So, I run into my dad yesterday just as he’s leaving. I ask where he’s going.
“I’m going out to meet ‘D’ for dinner.”
“Don’t you mean ‘J’?” I ask.
“Right, ‘J’.”
‘D’ is his ex-wife.
This is the second time I’ve heard him do this. I asked my brother and he said he’s caught him doing this as well.
My dad is 56. Perhaps it’s early alzheimer’s? Either way, I’m quite sure I don’t want to be there when he does this to her face.
My dad keeps accidentally referring to me my older brother’s name and has been for years (he’ll be 60 this year). I wouldn’t be too worried about it.
Probably just habit. My mom calls me by my aunt’s name a lot.
Well, they have been divorced for over five years now. How long do you figure it takes to break that kind of habit?
A LONG LONG time…
I very occasionally refer to the current boyfriend by my exhusband’s name, usually when I am VERY pissed at him. I’ve been divorced for 5 years.
~J
I don’t know, but you can tell him that if he keeps on like this he won’t be affianced for too much longer.
My dad came to visit me with his new wife a couple of weeks ago. He never referred to her by name at all…called her “honey” and referred to her either as “your new mom” or “my wife.” My brother and I decided he was worried about calling her by the wrong name. Maybe your dad should start referring to her by title rather than name to avoid any further such mishaps? Then again, I’d hate thinking my SO (if I had one) couldn’t remember my name.
About 30 seconds after the first time he does it when he’s in bed with her!
But he’ll hear about it for at least 30 minutes. And another 15 minutes in the morning. And another 5-10 minutes, every day, for the next week or two.
But, trust me, after that, he will be broken from this habit!
My first wife died more than 10 years ago and I have been remarried for 6 years, and I still make that mistake sometimes. If your father’s fiancee loves him she will understand.
Others have pointed out that old habits die hard. That is especially true of those close to the heart.
I sure hope it’s not a sign of Alzheimer’s - I’m not even close to 50 yet.
My mom calls me Ray-Kyla quite a lot. (My younger sister is named Rachel.) I usually answer “What, Da-Mom?”
For a long time, she addressed me with her younger sister’s name, which always struck me as particularly weird because my aunt and I don’t look at all alike. There must be something about me that just reminds her of that sister (my mom has four).
My grandmother calls me by her son’s (my uncle’s) name all the time.
She’s on the other side of 80, though, so it’s not a very good comparison.
My grandmother calls me every grandchilds name before she gets to mine.
“Hey, Angela, I mean Mary, I mean Kristen, I mean, Lori, I mean Kay, oh, forget it.”
My mom has been known to call me by the name of a long-dead dog.
Shemem, are you my brother/sister?
My mom often calls me by the dogs name.
My brother often calls me by his sons name. I often call our dog by my brother’s dog’s name. Perfectly normal. I hope.
My parents would sometimes mix up my brother and I. Now that I have two brothers, it’s gotten worse. 
My mom is forever doing this with my sisters and me. She’s done it ever since I can remember. And I do it to—getting my sisters’ names mixed up.
I think it’s pretty typical.
I used to think my mother was an idiot for not being able to remember my name! In fact, I thought one of my names was “dammit”, because she’d say: “Bonnie, Sharon, Donna, dammit, Norine! You knew who I was talking to!” LOL. But now, I call my kids by each other’s names all the time (I usually leave out the “dammit”, but I’ve only got three kids, she had five).
Funny anecdote in my family, my aunt Renee, the youngest of five siblings thought her name growing up was “Marthe, Helene, Guy, Daniel colisse Renee!” as my Grandmawould work he way through all their nabe to get to hers.
I have a vague and unsupported theory that your brain is so busy holding all of the other information that you know about that dear one, it drops random items and the name happens to be one of them because, jeez, why would you forget your own daughter’s name?
My mom did it to us all the time. Still does.