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[audiobiblio.livejournal.com]

What's your absolute LEAST favorite alternate/"creative" spelling of a name? The one that makes you cringe when you see it.

Mine? Jaxson. But honestly, my feelings about that name run a little deep. My 9 year old would have been named Jackson if she'd been a boy... it was the name that I had "waiting in the wings" for years before children were even really a thought. You can thank Steel Magnolias for that one. Anyway, a year after my daughter was born, my cousin used the name for one of her twins. So when I had my son, I wasn't able to use it. Granted, the popularity of it has turned me off a bit and maybe it's for the best, but I'm still a little sad about it. So when I see people taking a name that I really like and spelling it like THAT?!? I get a little ragey.

And on the flip side, what's an alternate spelling that you actually like?

I go back and forth on this so much, but my name is an alternate spelling of Ashley (Ashlie) and I've grown to like it over the years. My parents did it because Ashley is a gender neutral name, particularly in England where my mother is from, and my dad thought that the "ie" looked more feminine. As a kid, I hated it because no one ever managed to spell my name properly. But now that we live in an age of all sorts of "creative" names and spellings, it's one of the least difficult to grasp. And consequently, when we named our daughter, we did the same thing... took a gender neutral name and replaced the "ey" with an "ie".

Comments

[redfield79.livejournal.com]

My brother was almost Ashley, Ash for short. I love the name for a boy. I can't stand when people use "leigh" as a replacement now. I grew up with a girl named Ashley. And when she turned 18 she changed it to Ashleigh. Like............why? My name is Lisa...so apparently the trend now is that I should change my name to Leighsa. Can't stand it.

And...I saw a Jaxxxson the other day on a friends FB page. Yes. THREE x's.

[jeweledvixen.livejournal.com]

There are so many badly-spelled names that I can't pick just one. Changing Cs to Ks and Is to Ys drives me nuts. So does changing Ss to Zs.

I have to laugh because my favorite misspelled name is Jaxson. I love that spelling and I love the nn Jax.

[cremepuff.livejournal.com]

Jaxson, Paxson, Exzavier...it's as if people are trying to spell them phonetically because they think every single letter in the sound has to be spelled out. I don't get it.

[audiobiblio.livejournal.com]

Exactly. The "x" makes the sound that they're trying to accomplish. There's no need for the "s" or the "z"... it's extraneous. I mean, I still don't care for Jaxon, but it's better than Jaxson.

[kitchen-poet.livejournal.com]

This, this, this! My SIL has a son named Alexzander. Just, why?


@ the OP---I've met TWO Jaxxxons! Two! So it could be worse.

[starcrossed.livejournal.com]

A child at the school I work at is named Jacq (pronounced 'Jack.')

[lil-cherub.livejournal.com]

Jacques is French. My son has a friend named Jacques(nn Jac)

[kitchen-poet.livejournal.com]

I went to college with a Zaque. His parents went with Zachary and Zac, but he changed it to Zaque to be more unique. ;)

[iluvbroccoli.livejournal.com]

Ryly, Emmaleigh, Mellisa (with two Ls and one S).

[happyevrafter.livejournal.com]

I had a child in daycare named Jaymz. Ugh, the horror. My name is Carly and I went through a phase in my preteen years where I spelled it Carleigh lol. I thought it looked prettier. Kind of obscure, but I prefer Cecelia over Cecilia (we almost used this name for our daughter so there was a controversy lol)

[renishas.livejournal.com]

Anything with an apostrophe in it.

[ringsandcoffee.livejournal.com]

One of my students has an apostrophe in her name. We were learning about where to put apostrophes in possessive nouns recently, and she suddenly asks why she has an apostrophe in her name. I had to bite my tongue so as not to make a snide remark.

[politicking.livejournal.com]

I can't choose just ONE! Lol! SO I will use examples of people IRL that I know/know of, whose names make me cringe.

Anything with an apostrophe makes me twitch. For instance I know someone who has relatives named Ny'Zir (Nasir) and My'Ah (Mya). Ugh.

I also dislike most of the names with a letter dropped... example: Ashly, Ryly, Lindsy, Lesly. They don't make me twitch, but they look incomplete.

When letters are replaced with other letters, which don't even make the same sound as the original letter (if that makes any sense! Lol). Look at my example above: Ny'Zir is totally NOT sounded out as Nasir. I also know an Aliyca and it is said "Ah-lee-see-ah"... I'd sound it out as "Ah-lee-sa" maybe.

Honestly MOST names where people have the explanation of "OMG IT'S SOOO UNIQUE BECAUSE I SPELLED IT LIKE *THIS* AND NOT LIKE *THIS*!!!" I immediately want to stab someone. Example: I met someone who has a son: "His name is Peighton. P-E-I-G-H-T-O-N because there are just soooo many Payton and Peytons! I wanted to make it unique!" Honey, when said outloud a Payton is a Peyton is a Peighton.

