i was going to add something else to this but instead i got to thinking and i was like huh. what could you use.
in most languages the word for āmotherā usually starts with an M, because phonetically [m] is one of the easiest sounds for a newborn to make when they start babbling, and mothers tend to be the one most around the child. so in my mind that crosses M off the list, because itās automatically associated with a feminine figure
similarly, āfatherā tends to start with D, T, P, or B. (phonetically these sounds are very close together; [p, b] and [d, t] are all only different because of being voiced or unvoiced.) these are also phonetically easy letters and ones kids pick up on earlier.
now the hard sounds for kids are the following: [ɹ, dĶ”Ź, tŹ, Īø, Ć°] or in normal speak: the English R, the ājā or ādgeā sound in ājudge,ā the āthā sound in āthighā and the āthā sound in āthe.ā and we donāt want kids unable to say their parentās name for years, so those are also off the list.
additionally, itās easiest for young kids to just repeat the same sound twice rather than figuring out the tongue gymnastics of putting different sounds together, which is why kids will say Ma-Ma or Da-Da and not Ma-Mo or Da-Po. and weāll want to stick with low back vowels like āahā and avoid ones like the hard āiā or āee.ā
so what does that leave us? when we want a sound kids can learn easily and early but donāt want to just put a funky spin on āmamaā or ādadaā?
my suggestions: G, K, W, L. i personally lean towards W and L. theyāre called liquids, since theyāre the consonants that kind of arenāt consonants, and kids (and ESL learners) will tend to swap out the English R for a W or L until they can learn the R.
if i ever have a child, theyāll start calling me Wawa. then when they get older, theyāll call me Wala, or maybe even Wally.
and then, once theyāre finally phonetically developed, they can call me by my true title as their nonbinary guardian for their 18+ years:
