[23/f] My boyfriend [23/m] wants to go by a different name. I want to support him on this, but it feels wildly uncomfortable.

As with everything in relationships though, I feel like there’s a way to compromise. If he goes by Yehuda in general that’s probably fine, my biggest discomfort is how I’m going to call him.

Maybe this will make a little more sense: In Judaism, we have a concept that a person can have multiple names that represent different attributes about the person. Even G-d Himself has like 72 names and different prayers use different names to evoke different aspects of His character - compassionate, stern, mystical etc. it’s a little difficult to fully explain but you get the general idea.

This said, Yehuda is an important aspect of my boyfriend and I’d even arguably say it hits more of his core being than Jeremy does (which once again is why I’m confused that this isn’t even his main reason for switching!). If anything, Jeremy to me feels like his pet name to begin with, on some level, and to me it represents his lighthearted goofy fun side which is the side I feel I spiritually connect most strongly to (even though I also see value in his serious and practical side). So, for me to not have a pet name to refer to him by, one that we’d both love, feels like I can’t connect as easily to that aspect of his identity anymore. Which is difficult because I want us to connect on a soul-to-soul level. And to be really dead honest here I’m TERRIFIED that I’ll never fully connect to him as Yehuda and maybe this means our souls don’t fully connect - and maybe they never did in the first place? Who knows. You might call this overthinking, but it’s all based on Jewish philosophy/mysticism which to us is spiritually and culturally important. Especially to me (which he knows). It’s difficult to separate this situation from the “Jewish” aspect for many reasons, both spiritual and cultural.

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