Everyone is getting my baby's name wrong

[Laura3091]

So my baby girls name is Emila - It is pronounced as Em-ee-la.

Everyone keeps calling her Amelia and can’t get their head around Emila. Don’t think it’s that hard to grasp tbh but I know she is going to have trouble as she grows up with people mispronouncing her name.

Do we just shorten it to Mila? (Mee-La) to make it easier for everyone?

I must admit I read it as Emilia, I’m dyslexic! Be prepared for a lifetime of correcting people. I’d opt for a nickname of Milly myself

Ok so, we're going with rude at we?!

Too be honest I read the name as Emilia (my DD has a daughter with this name), which obviously sounds very close to Amelia.
It is a lovely name though and people will get used to it, just politely correct people that say it wrong.
Once your DD is at school her friends won't have any issue with saying her name correctly.
I called a child named Lily, Milly for ages (just because I misheard) I wish their parents had corrected me - I felt a right idiot once I realised 😂

It’s not lazy readers. The name is too close to a mainstream name and many people can’t make the mistakes.

I am not from UK but to me Olivia sounds nicer than Emila which sounds like Camila. Even my iPhone thinks Emila is a spelling mistake.

Poster called your dd poor child because she is the one who will be forever correcting people. Also, why won’t you make your dd’s life easier rather than proving points that it’s the other people who are in wrong.

You're being a bit rude OP, and tbh you haven't given her a very yoonique name as it's just part of the Amelia/amilyah/Emily family (which are all nice names)

Emila is a fine name (although it could EmeelA or EMILa she will need to clarify). dd and I have unusual names - mine is very rare and often people wont even try to say it (it's phonetic and simple imo!) You just need to be ok/aware of that. I thought that DD's was relatively well known but people trip up on it a lot.

That’s what happens when you give your child an unusual name.

You can’t possibly be surprised!

It’s pretty and better than being a boring Olivia for example which has been done a million times over
It's samey (Emilia, Emily, Mila etc) and looks like a typo.

I think she is.

The problem is it sounds like two names that rival Olivia for popularity. If you wanted to go for an unusual name, you possibly should have gone for a name that doesn’t bear such a striking resemblance to other names in sound and spelling

There's no need to be rude about other people's names.

I don't think anybody is suggesting you do anything for the benefit of those who get her name wrong. It would be for the benefit of your child. The only person who is going to be negatively affected by this is your daughter. If 10, 20, 50+ people mispronounce her name in a week, it would be extremely aggravating for your child but a complete non-event for each of those individual people.

It's not "lazy reading" to get this wrong, btw. It's literally how human brains work. Our brains search for familiarity to make predictions. The name Emilia is recognisable and Emila looks almost identical.

I read Mila as My-lah. So you'll only have the same problem. I cant see why people are getting Emilia wrong, Emilia Clarke is famous enough!!!
Just keep correcting people loud and clear until they get it right and make sure when you are saying your babies name to people you are speaking loud and clear.
The amount of people who mumble incoherently these days is ridiculous (not accusing you of that! Just a pet peeve of mine lol)

But this is not a difficult name. It’s a name with same spelling as a mainstream name expect for a missing I. People make mistakes.
How many people are you going to correct?

Idiot are those who despite you correcting them call the wrong name. But we don’t only interact with people who are close to us. We also have one off interactions with people. And that will be frustrating for the daughter.

She will get sick and tired of telling people how to pronounce it and she will change it to something else in her thirties. And you will be annoyed with her decision.
Speaking from experience.

Because it should be Emilia. You have mispelled a really common name so shouldn't be surprised when people get it wrong.

It’s not Emilia, they are getting wrong. It’s Emila they are getting wrong. I hope you can spot the difference 😂

Once children can speak and name themselves you will start to lose control of what she is called and once she hits the teen years you won't have any control at all! My first name was an unusual name when I was a child and it has one of the less usual spellings of it. Its a UK name. It gets misspelled and mispronounced and misspelled again and has been all my life. Do I care? nope.

Whoops
Just re read. Sorry i thought it was Emilia.
So its Emila
Ive never heard of that.
But regardless my previous comment stands- say the name loud and clear, maybe even spell it out. People should get the message.

It’s not Emilia. Read the OP again.

Yes my mind auto corrected it to Emilia whoops!

Is it a made up name @Laura3091 ?

How are people supposed to know how to say it if you did make it up.

To answer your question, yes I would shorten it to Mila for everyone's sake.

That's the risk you take if you opt for a unusual name - I haven't come across it before at least and I feel like we have every variation of similar names going at nursery and school.

Its lovely and people who care will learn the correct pronunciation but as someone who has had 2 surnames no-one can ever get right...sometimes you just have to live with it.

OP your decision is the equivalent of naming your child Oliva. Can you see what confusion that would cause? And how tedious it would be for her constantly having to tell people that it’s not Olivia?

Sorry @Laura3091 but I genuinely read the name as Emilia and didn’t realise what the issue was until I read more comments and saw it was actually.

It’s not a known name and there will be people who mistake it.

With all the bizarre names out there, you think she is a ‘poor kid’ for being called Emila? A lovely , pretty normal sounding name? 🙄

First glance I read it as Emilia but once you’ve corrected people it shouldn’t be an issue.