[kitchen-poet.livejournal.com]

This! I don't get how a different spelling makes a super common name less common! It just causes the child (and/or parent) to spell the name out loud all the time.

But I've heard a ton of mothers give that reason to justify the spellings of their little Aaleeighahs or whatever.

[roseofjuly.livejournal.com]

That looks like ah-lee-ca to mee!

[wolf-shadow.livejournal.com]

Random apostrophes that mean nothing other than an over affection for strange places on the keyboards. Also accented letters which don't exist in the namers language and which would not be used in the name if in a language that used them. I can live with Zs and Ys because some names are transliterations, e.g. Viktoriya could be Russian spelling out her name phonetically.

[many-winters.livejournal.com]

Least favorites, all of which for some reason are girl names: Ghennyfur, Mattisohn, Khaitlynna, and let us never forget the glory and horror of Qaiylah for 'Kayla'. God, this poor incoming generation.

That said, changing the Greenlandic name Iikayuu to simply Ikayu, which a friend of mine did, worked nicely to help the pronunciation issue since a surprising amount of people stumble when it comes to double vowels. I also liked Jessaline being changed to Jessalyn by an actress I like for the same reason. I saw a girl with a variation on Jessalyn, Jessalene, in one of my college classes. Not sure if I like that or not, but it was unique without being cringeworthy.

[politicking.livejournal.com]

My GOD I saw a "Quelie" written out and it just now dawned on me that it was probably said like Kaylee.

I actually know a Jessalynn. Her mother is "Jessica Lynn" so she just combined her own name to come up with a name for her daughter.

[politicking.livejournal.com]

Also, shoot. I cringed when I went to school with a girl who insisted on her name being spelled "Gennefer" (her name is Jennifer, as is mine.) But GHENNYFUR takes the cake. It takes the whole bakery.

[kitchen-poet.livejournal.com]

I loathe the Q for K thing!

[heyskeleton.livejournal.com]

"Qaiylah for 'Kayla"

WHOA.

And to think I hate when people add a mere H to the end of my name. *headdesk* I might start going by that now. I mean, obvious Kayla just doesn't cut it anymore.

[many-winters.livejournal.com]

I actually really like the name Kayla, but the variant spellings Facebook has give unto it makes me go cross-eyed. Qaiylah was the first time I really had to ask someone what it even was, though. It's so... off. Q does not equal cool, people!

[cremepuff.livejournal.com]

One of my coworkers is Allyssa Daniell. With the extra L and the lack of an E. I've heard her say on several occasions that she wished her mother had at least spelled Danielle properly.

Kr338tiv spellers need to think about that.

[politicking.livejournal.com]

My cousin is "Gabbriel" prn like "Gabrielle." She hates it so much, she doesn't even use her full name for anything.

[lil-cherub.livejournal.com]

My most hated creative names are the ones that are not a name at all. They are in fact a common word spelled backwards: Nevaeh, Legna, Traeh.

I also cringe when people combine two names into a new name. I think the Twilight books made up Renesmee. I have a friend who named her son Zackgary (her husband is Gary). The name Julissa bothers me too.

[kitchen-poet.livejournal.com]

I dislike creative spellings in general, but I think the double Y makes me the most annoyed. Like Ryly, Kylye, Ashylyn, Peytyn, etc. Ditto for anything with a double (or triple!) X. Braxxtyn, Jaxxyn, etc. And, tragically, I think this trend makes a lot of people view ANY name with an X in it as awful, even awesome names, like Beatrix.


For creative spellings I actually like, do less-common-but-accepted-spellings count? Like Katharine and Kathryn? I'm a Kathryn and I like it. However, that leads to the dreaded Q-for-K trend that is so terrible! I have actually met a Quatheryne. She was like "Hey! We have the same name!" No, no we don't.


ps. I prefer Oona to Una. But both are legitimate spellings, so that really isn't kryt8ve.

[owlzen.livejournal.com]

I like some names better with a K as well. Katherine being one of them! My name is Krystal, and while it was a pain growing up (I actually just go by "K"/Kay now, it's so much prettier looking than Crystal and saved me from needing to use my last name through out school. I was just Krystal with a K. (I hated my name growing up and wanted to change it sooo bad!!) Too many "CRYSTALS".
That being said, I think my least favourite creative spelling would be Chrystelle. Or here in Quebec people automatically spell my name Cristel.

[imamaryanne.livejournal.com]

I have a problem with names that end in an EE sound being spelled with an Eigh. Ashleigh, Baleigh, Haileigh, etc. I always want to prounouce eigh as -ay. So in my mind, Ashleigh is pronounced Ash-lay. I just can't wrap my head around it.

Excessive Ys also bother me, but not as much as -eigh.