CHANGE MY SONS NAME AT 7 YEARS OlD?

[CraigN24]

My son is 7 years old and has Autism and Global development delay.. My sons birth name is Luke, However he NEVER responds to that name. We have put it down to his Autism and we have been trying for years to get him to react to his Birth name( myself ,his tutor, specialists, family call him Luke!)

From the moment I found out his mum was pregnant I used to refer to him as " my little buddy" and even now it still sometimes slips out and we say " Buddy" is his nickname... When we call him Buddy sometimes he responds ( turns around/ babbles) but not always. ( more than he does than his birth name!)

Because of this I am seriously thinking about changing his name by deed poll ... Do you think this is a good idea or would it just make things worse?

Thankyou.

No need to change by deed poll. Everyone can call him Buddy without the paperwork being necessary

At least try out the 'Buddy' nickname a bit more first to see if he starts to respond consistently to it, I'm sure the other people involved with your DS would agree to use it too.

You don't need to change his name officially but you can request that everyone uses his nickname

I found out after a number of years my friends brother wasn't Edward but in fact Thomas!
From very early on he decided that was what he wanted to be called and wouldn't respond to anything else, everyone used Edward including the teachers and there was no need to change it.

Similar thing at work, when travelling abroad with a collegue I found out due to his ticket and passport he was actually Richard not Mark, there were too many Richards at school so he was given a new name by friends.
I'd worked with him for 8 yrs at that point, so it's more common than you think.

Just call him buddy, I wouldn't bother with changing it.