Referring to One’s Spouse as Mom or Dad

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hi, this is Ashley. I’m calling from Tallahassee, Florida.

Hello, Ashley. Welcome to the program. What’s up?

Thank you. So I’m calling because I was hanging out with a group of friends, most of whom were parents, and my husband and daughter were there as well.

And I called out to my husband to ask him for something, and I addressed him as dad.

And one of my friends asked me, did you just call your husband dad?

She seemed a little mortified that I’d done this.

So I said, I did.

And I asked her, what do you call your husband?

And she said she calls her husband by his name.

So we started asking her on the friend circle.

And most of the folks said they referred to their partner as either mom or dad when they were talking to their kids, like go ask dad or go ask mom.

But when they talked directly to their partner, they used their actual name.

So I was just calling because I was wondering why folks do this and if it’s odd that folks do this or if it’s a regional thing and trying to get kind of a better understanding.

Oh, interesting.

So were you calling him dad in front of your kids, your kids?

Yes. So my daughter was nearby, but then later when I talked to my husband about this, we realized that we were calling each other mom and dad even when our child wasn’t in proximity to us.

Okay. So he calls you mom and you call him dad.

Yes. And I will say that I have noticed, this was maybe like five years ago, that recently we don’t do this as much anymore.

We more call each other by like our nicknames or like our pet names.

So I don’t know if that’s because my friend said something and I was embarrassed or if it’s just our child is out of the house more because she’s going to public school or not really sure what the change was there.

I’m surprised that more of them didn’t do it, too.

Yeah, honestly. I mean, I mean, it’s a lovely honorific, right?

Well, yeah, you know, it’s been a few years since we talked about this, but I don’t think my opinion on this has changed because we we do this in my house.

I call my wife Mama, even when my son’s not around.

Sometimes I’ll call her Sarah.

But the kind of thing is, it’s like there are two people in the world that get to call her Mama, her son and her husband, because she is the only Mama in the house.

And she’s the one that made me a father.

So it’s for me, it’s a privilege to call her that.

And you’ve been calling her that for 18 years.

Yeah, 18 years. Yeah. So a very long time. So it’s a term of endearment.

And it is a little weird. So in public, I don’t call her mama because who knows who will turn around, you know.

So, Martha, you hit on the right thing there, I think. It’s a privileged name.

Yeah, a privileged name. That’s a good way to put it.

Was there an element of teaching your daughter who’s who? I mean, did it start out that way?

Yeah, I’m thinking that’s probably what it was, especially since she was homeschooled for most of her life and we were all just together all the time.

Yeah, so there is a lot of that going on.

So you’ll say, go ask mommy or daddy will help you.

And there’s also this kind of reinforcing the roles.

Like you mentioned very importantly, I think, that it’s about is the child present?

If the child is present, addressing him as dad or daddy will make a lot of sense to a lot of people because it’s within the context of the child understanding.

And it’s a habit you form very early before you’re even sure that the child understands.

Before the child even speaks, you start using these names for each other because you’re teaching.

And this is a habit maybe that’s hard to break once they do understand and once they do start speaking.

So I think that Grant and I agree that it’s a pretty individual thing.

It’s not like there’s a regional component to this.

It’s not generational either.

We find this mentioned in Charles Dickens’ work as far back as the 1850s.

Oh, wow.

I do have a linguistics term for you if you want it.

And some cultures, parents’ names are changed when their child is born.

So they become, you know, like my son’s name is Guthrie.

So I would then be called Guthrie’s dad and that would be my new name.

But using your husband, instead of using his name and calling him dad or daddy, is a kind of technonomy, as it’s known, where he becomes referred to by his relationship to the child.

T-E-K-N-O-N-Y-M-Y, technonomy.

So it recognizes him as a parent.

And it’s a form of respectful address.

Yeah, so you can feel just fine about doing that.

I’m interested that you seem to be doing it a little bit less now that your daughter’s out of the house more.

So you’ll have to check back with us when she’s of driving age or something and let us know.

Yes, for sure.

Well, thank you so much.

I love all you had to say about that.

Just hearing what you had to say made me feel a little emotional.

So I love that so much.

Yeah, parenting is just all about emotions, isn’t it?

Everything.

I feel like being a parent expanded my emotional palate by like a thousand percent.

Yes, totally agree.

All right.

Well, Ashley, take care of yourself and give everyone, give dad and the little ones a squeeze for us.

All right.

Yes.

Thank you so much.

I appreciate you both.

All right.

Bye-bye.

Thanks, Ashley.

Take care.

Thank you.

Bye-bye.