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My best friend in high school was a Beckie. But now that she’s all grown up she goes by Rebecca. She won’t change back. It’s very difficult for me.
We also have many friends and readers here at LRS named Rebecca. Or Bek. Or Beckie. So I’ve been wondering… If your name was or IS Rebecca (or Rebekah), what would you go by? As always, leave a comment if you’re a bigger thinker (or speller) than this small poll can contain, so others can enjoy your creativity.
Loading ...My parents named me Rebecca, but from the time I was born, my mom called me Becca. I’m told that my grandma called me Becky once, when I was very young. My mother instantly corrected her MIL, “Becca, not Becky.” So other than that one, I’ve been called every one of these variations at some point in my life.
When I first moved here to Texas the job I had lined up fell through, so I signed up with a temp agency. I arrived at the first job they arranged for me, and my supervisor was calling me Rebecca, since that’s what was on the paperwork. I knew the job would just be for a couple of weeks, so I didn’t bother correcting him. Well, they offered me a permanent position and I ended up working there for over three years, until I became a SAHM. I’m still friends with many of those former coworkers, and they all still call me Rebecca.
I’m not much of a nickname person. So I’d choose Rebekah. I’m boring like that.
Beckster, Beckenheimer, BeckieBoo, The R to the E to the Becca…. something along those lines…
When I was born my parents named me Cynthia Nicole, and decided to call me Nicole.
It traumatized me. WHen I got to kindergarten they were all freaked out and said that Cynthia was my name and I had to write it on my papers.
I was 4 years old. I couldn’t spell Cynthia.
My kids are William, Lucy, Rachel, Harrison, Ella, and Molly.
No nicknames, no being called by their middle names.
No trauma. (at least no name trauma, but with 4 of them being teenagers, we have plenty of other trauma and drama!)
I come from a long line of nicknamers. I have relatives whose “real” names I have to think a bit to come up with. These are sometimes the logical Rebecca to Becky or Becca or William to Bill, but I have an Uncle Mike whose name is Rulon, so it is no wonder that my children are called all kinds of things and that’s fine with me. My given name is Angela and truly, only business associates and telemarketers call me that. But as for the Rebecca debate, I know a woman who now goes by Rebecca, but who (inexplicably to me) apparently went by “Reebie” in college and to all those college friends, I guess she still is. As much as I love nicknames, that one would be hard for me to swallow.
I grew up being called Becky and still go by it with family and friends. At work though, I go by Rebecca–I just feel it is more professional. Plus, if someone calls asking for Rebecca, I generally know it is work related or someone who does not know me well.
Rebecca was the second most popular name the year I was born (after Jennifer). At BYU one year there were three Beckys in my apartment. Talk about confusing.
As you can tell by my user name I still go by Becky, but I do live a double life. I sign all documents Rebecca, all the doctors call me Rebecca, even my monkeys daily notebook checks for school get an R Summers. But if you’re on a personal level with me it’s Becky. I’ll go by anything really.
My cousin, Rebecca, has always gone by “Rebby”. It started when she was a baby and just stuck. I can’t imagine her as anything else, even though she’s now in her late thirties.
I happen to be the Beckie / Rebecca that is referred to in this poll. I’ve been Becca since the day I was born and Rebecca when I was being introduced by my parents, or in trouble. When my family moved me and my siblings from a private school to a public school I took the opportunity to “hippify” myself and introduced myself to my new classmates as Beckie, with an “ie”. I stole my very cool name from my neighbor Beckie Hinckley who was the coolest girl I knew.
All growing up I was only Beckie to the individuals I went to school with, my church friends and family still called me Becca or Rebecca. At one point I tried to get my family to call me Elyse, my middle name, but it didn’t really fly. I blog under the name Alice because I’m obsessed with Alice in Wonderland.
I don’t know why I’ve had an obsession with changing my name my entire life. But When I was in junior high and high school I felt more like a Beckie, when I was participating in Piano competitions, Elyse sounded more like a piano playing name and now that I’m in my mid 30s and wearing a suit 5 days a week Rebecca seems to get a bit more respect.
Rachel, you can call me whatever you would like! Who knows, in five years I might change my name again, why not?
My name is Rebecca. I introduce myself as Rebecca and most people call me that. I do however go by Becca with close friends. NEVER Becky though. I think that you are either a Becca or a Becky…never both. Although my husband’s grandma still calls me Becky after I’ve corrected her multiple times. Go figure.
My middle name is Rebekah and I think it looks a lot prettier than just Becky or Bekah (the latter just looks incomplete). I went through a phase in elementary school asking people to call me Rebekah, and that didn’t last very long. I had a friend in college that called me Hannah Reb, and that’s as close as it has come to be connected to my first name.
I’m just going to try and avoid naming any of my kids nickname-able names to solve that dilemma.
I have a sister who’s a Becky. She tried for a while to get us to call her Rebecca, but gave up after a while. Usually we call her Beck or the Beckster. And for a while she was Becky Barfer. Don’t ask.
My name is Beverly–NOT BEV! I hate to be called that and have only allowed a few people to get away with it. I call my husband by his middle name Bruce a lot and our oldest child picked that up and called him Bruce Daddy for a while. I also call him George and our son Little George, even though neither one is named George. My FIL’s name was Clayton and we named our son after him, but called him Clay. When my FIL passed away, Clay wanted to become Clayton. That was in 1994 and I still can’t make the change. But I try because it means a lot to him.
