Avoiding common shortenings

[17caterpillars1mouse]

Love Tobias but strongly dislike Toby.

I always seem to have this issue with boys names, love the full name here the common shortening.

Do you think a Tobias could avoid being called Toby by the majority of people?

Would also love to here if anyone have some of relatives that have a name with a common shortening but they just use the full name

That should be 'have a son or relative'

Haha! Funnily enough my ds is called Toby as full first name as disliked Tobias but loved Toby! I think may be a bit trickier for you though in regards to people taking it upon themselves to shorten Tobias to Toby. Hopefully though, people wouldn't without first asking...and they should follow your lead of calling his full name. Not sure I've been any help there OP!

If you don't like Toby scratch Tobias.
What are you going to do when he's 21. Tell him he can't shorten
his own name.

You can absolutely have a name that isn't shortened. You just have to be persistent to the idiots who constantly shorten it.
They get it in the end.

I knew a Tobias who was called 'Bias by his close friends and family.

Too much of a risk if you hate it.

Lovely name! My 4 year old is called Tobias! He dislikes Toby and will tell anyone who tries to call him Toby that it's not his name!
I am the same; liked Tobias but can't stand Toby! Stick to your guns and just repeat that he is Tobias and not Toby!!

I have a long babe that neither my parents or I like the common shortening of (think Rebecca / Becky, but I prefer Rebecca or Bex). You have to be persistent in how you introduce your child and have lots of common responses to corrrct people, like we call him Tobias not Toby, or oh he doesn't recognise the name Toby as him as we don't use it.

Persistence is the key. We have a Charlotte shortened to Lottie not Charlie... it gets easier as they tell people themselves...

I know a Tobias and he goes by Tobias. I think Toby is avoidable so long as you reinforce it.

Not possible. He's his own person, not a doll - he may well choose to be called Toby himself, and you'd be stuck with it.

People will shorten it, it will annoy you. Will it annoy you if he decides to shorten it?! That's the biggy!

I have an Isaac who we called Zac a lot as a baby. As he's gone through nursery and started school he's very much an Isaac, he's not yet 6 but has very much made up his own mind!

I once taught a child with a similar name - as in a name with a common shortening. Think Alexandra shortening to Alex (name changed though obviously).

The parents HATED her being called Alex, but the child loved it and Alex was the name she chose...so that was that. If you don't want to be caught in that situation you need to choose something else.

Of course. I know plenty of Matthews and Stephens who aren't Matt or Steve, for example. What I would be prepared for his for him to choose different versions at different stages of his life. You need to remember that it will be his name, not yours, and you can't control what he chooses to be known as.

I would avoid it if you hate Toby.

I know some adults who go by their full name, e.g. they're always Thomas and never Tom.
But I also know adults (including several relatives) who have chosen to go by the short form of their name despite their parent's vocal dislike of the short form of the name.

I have a pong name that is most commonly shortened to a couple of different nicknames. Both of which my Mum never liked so throughout primary school nobody ever called me the shortened versions but once I got to secondary school it did get shortened automatically by teacher/ friends. I was never overly bothered but now I'm older I prefer my full name so nobody calls me different these days. So what I'm trying to say is he can definitely be a Tobias over Toby, although there may be times when it will be Toby and I suppose then it will be his choice whether to correct or not.

*long, not pong! 😂

I think you can only avoid an obvious nickname if you use a different one.

Eg if you like Elizabeth but hate Lizzy, use Beth often enough that it sticks.

Friends will seek a nickname. That's how British people operate. Don't leave a vacuum to be filled.

You can only hope to control nick names and shortenings when your child is with you all day every day. The more independent your child becomes, the less it is your right and the more it is their business not yours what people call them. I'm not even talking about teens but 5 and 6 year olds.

By 8 your son's friends will call him by either a shortening or a version of his surname or another nick name and as long as he's happy with it you'd be a sitcom cliché on a hiding to nothing trying to insist anyone call him by his full name.

My ds1 has a 4 letter name but he still gets called by a nickname by his friends - luckily he likes it and it bothers me not at all.

You can't guarantee it. It works for some - in our family, Lucinda's parents started to call her Lucy before she went to school, to avoid her becoming Cindy. It worked. However, Alexander's mum and dad call him Zander to this day, but everyone else in the world has called him Alex since he left home. For others, there is a complicated list of identities depending on how they know the person: Catherine is Kate at work, Katie socially, but Cathy to people she's known since childhood, which is confusing whenever the different groups mingle.

My mum gave me a long name and hated the common shortening. (Not my name but will use Abigail) ‘you’ll never be an Abbie!’ Well she still can’t get used to me being a (not) Abbie!

But that’s the risk you run in choosing a name with a shortened version that you dislike.

My two girls have names that don’t have a generally accepted short version as they are short enough as they are but my son does have a long version and a short version we use and love.

Make sure you like the nickname!

I agree with Evelyn. You can constantly correct people if they shorten the name of your baby. When your child starts school (if not before) they can and will decide how they want to be addressed. You can't control that.

You and immediate family sticking to Tobias will mean most extended family probably will too. That was the case for me (my name is extremely commonly shortened).

At school he could end up as Toby (or basically any nickname, whether related to the name Tobias or not), but who cares about what his school friends call him? Will you be talking to them about him a lot?

So my parents have always called me by my full name. As does my entire extended family. But to my friends, OH, colleagues, etc. I go by the shortening. I don't expect it bothers my parents much as they rarely talk to any of those people (only exception being my OH). To each other and all my siblings, in other words in a family setting, which is 99% of the time, I am [full name].

LMFAO at pong name.

The Tobias on Arrested Development was always Tobias.

But it's also not the greatest association.