How do you address your spouse in your family?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Allegra
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it is not how that i had understand the question of allegra:
how do you speak of your spouse in front of your children?
 
Not specific to in front of children, just in general. It seems some people address their spouse differently in front of their children than when they are with adults or alone.
 
so my answer in the poll is incorrect

in front of kids, it is “daddy”
with other family members or friends it is by his first name
with stranger, “my husband”

i find your question too large for a poll
 
“Give the stick to your dad”.

“Your dad and I are going out to dinner”
 
Exactly the same as I do with my wife. Mummy if our daughter is involved in the conversation, dear or darling if she is not. Talking to someone else I refer to her by her Christian Name
 
I always called my husband Bear, or a permutation thereof. He was large and bearlike. He gave me a matching nickname that rhymed with Bear, or a permutation thereof.
 
Now that I think about it, I don’t really directly call my wife “Mommy”, but only when I’m referring to her to the kids. For example, “Go ask Mom.” 😝

When talking to her, I always call her by name or by whatever nickname pops in my head at the moment: Honey, Dear, Sweetie, Sugar-Pie-Honey-Bunch, etc., etc. And that’s even when the kids are in the room.
 
My mom was oldest of many children, so, she was very used to caring for babies when I came along. Of course, she was so accustomed to being the big sis that she would say “Jane has you. Come to Jane!! Oh, you know Jane loves you!!” to me.

As life went on, we grew up, using her first name was just something that came natural, we all slip between calling her by her first name and by mom. The grandkids and great grands do “Grandma Firstname”.
 
Tis_Bearself said:
I’ve known parents who made a big point of wanting to be their children’s friend rather than parent, who pushed the first name thing really hard. It was weird.
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I too find it really disconcerting when children, no matter how old, refer to their parents’ by their first name. It is just weird and disrespectful to me. I was talking with my neighbor’s son the other week (he is my age), and he kept referring to his dad by his first name. It threw me for a loop and I started wondering if I misheard their relationship for a sec. it seems to me that many children who call their parents by their first name come from divorced households and the parent starts being a “buddy” to the kid as a substitute adult relationship. That is just my amateur psychoanalytics though.

I have some cousins who often refer to their father, my uncle by blood, by his first name when poking fun at him or generally being condescending. It always rubbed me the wrong way. My uncle’s marriage ended in a rather ugly and avoidable divorce and it turned out that lack of respect for him in the home was a big contributing factor to this. I always wondered if my cousins’ behavior was informed by how their mother acted towards him in front of them.
 
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