I have the reverse problem. My little sister’s name is Cynthia. Our family always referred to her as Cynthia. Once she started school the problem started - they called her Cindy, which she prefers. I still call her Cynthia much to her dismay because that’s who she is to me. When introducing her to people I have to remind myself to use “Cindy” or else I’m in big trouble!
This is so funny - an old friend just requested to be my friend on Facebook and her name was “Becky married name”. I was so confused - I couldn’t figure out who it was. That’s because I always knew her as Rebecca maiden name. It took me a few minutes, but I got it all cleared up.
My nickname, amylouwho, was given to me by my grandma when I was no more than 2. Seriously! I love it, because I love her. But no one really calls me that except my aunts and uncles who think they are so funny.
My parents were originally going to call me Rebecca and use Becky. In the olden days (ahem)that was common. Becca is more “in” now. But my other siblings insisted it be a K name, like both my brothers. Unfortunately, my sister who is the oldest, got stuck with a V name that she hates. There was only one other child born after me and she’s got a K name, too.
It is annoying when people ask me (Jacqueline) if I want to be called Jacqueline or Jackie. I tell them Jacqueline and they say “o.k., Jackie”. I happen to think Jacqueline is a beautiful name and my mother must have thought so too because she named me that. What is so difficult?
I am Bek online but grew up as Becca. When I was in kindergarten there were THREE of us in our class, one became Becky, one stayed Rebecca and one (me) became Becca. There you have it. People who knew me in my youth still call me Becca but when I went to college I changed it to Rebecca (after one horrifying stint in 7th grade where I tried to change it back but wanted to spell it ReBecca –I know–needless to say, it didn’t last long).
Ironically, since that time, I can’t think of the last time that I met someone with my name! How weird is that. We are a TOTAL nickname family (not on purpose). Our kids are called Lulu, Cubby, Nosi and Ace. None of these are their given names but they are the names they respond to. Ooops.
I hope we don’t traumatize our kids.
P.S. I don’t care what people call me. I introduce myself as Rebecca, but as I have started meeting blog friends, I get called Bek a lot… 
Oh, I get called Reba, Erbecca (by Lisa’s husband) and used RJ for my work name (that way I always knew if someone was calling me to pick up a shift). My dad used to call me Bee-ca-ca (or, when my sisters were feeling mean, Bee poop…). SO, you could say we were a nick name family. I had forgotten all about that till this post….
My given name is Rebecca, but I was called Becky until I was five. I then decided that I wasn’t a Becky, I was a Becca. Then I just had to convince everyone around me. The only person I’d let call me Becky was my Grandpa. It amazes me when people still assume that because my name is Rebecca they can call me Becky. Oh, well.
Reb3ecca, Beckie, Rebecca, I love you. And I love that you change your name according to the needs at hand. I am a Rachel with NO MIDDLE NAME (which has inflicted plenty of deprivation issues) so I never had the luxury. Does it make you happy or sad that I think about you and your name enough to poll about it?
I was born Rebecca, grew up being Becci (unless in trouble then it was Rebecca or if it big trouble Rebecca Elizabeth) when I hit my mid 20’s I took up using Bec, and then when I lived in London people took to calling me Becs. Funnily enough I’m now back to Becci sometimes affectionally called Becciboo!
I’m not a Rebecca. But if I were, I think I’d go by Rebecca. My family would call me every variation of the name, probably Becks most often. But something about the full name just really appeals to me.
My name is Rebecca but I’ve always been called Rebbie. My sister’s name is Elizabeth but she’s always been Buffie. We just tell people that our parents were hippies.
I was born Alesha but my mum always called me Ali (i’ve never understood why it’s spelt that way). I was Alesha until my last year of primary school when someone overheard my mum call me Ali, since then people have called me Ali and somewhere along the line i decided i hated the name Alesha. People generally just call me Ali, except my dad’s side of my family who i haven’t really spent much time with growing up. Some people, upon meeting me, assume my name is Alison, I even had a teacher who insisted on calling me little Alison ALL the time, no matter how many times i told her Ali wasn’t even short for Alison.
Oh, i’m also a serial nicknamer. My husband’s name is Nicolas but i call him Nic, Nicklby, Pokolas, and Pickle with probably a few more thrown in now and then. My children are Xanthe, Olorin and Imogen but Xanthe also gets called Munchkin, Munchy, Lumpy and occasionally munchylumpkin. Olorin is more commonly known as Ollie, but I also call him Ol, Ol bol, bubbaloo, and doodlebug. Imogen is mostly called Immy, she’s only 12 weeks so i’ve yet to come up with as many as the others, i tried out button, but that didn’t seem to fit.
And if my name was Rebecca, I’d go for Bec or Bex, maybe I just like 3 letter names?
My given name is Rebecca, but I have grown up as Becky. During my teenage years, in search for identity, I tried several other variations: Becca, Rebecca, Rebster, etc. None of them worked. I will always be Becky. The meanings are similar, but I have seen a couple of name dictionaries that give them a slight difference. Email me if you’re curious as to what those are.
P.S. My family calls me the nickname queen.
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Emily says: One of the greatest thrills of my life was when I was editing Elder Holland's latest book (Broken Things to Mend; have you seen it? It's SO GOOD) and I had to take something up to his office and his secretary called in the open door, "Emily is here," and he called back, "Oh, come on in, Em!" A nickname can be such an intimate validation of a person as a friend; whether he really meant it that way or not, it was how it made me feel.