AIBU to expect relatives to learn to spell and use DDs name?

[Bella5C]

my Dd is almost 2. I am a single parent with grown up children as well. Dd doesn’t know her biological father. He’s not in the picture. However, his family are. They see her weekly/fortnightly or less if they’re on holiday or have medical issues.
Dd has an Irish spelt name. It’s probably one of the harder ones to spell/pronounce. I love it, I learned immediately how to spell it. I have no concerns that she will struggle. As far as I’m concerned once you know how to spell it, you know? People still spell my name and my grown up kids names wrong so I look at it like, with it being quite a unique name, you are going to learn it so you’re not getting it completely wrong.
my Issue is that her relatives (not mine) refuse to learn how to spell it and just refer to her as ‘the wee one’. I easily picked up on this in their texts and didn’t think too much of it. Accepted it really, but then, her Grandmother said to me ‘oh he (her partner) saw a woman holding a child at the end of the road and stopped and said he thought it was Bella5C and the wee one’
she obviously heard herself as she then said to me when leaving, I call her the wee one because I don’t know how to spell her name? AIBU to assume she doesn’t like her name and is refusing to use it? I can understand not spelling it in a text if you think you’ll spell it wrong but to not say her name out loud and use that excuse is surely, a load of crap? Just looking for opinions really, although I may eventually say something?

It's not a big ask of anyone. You just check the last message or save it or write it down somewhere - only manners to get the child's name right.

It’s Caoimhe (keeva)

I have a daughter with an Irish name. Really bugs me that grown adults can’t get a name right. I actually think it’s quite rude. Fair enough the first or second time but after that I think it’s ignorant 🤷‍♀️ spelling meh okay but just write it somewhere and copy it down. This is what my elderly nan did. Actually saying it isn’t that difficult. The amount of family member on husbands side that would say “how will she ever learn her name” or “the teachers won’t be able to say or spell it”. Erm nope, she could write it at 3 (and so could the other children in her class) and god help us if a teacher can’t learn a name! (Also, again not been a problem!) 😂

Don’t bother doing that… I wear a name tag to every corporate event that insists it’s good for ice breakers… I’ll let you into a secret, it’s not. People take one look at my name and turn away. They have no idea how to read and say my name. I couldn’t care less. People genuinely can’t get their heads around how many names are spelled if they’re not bog standard English.

My middle son is Ciaran, he is 21 and family on his dad's side still don't know how to spell it. One of them being a school teacher. We just place bets on what extra vowels they will use when they are writing cards etc.

It's really common where I'm from to refer to small children as "the wee one", or the "wean".

However, if you want her to be known by her actual name, then it's rude of them not to make an effort to learn it. I imagine it would take 10 minutes of focus and practice.

Bit different, but we have a lot of overseas employees at work. One of my colleagues refers to a Zimbabwean woman as "her whose name starts with Z".
It's awful, and I hate it. I have told her a few times how it's pronounced, but she's not interested in attempting to learn it.

So ignorant and narrow minded.

Caoimhe is fabulous name...it's whole 7 letters, not overly uncommon. It's really unfortunate they name zero effort.

So you pronounce it keeva..and not qweeveh? That would be confusing to me as an Irish person. As then it would just be spelt Keeva.

What did they write on her birthday/Christmas cards last year?

I have an Irish name that nobody in England (except one person) is able to read.

nobody has ever spelt it right in the history of my life.

(this one person was a professor of ancient literature).

I feel your pain but you are on a hiding to nothing.

I’m someone who ‘thinks in words’ and I find non phonetic new names incredibly difficult to retain the pronunciation of as a result. Siobhan, Niamh are fine as they’re common enough that I’ve internalised them. But lots of Irish ones I’ve been told lots of times, I can spell them but I find it very very hard to retain the correct pronunciation.

