How Did You Refer to Your Parents as A Child?

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I just wondered if anyone else grew up referring to their parents in an unconventional manner (assuming you were verbal that is).

I called my parents by their first names for most of my childhood and I have no idea how that happened. I can only assume that I mimicked how they referred to each other and somehow either missed or ignored the usual lessons parents give in the early days (e.g. pointing to self and saying "say Ma - ma!, Ma - ma!" etc.).

I remember there were occasional comments from people who thought it odd, formal or impolite, but I never changed because no-one actually told me to directly. That is until my mum finally took me aside and said my father felt quite sensitive about it, he'd always wanted me to call him "daddy". I don't remember how old I was when this happened, but I think it was pretty late on eg. between 10 and 12 years. Of course, I couldn't bring myself to change my habits on demand like that, especially not to something as horribly cutesy as "daddy", but I made an effort to morph my terms of address over time and I'm still working on it at age 30, frequently avoiding addressing my father directly wherever possible since it just feels so contrived by now.

Is it really just me?!?

My oldest brothers and sister called them by their first names while my younger brother and I called them mom and dad.

We all called our grandparents by their first names.

I called my mom as mom, but I always and still call my dad by his first name. I never really understood why, because it is really rare where I live for kids or adults to address their parents by their first name. It might make sense if he were my step-father, but no he's my biological father. I still can't call him 'father' or 'dad'. It would just feel or sound wrong.

This is only related in the most tangential way, but your post reminded me of it. Until my daughter was at least 2.5 or maybe even older...maybe even 3?, if you asked her where "mommy" was, she pointed to herself.

I refer to my parents by the, as you put it, "horribly cutesy" "Mommy" and "Daddy" - even at the ripe old age of 22!

I called the parent who was not present by their first name, and the present parent by title. If I learned a teacher's first name sometimes I would accidentally address them by it, that didn't last too long

Mum and Dad.
I stopped using "Mummy" and "Daddy" at a very young age (pre-preschool).

I remember that when I was young I would refer to them by their first names. My mom told me that my dad hated that very much, but after my younger sister was born and started talking she would call them "mom" and "dad", so I started calling them "mom" and "dad" too.

Mom and dad.

"Mom" and "dad", with one exception.

Pretty much the whole time I was growing up, my parents fought (argued bitterly) at least once a week. When they did it, they'd refer to each other in third person as "your mother" and "your father". (Sound familiar?) Once I learned my family tree, I turned the tables by referring to them in third person as "your husband" and "your wife". This unsettled them enough to make them stop, except rare occasions.

Also, after starting first grade, where I first learned the concept of addressing a teacher as "Ms. HerLastName" (in kindergarten, the kids called the teacher by her first name, for some reason) , I briefly called my parents Mr. MyLastName and Mrs. MyLastName, as a joke. My parents asked me to stop, and I did.

when i learned how to talk (i don't know when) i at first started calling my mother "mom." at some point not long after that i began calling her lady and when i became a teenager i started using her first name. When i tried doing the same thing with my father around the same time i was verbally scolded into not calling him Mister...after he lightened up when i became a teenager i started calling him baldy, pop, old man, schmoopy cakes, and fluffy one. I thought it was normal to give everyone another name...

Mom and Dad (or Mommy and Daddy). I would have gotten in trouble if I called them by their first names, but it never even occurred to me to do that anyway. They even call each other Mom and Dad, so that is all I heard anyway.

Hah! Whoops. Well, if you can't be offensively opinionated and blunt here (with all the best intentions of course), where can you be? But sorry anyway. Although, have you considered stopping? It's still not too late!


As for all the other responses, it's really interesting what some people did. I guess I haven't found an explanation for my behaviour on WP though. It just suddenly occurred to me that it might be a common spectrum thing not to pick up on those naming conventions along with social conventions and pronoun mix-ups etc, but the poll says different. Odd that the unconventional thread responses outnumber the unconventional poll responses though.

I suppose I also assumed that such conventions are fairly culturally universal, but I realise that I actually have no idea. In the UK its a strong convention to use mum/dad and an unwritten, silent faux pas of sorts to do otherwise (from my experience). But maybe in other cultures it's frowned upon a lot more or a lot less than it is here.

I called them mom and dad and I still do to this day. Oddly enough though as a kid I threatened my parents "when I'm 18 I'm NOT going to call you mom and dad". Low and behold as an adult I haven't made good on my promise. In fact I have a hard time calling anyone older than myself by their first name because I never was supposed to as a kid.

I called my mother by her first name ever since I was little. I never thought to call her anything else, that was her name. I called all my relatives by their first name.

Last edited by hanyo on 11 Feb 2013, 6:02 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I called my parents mom and dad. I never really liked "mommy" or "daddy" though.