Do you call your parents by their names?

In My Humble Opinion
21

My sister and I have always called our parents by their first names. Family lore has it that my sister (five years older than I) started calling them by their first names to imitate a cousin of ours that she idolized and it just… stuck.

I did experiment with calling my mother “Mom” for a while when I was about 7 or 8 but it didn’t fly. It felt odd to me and my mom apparently found it quite irritating. (She’s a weird one, my mom.)

FWIW, we called our grandparents “Gramma” and “Grampa” - I would never even think of calling my grandmother by her first name - yikes!

22

Mine started out as Mommy and Daddy, migrated to Mom and Daddy, and eventually just to Mom and Dad.

My boyfriend calls his mother Mom, calls his father “my dad” when he’s talking to me, “my father” when he’s talking to other people, and “(father’s first name)” when he’s talking to his mother.

In his case, his father is a horrible, HORRIBLE man, but boyfriend had absolutely no inkling of anything that was going on until he was 9 or 10. And while he despises his father now, there’s still some bond that was formed during that time - it’s just a question of with whom he’s willing to acknowledge its existence. With his mother, he tries to de-emphasize even the genetic relationship. With most people, he’ll admit to that, but downplay any vestiges of an emotional one.

23

My mom was always Mama. That’s how she signed my Christmas gifts, and that’s what I always called her.
My daughter generally calls me momma, but occasionally I get the eye-rolling “mommy dearest”.

24

Always Mom and Dad, always. Lately I’ve had to remind myself to say Aunt or Uncle Whomever instead of just their names, weird.

Working at the same schools as my parents was neat. I’d walk into the workroom and call out ‘Mom’ or ‘Dad’ and most of the people would turn, looking for their own kid. Always good for a smile.

25

Mom and Dad. But when I’m in a store with Mom and trying to get her attention, I’ll say, “Marietta” (what she goes by) or “Liisi” (her given name) or “Mrs Reed.” The last seems most effective and she always laughs.

But, when speaking with her, she’s Mom. I think she’d spank me if I did otherwise. She’s pretty damn spry for an 84-year old and I’d rather not tempt fate.

26

My parents, to me, are always Mom and Dad or variations of those names, while my SO, who is French Canadian, refers to his father by his first name (and his step-mom too, but IMHO he can’t be expected to call her “mom”).

On the other hand, I do refer to my aunts and grandparents by their first names, although its not uncommon for me to use grandmaman or grandpapa either.

I have noticed that francophones (I’m from Quebec) have a much greater tendency to want to be called by their first names than anglophones do. All of my french teachers hava always gone by their first names to me (Diane, Lucy, etc) while english teachers haven’t. My own mother taught in french for a long time, and when she took on a grade one class in english about 10 years ago, she had a bit of a tough time getting used to being called Mrs. C— rather than by her first name. Student’s parents just didn’t like the apparent lack of respect that comes with calling a teacher by her first name. OTOH, by SO has always addressed all of his teachers throughout school (untill he went to an english college) by their first names.

Oh, and whenever I tried to call my dad “Bill”, he would reply with “I’m your father, not your friend”. !

27

Yeah, Sweden’s the same - I would never call a teacher by anything but their first name. But I don’t think this has anything to do with what one calls one’s parents, though. Me and my brothers are the only Swedes I (and amanset, apparently :)) know of that does this.

28

I call my mom by her first name. My cousins call their parents by their first names, too.

29

Mom and Dad were mom and dad until I had kids. Then they were Gramma and Grampa.

30

I never knew anyone, when growing up, that called their parents by their first names.
It seemed to me that everyone used mom and dad (or mommy and daddy, whatever).
it’s not a name, it’s a title, it’s what they are, My mother and father. No matter how old I get, I’ll always keep on calling them that, unless they ask me not to.

31

Calling parents by their first names is just…wrong…weird, when I hear it it makes me feel uncomfortable.

Me, I use “Ma” and “Da”, or “Mother” and “Father” when they are irritating me.

When talking to other people it’s “Me Ma” and “Me Da”.

32

My mom doesn’t answer to “Mom” these days–hell, she’s 73, she hears someone yelling, “MOM!” in a department store, she ain’t gonna think they’re talkin’ to her.

So I started yelling, “Nadine!” (which does get her attention) and have called her Nadine since I became an adult. Sometimes she pretends to “correct” me, but overall it works for her.

