Parents and first names

Does anybody here think it is rude to use your parents’ first names when speeching to them? I have used my parents first names since I was about 6-years-old. I don’t know why I started using their first names (my adult brother still calls them “Dad” and “Mom”). I was recently told by a woman I know that is rude to call your parents by their first names. My response was my parents and I are all adults and those are their names. And since my parents had no problem with me using their first names when I was child there was nothing wrong with using their first names then. When I have children I am just going to have them use my first name .

So, does anyone think it is rude for an adult to call his/her parents by their names? How about young children? Is there something wrong with children using their parents first names?

I don’t think it’s rude, or wrong, but I just naturally call my parents mom and dad. I’m 19.

I have friends who call their parents by their first names, though, and it’s nothing out of the ordinary for them.

It’s rude to call your parents something other than what you’d like them to call you, certainly. I think part of the appeal of having screaming dwarves around is that you can make them call you Your Majesty Dr. Grand High Poobah Sir if you’d like. But I can’t see how it’s anyone else’s business… if the kid is otherwise polite and obedient and knows to call other adults Mr./Ms. Whatever unless instructed, what’s the harm in it?

When we had our kids in karate classes, she told them to call her by her first name because all the women there were “Mom.” The other kids picked up on this and started doing it. Made things go much smoother.

My younger brother called our parents by their first names starting when he was about 10. They thought it was hilarious. The rest of us have always called them Mom and Dad. I personally don’t see anything wrong with it at all… but I also don’t see ANYTHING wrong with “cuss”/“swear” words. (Changing the public view on that would be one of my personal crusades if I had the time) So you might take my opinions on proper speech with a grain of salt.

When I am somewhere where there are lots of moms and I want to get my moms attention I yell out “hey, Pattywhacker”. She always answers me then.

Her name is Pat, and I am the only one of her kids that call her that, my brother calls her JohnnyPotsmoker ( she doesn’t smoke pot, she just does some incredibly silly things sometimes ) and my sister calls her something else ( I can’t remember what it is) when she wants her attention.

When she was around three, my daughter decided to call her daddy by his first name. No problem for us but we did find that people assumed he was her stepfather. Some people even asked if that was the case. She switched back to “Daddy” of her own accord about a year later.

If we are in a crowded place and she needs to get my attention she calls me by my first name. She also uses my first name when she is making fun of me. Hmmmmm, I need to do something about that.

I love being “Mom”, but really, it’s all a matter of personal preference.

My four children (aged 18 to 26) all call me “Dad”. I would have had no problem with them using my first name, and never tld them what to call me: it just happened that way.

I almost always call my father “Dad”. The one exception that I can remember was when I was chairing a meeting, and had to refer to him (as a member of the meeting) – I decided that I’d better be formal about it, and referred to him by his name.

Nothing wrong with it, per se. But I know a family in which the parents aren’t very responsible, and the children sometimes took care of them. That family went by first names. I always associated the practice with the more general situation.

It wouldn’t be something I’d think was WRONG or rude, but I would do a doubletake at someone else referring to their parents by name…probably would assume they were step-parents.
In my family, my mom is always “mom” and my dad was always “dad”. I would feel really weird about referring to them by their first names no matter how old I get. I will never think of my parents as my peers.

In my family, the moniker of “Mom” or “Dad” is an honor. I was taught that it was respectful and proper since no one else other than their kids would ever call them Mom and Dad.

I was also raised that using family titles such as Aunt ___ and Uncle ___ were also the only proper way to address them. Today, I hear most kids refer to their aunts and uncles by their first name.

Why do I suddenly feel like an old geezer…

The first time I heard small children call their parents by first names instead of “Mom & Dad” I was very surprised, and confused. It took months before the neighborhood figured out that Carol and Tim were the natural parents of these children, not, as some theories went, either step-parents or older brother and sister-in-law who got custody after the real parents died. The most complex theory was that Tim had married the children’s mom (who was an only child/orphan/widow, and then the mom had died, and Tim later married Carol.

After we’d known each other a few months, we were all having a discussion about labor and delivery tales (as women will do) and Carol mentioned something about child two’s birth being much more painful that child one’s delivery, and dear sweet Consuela from next door blurted out, “Oh, then you really are their mother!” and in the ensuing laughter we all admitted our confusion as to the relationship. Carol was perplexed…apparently she had never realized that none of us knew these were really her kids (and Tim’s!).

When asked why they let the kids call them by their first names, she said that when the first one was born, they didn’t feel grown-up enough to be called Mom & Dad…said it made them feel old. And they weren’t teens when these kids started popping out, they were in their twenties like the rest of us.

