WIBU to tell friend I don’t like the name she’s called me for ten years?

[flossyragdoll]

Example (not my name but similar scenario) -

Name: Danielle
Prefer to be called: Danielle or Dani
Friend calls me: Dan

I never used to mind being called ‘Dan’, but for the last few years it has made me cringe. It doesn’t feel like ‘me’ and I don’t want other people to hear and start calling me it too.

Obviously I can say “I’ve gone off being called Dan, can you call me Dani instead”, but in reality (although maybe not on Mumsnet, where screaming “NO IS A COMPLETE SENTENCE” is widely considered to be normal and proportional) I worry this might be a bit awkward. She might wonder why I haven’t told her before and feel embarrassed at all the times she was calling me by a name I didn’t like, possibly wondering if there were other things she was doing that I didn’t like and wasn’t telling her (that’s how I’d feel anyway).

I only see this friend a couple of times a month, so I’m thinking of just leaving her to it and getting back to worrying about more pressing matters. It’s not like she’s calling me by a weird or rude nickname, it’s just a shortened version of my own name.

Voting -

Yes YWBU to tell her after ten years, that ship has sailed.

No YWNBU to tell her you don’t like what she calls you.

You don't have to tell her she's been getting it wrong.

You can just say 'oh hey, so I've just decided I really prefer being called Dani or Danielle now! I'm telling everyone - can you call me one of those from now on?'

Just make it sound like you only just decided.

I still think it would be awkward to say anything but, if needed, I'd go for some British indirectness along the lines of 'do you think any of my friends would mind if I asked them to start calling me Dani'. Hopefully she'd take the hint.

That's about as frank as I'd be able to get.

It's so awkward isn't it. A friend of mine somehow decided that as an especially close friend she would stop using my nickname of 20 years standing and use the name my family calls me. A totally different name in this case.

But I really never liked that name and associate it with bad times in my life. It has caused me to associate her with those times too, in some strange way. I wish she would not do it; I did tell her once, but she didn't seem to really hear me and now it's just a distance between us. :/

So I had this but opposite with my best friend. In high school we made up “quirky” nicknames like “Annie” for Melanie and the one for my best friend stuck- but only with me and her. As far as I know she was fine with it in high school. After uni she started a new job and asked my advice a few times on what to do about ‘people at her new job’ that have taken to calling her “Mellie” when she feels that she is a Mel.
Pretty direct but I got the hint and wasn’t offended as it’s her name not mine!

'Hello friend, you know you always call me Dan? Well I've decided to drop that nickname so please call me Dani from now on.'

I have a name which has about a million shortenings. Over the years I have reconciled myself to all except one. I always say "Please don't call me x I really don't like it. My favorite is y."