Wohube

Every once in a while, Martha, we do a show about family words.

We talk about the kind of language that you use in your house.

You’ve never heard anyone else use it before.

Oh, yeah.

Bob in Allen, Texas, was one of many who wrote with some of his family language.

He said that when he and his wife were expecting a child, they called it Wohube.

I’m not sure how to pronounce it, but he spelled it W-O-H-U-B-E.

And it’s a blend of the words, wonderful human being.

And he says they now have two woohoobs or woohoobies.

And so this is interesting because this goes on a list that I’ve been keeping.

Lists of names for unborn children.

You’ve heard me say this before.

Nom de fetus.

Like nom de plume or nom de guerre.

How about nom de womb?

Nom de womb works.

But nom de fetus is something I picked up along the way.

Somebody else is using it.

A lot of people use things like bump or peanut.

Those are pretty predictable.

In my house, we subscribe to the Baby Center newsletter.

What they do is if you tell them the due date of the baby, they’ll send you email along the way saying, well, your baby is about here in the development stage.

And they compare it size to food.

So they’ll say it’s the size of a sesame seed or a plum.

And so we would often call my son before he was born a sesame seed or a plum or a lentil.

Now he’s a watermelon.

Well, he was born before we could get up to the watermelon size.

Thank goodness.

Anyway, I was glad to have from Bob in Allen, Texas, this one more term to add to my list of nomes de fetus.

Wohooby.

Wohooby.

I believe wohooby sounds better, doesn’t it?

W-O-H-U-B-E.

It does.

It sounds like it’s from some exotic language.

We’d love to hear about your exotic family language, the things you say to your mother and your father and your children, but nowhere else.

Give us a call, 1-877-929-9673, or put it in an email to words@waywordradio.org.