Did you have an uncommon name growing up?

Question

For those who had an uncommon name that was difficult to pronounce, do you wish you had a different name? Did you hate your name growing up? Do you hate it now? The reason I ask is because I like a certain girl's name that is difficult to pronounce. It is a Mayan word, actually. Just not sure how a child would feel growing up with a really different name.

Answer 1

My name is Siobhan (Sha-vahn) so yes, I had quite a different name growing up. I did, however, love the fact that I had such a unique name. The problem is that some names are so unique they are dumb. For example, my one friend was named Darquerisha. Great girl, hideous name. Same goes for these people who "create" their own names, put two odd names together and go way out of hand spelling some names.

I enjoyed having a unique name. I liked explaining its origins and what it meant.

By the way, Siobhan is Gaelic in origin. It is equivalent to Judy or Jane.

Answer 2

My name is Priscilla which is not extraordinarily uncommon, but hardly anyone can spell it correctly and people sometimes call me Patricia (Which I never understood!). When I was a preteen, the fad was jewelry and things with your name on them and I could never find my name. Things like that were annoying when I was a child. Now that I am grown, I like that my name is unique (although I still get called Patricia sometimes).

I assume that you like the name you chose for a reason, that it has a special meaning. That will mean more to your child than if you pick a name just because it will be easy for others to pronounce. Besides, if you look at the birth announcements in the papers, you will see LOTS of names that are hard to pronounce. If you like the name, use it.

Answer 3

I have a rather uncommon name, Sabrina, and I have always been happy to have a name very few people share. However, I have a very difficult to pronounce last name, and even though I love it, was always a little disappointed when no one could say it right. They even mispronounced it both my college and high school graduation. So I would say it's good to have an uncommon name, but it should be easy to pronounce. Maybe change the spelling to be more phonetic?

Answer 4

My name is Noelle. Not hard really, but different. I hated it as a child. Kids sang Christmas songs to me all the time. To this day people mess up my name. I get called Noel, Nicole, Nora, it's really ridiculous what they come up with. If I had to do it all over again, I would have insisted at an early age that everyone call me Elle (pronounced Ellie) and forgotten all about Noelle. I'm okay with my name now, but I can't say I love it. If I could change it and people wouldn't think it was weird to change my name at 32 years old, I would.

Answer 5

OK my name is Reyna. I got picked on in school, I knew when it was my name in roll call, I also have a different last name for any other region of the USA other than southern Louisiana and still they would mess it up De Jean. I now am married to a guy with the last name Florek.


I think I was in 4th or 5th grade when I really didn't care and started to Love my name. I Love having a name that you don't hear all that often. I hope that helped.

Answer 6

I didn't personally. I had a common name, when I got to high school there was about 6 Kylies in my year.
But it depends on the child and their personality as to whether they can 'pull off' an unusual name. Of course this is something you can never know until they get older!
Stick with something original, (but not made up) as opposed to something unusual/wierd if it concerns you.
I know personally that I would not care what other people thought, having said that, I don't have ghetto taste in names and I don't believe in spelling names stupidly just to make them look different or stand out.

Answer 7

Yep. Pretty difficult to pronounce but not as bad as some other names. When I was younger I did want a different name but as I grew older I just grew to like it. One of the reasons is that it actually sounds somewhat cool. Second reason is that it is always interesting to see how badly people butcher your names when reading them out loud....but that's just me.

Answer 8

My husband and his sister both had very unusual names that no one had ever heard of. He hated it growing up, and it's still an issue now (people frequently think it's his last name, or mispronounce it). I had to ask his sister's name at least 5 times before I remembered it, since I had never heard it before.

Name your child the unusual name as a middle name, if you must.

Answer 9

My birth name was "Bertina". Only heard of it one other time. Do NOT give your child a strange name. My kids are Kelsey {was not common 18 years ago} and Matthew, but we call him Max. If you give a really unique first name, give a usable middle name to use, like Elizabeth. It can be used for a lot of nicknames.

Really, you do not want to give your kid a name that he or she will regret being. I legally changed my first name 5 years ago, and I am much happier.

Answer 10

My brother's name is Seamus (SHAY-mus). It's Irish and despite people constantly calling him See-mus or even Sean/Shawn at times, he's really proud of it. His middle name is Flynn, also Irish, and together they make a name you don't hear too often. When you've never met anybody else with that name, you know it's unique. lol. Personally, I really love unique names, unless they're going to give people an extremely hard time. Good luck!