Say it right or don’t say it at all

I LOVE my name. I really do.

My mom tells me all the time after I was born, my dad wanted to name me Eliza after his grandma, but my mom thought she was evil (more like super mean) and she wasn’t going to name her daughter after her. Then she found out that my great grandfather’s mother had the same name so she agreed to it.

Now I love my name for multiple reasons.

Because I’m named after two women on each side of my family.

I feel like it’s something you don’t hear every day.

My name is super easy to pronounce. You say it just like it’s spelled. EEE-lye-zah. Easy.

I’ve heard Aliza, Elisa, Elisa, Alyssa, Elijah and any other way you can say it incorrectly.

This semester, I have a professor who on a weekly basis, says my name wrong. Then today she said it right for the first time since last semester (when I was in her class) and was surprised that she knew how to say it correctly. Now my expectation for her is to always say it right.

Most of the time, I will correct someone when they say my name wrong. Mostly because you aren’t going to call me something that isn’t my name and expect me to answer.

Names are super important to me. I call almost everyone by what their mom calls them or their government first name. If you go by Charlie and your name is Charles, I’m calling you Charles. There are a few exceptions; I have a friend named Babatunde and I call him Tunde for short. I also have a friend named Oluwatobiloba and call her Tobi for short. But I can’t confidently say their full names correctly and they told me to call them by their shorter names.

My name isn’t that hard. I really don’t know what it means even though I’m sure I could look it up. I asked my mom once and she never gave me an answer.

I may go by a variation of my name, but at the end of the day, everyone who knows me knows until you can say Eliza correctly, you can’t call me anything else.

Love your name and don’t let anyone call you anything different.

✌🏾