When your last name is Yiddish slang for "penis," school can be a living hell. Kids call you Schmuck. Teachers call you Schmuck. And whether they say it with respect or disdain, there's no denying a Schmuck is a Schmuck.
For an 18-year-old journalism student born as Frank Schmuck, things got so bad in grade school that instructors going through roll call would simply yell "Schmuck!"
"I had no way to escape that label, so I acted out," he says, "and that just furthered my identity as the schmuck of the school."
Although his parents told him to turn the other cheek, the Schmucks had problems of their own. Both were professionals in the medical industry in Asheville, N.C., and "people couldn't take them seriously."
Finally, when Schmuck junior was 13, the family of three went before a judge to have their surname changed to Chapman, his mother's maiden name.
It was a life-changing decision, according to their son, Joseph Chapman, who seized the opportunity to choose a new first name too.
"Now my parents and I love just sitting back and talking about all the things we experienced with such a terrible last name," he says. "It's just a funny story now."
Unlike ill-conceived given names, such as Sage Moonblood (son of Sylvester Stallone) and Blue Angel (daughter of U2's The Edge), parents aren't to blame for embarrassing last names.
Nevertheless, it's up to parents to "inoculate" their kids against schoolyard taunts, psychologists say.
And in cases such as Stalker, Wardropper or Molesti, parents may want to discourage children from living up to the family name.
That said, having a doozer of a surname may not be as bad as it sounds.
According to researchers, there is no evidence that unfortunate surnames, whose meanings are subjective, are associated with a person's success in life.
Unfortunate last names haven't stopped urologist Richard (Dick) Chopp from performing vasectomies in Austin, Tex., or Opheera McDoom from becoming a harbinger of news - mostly bad - as a Reuters correspondent in Sudan. And despite his shocking patronymic, Reinhardt Adolfo Fuck is a respected geologist at the University of Brasilia (colleagues call him Dr. Fuck).
Even so, depending on cultural context, a last name with negative connotations may have some influence on a person's character, according to Cleveland Evans, a psychologist at Bellevue University in Nebraska and a past president of the American Name Society.
A surname can be anxiety inducing or a source of pride, he notes, "depending on the individual's personality and exactly how their own parents and family reacted to it."
When your last name is synonymous with "toilet," you develop a sense of humour, says Chris Crapper of Vancouver.
A distant relative of Thomas Crapper, legendary plumber for English royalty, he grew up in the small town of Meaford, Ont., where his father became mayor and the name was well known. Only in university was he subjected to potty jokes, he says, adding that he took them in stride.
A self-employed facilitator in business planning, he points out the merits of the Crapper name: "Nobody forgets you."
Still, he acknowledges, neither he nor his two brothers convinced their brides to become "Mrs. Crapper."
When a surname has crass undertones, parents shouldn't get too creative with first names, Dr. Evans says. "Those are the kids that you name Emily and Aiden and Jacob and Sophia."
Children with vulgar-sounding family names, such as Schitt or Mycock, should be coached on how to deal with teasing, he adds.
"Make sure that the child knows what the name means in the original culture," Dr. Evans says. If parents themselves have pride in the name, "they can probably transmit that to their kids."
David Hymen, a 24-year-old law student in Chicago, says his parents advised him to ignore any mockery of their Eastern European name, derived from Hymovich.
Before the first or second grade, few kids his age knew what "hymen" meant, he says, "until my wonderful camp counsellors told them."
Soon enough, he learned to deflect putdowns of his name with a joke, a skill he describes as "character-building."
Down the road, he says, his children will be Hymens too. "It's a good conversation starter."
Changing a family name is a drastic measure, according to Dr. Evans, and should be considered only if it becomes an unbearable social handicap.
Joseph Chapman said his grandparents were offended when he and his parents gave up Schmuck. "They thought we were wimping out."
But he credits the name change with improving his behaviour in school and increasing his confidence in meeting people.
While he has no regrets, Mr. Chapman urges others with undesirable surnames to stick with them and take the punches as they come, "unless it interferes with your life."