north Walians who routinely pronounce it incorrectly). It is horrible to sneer at people who are trying.

I think you must have misread what I wrote. I was not sneering at all and I specifically mentioned people who had HEARD somebody say it correctly and paid no heed to it, so were obviously not trying.

tabulahrasa · 18/02/2020 13:56

“Is it Naomi and people say Nay-oh-me instead of Ner-omi“

Ner-omi?.... is that how anyone says Naomi? I’ve heard nye-omi and nay-omi, never with an r in it...

floffel · 18/02/2020 13:59

Feel your pain, people always default to an ‘e’ in my name, even when the correct spelling is right in front of their eyes on an e-mail. I don’t bother to correct it now, unless it’s an official communication.

EstebanTheMagnificent · 18/02/2020 13:59

I think you need to re-read what you wrote. ‘Indistinct back of the throat retching sound’ is particularly charming.

gingersausage · 18/02/2020 13:59

@Gwenhwyfar so what? It’s her name. It’s up to her if she wants to be called by it.

StarbucksSmarterSister · 18/02/2020 14:00

Correct them. Every sodding time. Grind them down till they give in.

That's what I'd do, but I do get very "dog with a bone" at times.

Everanewbie · 18/02/2020 14:04

Gwenhwyfar for goodness sake. Kent is an example. Same would go for a man from Cornwall who may never have seen/heard a Scottish name before. I'm trying to say that people with names that are unusual when compared to the population as a whole should just cut a little slack to those who don't quite initially get it, and accept they are not being intentionally ignorant, they just haven't come across it before.

Please have a day off for a change and accept that most people who cannot pronounce Llanfairpwllgwyngyll at the first time of asking are not being as deliberately as obtuse as you.

RideaCockHorseOfCourse · 18/02/2020 14:06

My name is a common Christian name with a variant spelling. I've known my husband's niece since she was a baby. Don't see her that often tbf, maybe just every year, but have sent a birthday card every single year, including a cheque gift every single year throughout her childhood. Sent xmas cards, money for her childrens' birthdays. She got married a couple of years ago, (now in her early 30's) and on the table place settings and the table name planner, yup, you've guessed it, there I was, (or actually wasn't) with the different name spelling.......I was gutted Sad

user1473878824 · 18/02/2020 14:08

I assume you are something like a Merry who people keep calling Mary. If your name isn't actually a name it's slightly understandable OP!

Laiste · 18/02/2020 14:10

A four syllable name is quite long to be using the full form all the time.

Elizabeth is hardly a chore to say is it?