Now you’ll notice I said “let” them call them by first names. All our kids tried to pull that first name crap on us, but we all just refused to allow it. In my mind, it isn’t the child’s decision to decide what they call you, it’s yours. The minute the kids realized that we didn’t hear them unless we heard Mom or Dad, they gave up the notion. Of course, being in the South at the time, the kids all called the other moms Miss Carol, Miss Vickie, Miss Consuela instead of Mrs. Harrington, Mrs. Fox and Mrs. Garcia, so we weren’t terribly strict. But my line was always, “I worked hard to get this title of Mom, and that’s what you’ll call me.”

We do the “Mom and Dad” thing and so do all our friends and family. On mr zoogirls side it’s “Aunt and Uncle” until the kid is an adult and then it’s sort of optional. On my side we still use it.

Here’s an odd one, though. I’ve known Mr zoogirl’s Mom for twenty-three years and I’ve never called her anything! I’m just not comfortable with either Mom or Cathy. I have no problem with telling her I love her, just calling her something. Weird, huh?

It feels a little odd to me personally, but that’s about as far as I’d comment on it. I have a friend who calls his dad by his first name - he doesn’t think it odd, and that’s all that matters, really.

I don’t think it’s weird because that’s the way it works in my family. No one has titles, my parents, aunts, uncles and grand-parents all go by their first names for the most part. My father’s parents do go by titles, but since they live several states away, I never got used to calling them Grandma and Grandpa. As a result, when I talk to them, I don’t call them anything. I just get their attention and start talking. If I’m talking about them, they’re known as “(Father’s name)'s parents”.

I’m surprised at the amount of parents that have no problem with their kids using their first names. Maybe I’m an old geezer to (I’m 44), but allowing that familiarity (to me) seems to be inviting disrespect or worse feelings of equivalence.

There can not be equivalence. A parents job is to protect and nurture a child, and ensure that they can function successfully in the world; to guide them towards that goal. Being someone’s pal on a first name basis isn’t in the job description.

I’m not saying being a friend to an adult child is wrong; just that it’s not the goal. If anything it’s a possible fringe benefit; but certainly not guaranteed.

I would never dream of calling my parents by their first names. It will always remain like a teacher/student relationship; I may have surpassed the teacher, but can never forget their role in my success and should remain forever in respectful reverence.

In my experience, those parents who allow it wind up having kids that walk all over them; with little discipline and quite often selfish. And why not, why should they heed/obey their pal? Aren’t they equals? :rolleyes:

Well at 44, you’re a couple of years younger than my parents, and much younger than my grandparents, so I don’t know how much age has to do with the situation. I think that the situations you’ve witnessed had much more to do with the family dynamic as a whole, than the decision not to use titles. Now, I agree that more laid back parents will probably decide against titles, but I don’t know if this one decision will have much effect on the level of respect in that household.

Children will learn to respect their parents based on the way that they are treated. Families usually have close-knit relationships, and the removal of titles , or the use of pet-names can increase familiarity. Maybe that is a bad thing in some families, but others strive for it.

This is utter codswallop. The parent child relationship is not predicated on the use of titles but on the quality of the interactions between them. In particular if the parent child relationship is based correctly the child will obey or disobey the parent based on how much they respect him or her rather than on what they are forced to call the parent. To characterise the relationship as obviously between pals purely because first names are used is completely incorrect. No child is going to make the logical leap from ‘I call my parents by their first names’ to ‘I can treat my parents as if they were my kindergarden friends’. If the parents allow that then it’s a completely seperate issue.
To me, having grown up calling my parents by their first names, someone who insists that their children call them mom and dad would come across as having a desire to control every aspect of their children’s lives, above and beyond the care expected of them as parents.

I call my Mom by her first name and so does my brother. She told me she either wanted be called Mother or FirstName. I opted for FirstName. Considering how strict my Mom was, this is pretty funny.

I also call my Mom’s sisters–my aunts–by their first names, too. I call my great-aunts Aunt So-and-So, though. My cousin calls his Mom by her first name.

Our kids call me Mom or Mommy and my husband Dad or Daddy or Da-Da. Although I wouldn’t mind if they called me by my first name my husband just will not have it. Since we strive to put forth a united front, with the kids, at least, they’ll probably continue to call us Mom and Dad.

Lately, I’ve been calling my mother Mom. I like it and I kind of missed it growing up.

It doesn’t really matter if I think it’s rude, it matters if my * parents* think it’s rude. They do. So Vynce and I call them Mom and Dad, and we don’t use our aunts and uncles’ first names alone either. Some families are more strict about this than others when you’re growing up, and even though my aunt probably wouldn’t care if I just called her Gerry now, it just seems rather strange to do so.