h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

If you never introduce yourself to your children as 'mummy' and 'daddy' would they still call you mummy and daddy?

Anyone tried this?

I'll just pop into the tardis and try it, Z

Well it can't be that unusual?

I mean it applied to my family and I wouldn't think of introducing myself to my children as 'daddy'. I just don't have any children to experiment on.

Well of course they call you what you introduce yourself as.

I called mine Mummy and Daddy until I got to teenage years and that became embarrassing (I went to a rough school ) so it's now turned to Mum and Dad - but the transition was tricky.

I tend to go for 'Father' and 'Mother' in a semi-sarcastic way. I will often call my father 'Willum', because he hates it.

B

What do you mean Z, plenty of families use papa or pop or something other than daddy. The kids would probably know who "daddy" was if someone else said it though, due to the prevalence in books etc of that as a description of the role of male parent.

Me mam's always me mam, as she hates it. My dad's Dave at the footy and dad elsewhere.

Mummy and Daddy up until about 8 or 9...then their first names after that. I'd noticed they never ignored each other using that address..but Mummy and Daddy was often ignored.

It worked. Couldn't imagine going back to calling them anything else.

It felt quite sad at the time.

My 1st daughter called us by our real names up to about aged 5. Then she found that in school when she was talking about "Eoin", all her friends would be puzzled, but if she said "Daddy", they'd understand. So she started calling us Mammy and Daddy from then on, and still does.

The 2nd daughter just used the same names as her big sister, so she called us Mammy and Daddy from the start.

I still call my father Daddy. He is now 88. My mother died many years ago, but she was always Mammy.

On the other hand, I never refer to my wife as "Mammy" when talking to the children. I'd always refer to her by her actual name "give that to " followed by her name.

In the same way, when my father said "Mammy" to us in the old days, we always knew he meant his own mother.

They will call you what you call yourself and other people call you. I've been around babies and little kids all my life, when I was younger they called me my real name as that's what everyone called me, babies grow up knowing that's my name, and older kids are introduced. Teenacher called me Mummy, as that's what I taught him. As I had nieces and nephews they called me Aunty as that's how I referred to myself ("come and sit with Aunty").

The longest foster children we had, 3 & 5 when they arrived started calling my mum Mummy, despite her calling herself Aunty to them. At least in front of people. Of course this set off some serious jealousy in me and I kept correcting them. Is that more what you meant Z? I guess they kept hearing us call our parents that, and knowing all the other kids at school had mummies and dadddies, and reading about mummies and daddies in school books.

T'boy noticed on his own that other people called me Kelli and if he felt I wasn't responding to mummy quickly enough he would shout Kelli instead. I don't know when mummy will become mum.

I still call my parents Mom and Dad, except when I'm putting names on Christmas presents. We have four generations at Christmas get-togethers. If I put "To Mom" on a gift, it could refer to my mother, my sister, my sister-in-law, or my niece-in-law. In context, they could figure it out from the "From Paul" tag, but to save time and effort, I just use first names.

I have thought about this a lot. My family is complicated.

My original parents had an ideological commitment to first names and introduced themselves by their first names. They didn't answer to mum and dad. I call them by their first names.

They split up and I got step parents. I called them by their first names.

Then my younger half brother stated school and started to call my mum and step-dad; mum and dad. I joined in (I was around 9). So the man I call dad isn't my dad.

My step-mum and original dad found guru's and took spiritual names. My step-mother insisted on hers so I started to call her after a lesser known Indian river. My dad didn't insist so I continued to call him by his real name.

My dad and his wife separated. A parade of new girl friends were called by their first names. My dad nicked my brothers girlfriend and so we called her mum to annoy. At this point the women we call mum isn't our mum.

I had my son. My partner and I didn't have strong feelings about the mum/first name thing and let it be. He called us by our first names until he was around 5, despite going to nursery where they referred to us as mum and dad. He now meanders between first names and mum/dad.

Apart from an interlude (of around 2 years) where he was seriously obsessed with Bob the Builder and called me Wendy. He would wake in the night calling w-end-eeee. The nursery teachers were shocked when they realised I wasn't really called Wendy.

From all this I conclude that children call their parents whatever the parents will answer to.

My dad (original) called his mum 'mummy' up until the day she died however I imagine that my son will revert to first names when we are all adults.

Belatedly my mum has started signing herself Ma and I'm not sure what to make of it.

A correction

the man i called dad isn't my dad. He died. Poor grammar

It's always been Mum & Dad from all my family. Now I tend to call my dad 'Papa' a lot cos my niece does, and it sounds really when she does. Although if we were in the pub, say, it'd still be Dad.

My grown daughters started out calling me Mommy and switched to Mom from the age of about 7. However, when there is an emotional crisis of some sort, I become Mommy again. Despite the crisis du jour, I love it when they call me Mommy. It cements my status in their lives.

Dead.

Mummy and Daddy until about age 6, then Mum and Dad, unless of course I want something, then it's "Daddy?" or even "Mummykins"

Conversely I will answer to "RLname" or to "Mouse" or "mini" or 'squeak'

My parents recently (about a year ago) became 'Nana and Papa' to my niece, So i'm assuming they will be nana and papa to any children I or my younger sister have too.

mini

My nephew once asked my mother-in-law
'when you had a child why did you call it mummy?'

My in-laws being much more formal about names than my family..

Mind you I always called my grandparents Mr and Mrs (Smith)...when I was born they refused to acknowledge me as I was born out of wedlock and so didn't introduce themselves. Later they warmed to me but by then it seemed a bit late for introductions...