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2nd Trimester
thequeeenbee
member
Does anyone have a hyphenated FIRST name?
thequeeenbee
member
I was wondering if any of you had hyphenated first names, like "Mary-Kate". We are planning on naming DD Vanessa-Kate and I was wondering if I was possibly overlooking something about having a hyphenated first name. Has it ever caused you any headache when it comes to legal things like getting a drivers license and such?
I know this sounds like a silly question, but some ladies pointed out how having two middle names makes things difficult sometimes, and I wondered if maybe there were some negative effects of hyphenated first name that I'm not thinking of.
TIA!
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Re: Does anyone have a hyphenated FIRST name?
Why hyphenate? I only know two Mary Kates (both with no hyphen). I would just go with Vanessa Kate. It's pretty and looks better anyway, IMO.
When feeling out any forms, I would just put Vanessa Kate under the First name, then whatever MN, then the last. That's what I did when I changed my name when I got married. I made my middle name my second first name and my maiden name my middle name.
Eh, I'm not a fan of giving her two legal middle names. We discussed it, but we both think it will be more trouble than making Vanessa-Kate her first name. Her name will be Vanessa-Kate Brewer Lastname.
I agree Mary-Kate is 3 syllables (Mary-Jo= 3 Mary-Anne= 3 etc) Vanessa= 3 syllables alone. I can't imagine (personally) yelling down the hall "Vanessa-Kate come for dinner!". We're giving our son a 4 syllable name, but we plan on calling him Xander because Alexander is too long most of the time.
BFP #1 9/7/10, EDD 5/14/11, Violet born 5/27/11.
BFP #2 4/9/12, EDD 12/16/12, M/C Rory 4/24/12.
BFP #3 10/6/12, EDD 6/16/12., Matilda born 6/17/13.
I didn't suggest giving her two legal middle names. I suggested giving her two legal first names.
I have a hyphenated last name, and I'm sure your daughter would have some of the same issues that I run into. It's surprising in 2011 how many company's computer systems don't recognize hyphens or spaces within names. I guarantee she will end up with 10 different variations of her name...Vanessa-Kate, Vanessakate, VanessaKate, Vanessa Kate, etc.
People's ears are only set up to hear 2 names, so when she says Vanessa-Kate Lastname, they will pick a random combination of 2 of those 3 names and go with it. For example, I'm Susan Jones-Smith, and despite me saying that, people repeat back Susan Smith. Or Susan Jones. It's shocking how often I have to spell out Smith HYPHEN Jones for them to get it.
I don't feel one way or the other about hyphenated names, but my brother doesn't like that he has one.
His name is Austin-Micheal (unusual for a boy to be hyphenated, and "Micheal" is spelled wrong...but my stepmom isn't normal
). He's 17 now and has completely dropped the hyphen; just goes by Austin. He says he never has room for the whole thing on job applications and in school the hyphen made things difficult on standardized tests where there are only so many spaces, and no option to fill in a "-" bubble, and I think the only places it still has a hyphen are on his birth certificate and his original Social Security card.
I have a double first name-- no hyphen... by accident
My parents decided to name me Elisa (first) Maria (middle).. and my mother sent my father down the hall to fill out the birth certificate paperwork.... where he wrote the whole thing in the first name section-- oops! They didn't think it was a big deal and just went with it...when discovered YEARS later.
My father's side of the family has always called me Elisa Maria-- I wouldn't say it's been a huge inconvenience-- sure I occasionally run out of spaces on standardized tests, but then I just drop the Maria. The most notable was our marriage certificate-- I couldn't fit my first name-- not even close- and the extremely unhelpful clerk had no idea what to do- so I legally shoved the Maria over to the middle name section.
Overall, I would say don't use a hyphen, but go ahead with a double first name if you want! As long as there is no hyphen, she can make her own choices later on depending on what's convenient or what she's gotten used to being called.
I think it you hyphenate, its legally 1 name. Not 2 first names.
My first name is hyphenated and to be honest, it can be a PIA. Even worse, for a long time it wasn't legally that way. I was supposed to have a hyphenated first name, no middle name. Like elisamaria, my birth certificate was filled out wrong. First name, middle name. Even with that, my mother always went by what she meant first-first, no middle. I found out much later in life (high school maybe?) that in fact wasn't my "legal" name. For my sanity purposes, I legally changed it to the hyphenated version (removed the middle) when I got married. It was the name I knew and wanted to simplify things. Even if that meant a more complicated name.
But...it can be a pain. I always have to spell it out, say "its hyphenated" and get questioned on it all the time. I love my name, its different but the hyphen can be a bit annoying. I mentioned liking the name AnnaLynn to DH and he said...NO HYPHENS! I told him there was no hyphen and he said "but she will always be asked...is it hyphenated? one word?" and I knew he was right.
Thanks for the input, it was actually very helpful. I was mostly looking to find out more about legal issues and such. We're pretty set on the name, and most of the thread turned out to be people suggesting we don't use it Oh well. lol. We like it. And to be honest all of our family and friends have commented on how pretty they think it is. And as for people calling her "Vanessa", we're prepared for it. I imagine it will happen quite a bit, especially at first.
I probaly should have made it more clear that we aren't just using "Kate" as a middle name because we are using "Brewer" which is a family name, and is important to us. Otherwise we would have just named her Vanessa with Kate as a MN and just called her by both.
Thanks again!
(Second post about this, but I work for a police department, and just ran into a couple of names that are hyphenated, and thought I'd share what I found.)
One was the hyphenated first name of a missing juvenile (old enough to have a permit). Some forms of id had the name written as one long first name, or hyphenated like it should be, or as a first name with two middle names. I don't suspect that it's going to hinder investigation, but when there are multiple options like that it can leave room for error in verifying if/when the juvenile has been found. I think if the parents would have been more careful and made sure that the hyphen was included correctly in all their child's paperwork (ss card, birth certificate, drivers permit, school id, etc..) the problem wouldn't exist, so it's just something to watch for if you choose to go with the hyphenated name.
Oh yes! My friend had to have her DD's birth certificate re-done because they had typed the name wrong. Definitely double check when you receive any type of official ID for her.
That would certainly help but it also comes down to how other people enter it. I have like 7 different versions of my name on my credit report. Its ridiculous. Spellings I certainly never submitted anywhere. Both before and after the legal change. Granted this can happen to anyone but I think with the hyphen there are more chances for error.
OP, I certainly wasn't trying to be a downer on the hyphenating. If you love the name, then go for it. I was just explaining some pitfalls to having a hyphenated first name. I had the opportunity to change my name and didn't so clearly it can't be so bad