YOU gave your kid a perfectly good name, so why the unimaginative nickname that makes you sound like you’re off Eastenders? Here are some more to demean your child with.

Princess

The only respectable reason for calling your daughter ‘Princess’ is if you’re playing an unconvincing hard man in Eastenders. Unless that’s her actual name of course, in which case: poor kid. Actually it sounds like you got the idea from a Disney film, so your kid probably narrowly escaped being given the actual name Elsa. Or just ‘Frozen’.

Chief

Are you trying to instil self-confidence in all of your children by bestowing upon them a nickname that calls to mind a fearless leader? Or is the reality that you have a large brood and can’t confidently remember all their names so you’ve adopted this one-size-fits-all approach?

Dude

You spent the nine months leading up to the birth of your precious child making lists of names for this beautiful, unique soul. But now you just call them ‘Dude’. What was the point? Also it carries the risk of nominatively programming them to become a generic American frat bro teenager, so don’t be surprised if you find them attempting to have sex with a Mr Kipling bramley apple pie.

Stinker

You start calling your child this when he’s a baby and you’re forever changing nappies. It’s funny and cute, in your sleep-deprived mind. However, fast forward 12 years and it just suggests he does actually smell. Also you just called him it when his new secondary school mates came over and you’ve just ruined his teenage years. Well done.

Munchkin

You think this is a sweet name. Wait till your child sees The Wizard of Oz and realises you associate them with a bunch of creepy, strange-haired, helium-voiced oddballs. At a young age they may even believe you’re their adoptive parents and they rightly belong in the land of Oz. Maybe should have just called him Gareth so he doesn’t need counselling in later life to ‘find out who he is’.