I’m a supply teacher and I’m amazing at remembering most names but struggle with ones where (English) phonics are massively different from pronunciation. I had a Gabriel in the class the other day but he pronounced it differently from how I expected and I just couldn’t retain the correct pronunciation all morning!

Still, it’s been months. I definitely would have learned my granddaughter’s name by now, no matter how unusual! My daughter has a name which is fairly common in her generation but very unusual to older generations, though phonetically obvious. I had to tell my grandma what it was about every 10 minutes when she first met her bless her. She just couldn’t retain it!

Caoimhe is not actually pronounced Keeva though....

YANBU. I've taught loads of kids with 'difficult' Irish names, as well as difficult names from all over the world. I ask how they pronounce them or I look them up, and from then on I pronounce them correctly. Not bothering to learn how to say or spell your own grandchild /niece's name is both pathetic and rude.

If it’s that much of a problem to you then firstly why did you call her a name that people would struggle with throughout her life if you’re sensitive about it?
secondly can you invent a nice nickname for everyone to use? It’s a bit precocious to expect everyone to not struggle with a name like this.

If I had a grandchild with an unusual spelling and pronunciation, I would learn and practice it until it was as easy as Anne or Mark. Anything less would be disrespectful to the child.

Just googled and found two videos both saying that they are authentic and .

Whichever if the family are English native language they should definitely be able to learn it.

my daughter is 23... and close family still cant spell her name or pronounce it right and its really not that difficult, its just unusual. it doesnt bother me and it doesnt bother her, we tend to joke about it more than anything

I had a neighbour who used to talk to me nearly everyday. She told me her name once. Other people would say oh I saw neighbour name. After 5 years she wanted to give me her number as she was going on holiday and wanted me to house sit. I had zero clue what her name was and was far to embarrassed to ask her.

So I handed her my phone and get her to input it herself 😅

People often spell my first and last name wrong.

Some people are just terrible with names. Add onto it if you’ve used an Irish name and you/her family are not Irish it’s adding an extra layer. Wee one is also often a term of endearment.

In Ireland there is no ‘correct’ way to say Caoimhe, it depends on the accent whether it is like Keeva or Kweeva and it sounds pretty bad with an ‘r’ sound on the end that some English accents can’t help adding making it rhyme with beaver.

I have a common enough name that some relatives still get wrong, it’s annoying but I’d let it go.

If it makes you feel better OP i am nearly 40 and my relatives still spell my name wrong. Your daughter will laugh about it one day x

im not Irish, I just really liked the name and rightly or wrongly, chose that the pronunciation would be Keeva and not spelt that way instead because of my need for it to be spelt with a C as we are all C’s. Yeah, I’m one of them!

Im not being sensitive about it like if im at the doctors and they shout her name and say it wrong. I understand all that in choosing her name. I’m not bothered about them not knowing how to spell it. If you have to spell it correctly, you’re googling it and that’s fine. My issue is that her gran who is not my mum and who’s Son doesn’t have any parental rights, seems to be avoiding using it and didn’t say it out loud because she can’t spell it? Just wondering what to make of it.

No, there are 2 pronunciations of Caoimhe- keeva and qweevah. To say it’s “wrong” from an “Irish person” makes you look a bit daft. I’m guessing your ROI if that’s what you usually hear. Typically Keeva is northern. HTH.

What utter nonsense. I work with people from all over the world and I make a conscious effort to pronounce and spell their name correctly and tell them to pull me up on it if I make mistake because I want to get it right. Irish names are no different in that respect.

There's also many different spellings of common names and I have friends where in text I'll go back on previous messages to double check my spelling of their other halves names is correct from how they spelt it. It's laziness and lack of effort.

It is in parts of Ireland.

My Mum’s like that, we are Welsh but she doesn’t speak Welsh and really struggles with Welsh names- she’s ok unless she’s it seen it written. Once she’s seen it written she’ll try to say it phonetically. I’m a linguist and have tried to correct her gently, but she just can’t get it.