My dad, I started calling “Bertram” as a kid–but that’s not his name. We used to play a game when I was little, wherein I was “Miss Agatha” (which is not MY name) and he was my butler/chauffeur/cook (I was spoiled). Somehow Bertram seemed like a good name for a butler, so I called him that from the time I was, oh, five, to his death when I was 26.

(He was big into that Southern nicknaming tradition, I guess, because the only time he called anyone by his/her given name was when he was angry, and he didn’t like to be called by HIS given name, either.)

Most of my friends called him that, too (which he loved), and had no idea that wasn’t his real name until he died.

To my three siblings, however, my parents are and have always been “Mom” and “Dad” (did I mention that I was the spoiled one?)

I don’t plan to have kids, so I don’t know what my preference would be (in terms of monikers), but I have been a teacher, and prefer for my students to call me by my first name. And I’m from Kansas, though I did take French in high school . . . :wink:

33

I almost always refer to my parents as “mom” and “dad”.

However, it will be a cold day in hell before I ever call the people my parents are currently married to (obviously they aren’t to each other anymore) anything other than their first name. They aren’t “step parents” to me, because to acknowledge that would be to acknowledge they have any authority over me. Yes, I have issues… :wink:

34

I only refer to my dad by his first name if I’m being sarcastic or trying to prove a point. All other times he’s simply dad. When I was a kid I would always be befuddled whenever another adult would refer to him by his first name as if they spoke a word of power. No, I wouldn’t expect some other adult to call him “dad” but at least call him “Sir” or some other honorific when I am in earshot. My mom is “that woman” or “mom” depending on my mood.

35

My kids refuse to use my first name, and even insist that it’s wrong to for me to use it to sign greeting cards.
But I did manage to train them to use it when we are separated at the mall or a maze-type store. Nothing worse than someone yelling “Mom! Mom!” down every aisle and a dozen mothers have to check it out.

36

I call my dad by his first name. I call my mom “Madre”(a formal way of saying mother in spanish). When anyone from my family refers to my mom in the third person they call her “La Mamá” (this translates to “The Mother”). It’s a strange thing, but there it is.

37

Another vote for Mom and Dad. My wife calls her parents “Mom” and “Dad” too. But then something interesting happens.

My Mom’s been dead for a number of years, so it’s not unusual for my wife to refer to her by her first name, especially since she never knew my mother. She’s heard my Dad refer to my mother by her first name a lot, and since she never knew my mother, it seems the best solution. She will often call my Dad by his first name–although when she’s talking about Dad with me, it’s usually, “your Dad,” rather than calling him by his name.

Somewhat similarly, I know my wife’s mother and father my their first names. Sometimes, I’ll refer to her mother as Mom, but for the most part, I use her first name. Her Dad, to me, is always called by his first name.

Mind you, my wife and I were married rather late in life (late 30s, early 40s), so we’re far beyond the “Mr. and Mrs. Smith” stage when talking about our parents.

I have used my Dad’s first name to get his attention if we get separated in a crowd. But otherwise, he’s always just “Dad.”

38

One of my friends from high school called his parents by their names. When I asked my mum if I could do the same, she got pretty angry. She said anyone can call her by her name, but there are only two people on Earth who call her Mum (well, four now) and to her its a special thing.

I can now understand what she means, and I am Mummy to my kids (well, two of them anyway. I think the third thinks of me as little more than a milk bar).

39

Always Moma and Daddy (note the spelling - not mah-ma but mohm-a) But now mostly Mom and Dad - “my mother” when I’m angry.

One interesting note:

Moma trained us to come back to her when she whistled, kinda like dogs (Lots of kids, big stores - understandable but strange). She’d go to the middle of K-Mart or whatever and do the whistle equivilant of Aunt Bee’s “Yoo Hoo”. And she’d keep whistling until we found her. Woe to the child that didn’t come running AT ONCE!

Well, last week the whole clan (parents down to grandkids) went on a cruise. There I am, sitting in a BIG terminal building in Montego Bay Jamaica. I look up and see Moma entering the building about 50 yards away. I try calling her name and yelling “Moma” - no response. So I did her whistle. Yep - That got her attention!

FTR, my husband hates it when I whistle for him!

40

I would never call my parents by their real names. It feels weird even to refer to them by their names. When I call Dad’s office, I usually say “This is <c_carol>, is my dad there?” rather than ask for him by name.