Joval: A Name that Embodies Love, Strength, and Identity

“I’m Joval, and you can easily remember how to pronounce it because I’m named after my parents. My dad is Joel and my mom is Valerie,” I often introduce myself. When I introduce myself without my naming story, I get asked what my name means. “Joval is a combination of my parents’ names so really it means ‘daughter of Joel and Valerie’” and I smile.

It’s been my experience that the only people who insist on mispronouncing my name are people who hate Black people.

When you’ve been introducing yourself for the same way for what feels like forever, you get in the cadence of people saying that your name is beautiful. Today is the first time that I realized that the very first thing that my parents did for me was to bestow beauty on me with my name. And that’s an subjective fact!

Sometimes people will try to make it sound French Jjjoooval!, making almost a sh sound out of the j. Or they’ll say it sounds like a perfume. They want my name to be and sound like and mean something it’s not. But just because you like the incorrect, mispronunciation my name rolls off of your tongue does not make it better just because you like it. Nooo!

The way that my name rolls off my father’s tongue and my mother’s tongue and my tongue and my brothers’ tongues and my nephew’s tongue are quite literally the only way that matter. Anything, and I do mean anything, other than that is simply wrong. With one exception: unless, of course, tienes un accento and your mother tongue doesn’t allow you to make these sounds, to roll and twist and love this way.

The Emotional Impact of Mispronouncing My Name

My name isn’t difficult. It’s 5 letters and only 2 syllables. But some make it so.

It’s the last sentence in this poem for me. Always has been, always will be.

So no, you don’t get to rename me because you like some other pronunciation better. Not only is it silly but it’s also incredibly self-centered for you to think that you— you who I just met that you, you who I don’t know, that you get to rename me. You who don’t even know that second -e in my last name is silent. You who don’t even know what my middle name is you. You don’t even know me. Other than my first name, which you barely even know, and you continue to mispronounce. No, you don’t get to rename me. No, you don’t get to call me… Literally anything other than my first name.

“Do you have any nicknames? Can I call you Jo?”
“No, I respond with a forced smile, “I go by Joval.”

Because you don’t get to call me my nickname, the name my dear friends, or my family, or those with whom I am incredibly close and familiar. You aren’t worthy to call me anything other than Joval.

Yes, my name is beautiful. Yes, my name is unique. Yes, my name is fierce. Yes, my name means “daughter of Joel and Valerie”, but it also means child at the Most High God. It also means dynamic one. It also means powerful one. It also means sister and daughter and auntie and mother and nurse. It means lover. It means doer of hard things. My name is whatever I say it is.

My name was not chosen from a book or from a website. And sure, as a child, every time I went to Disney I would be remain steadfast in hope that maybe this would be the day that there would be a keychain or tshirt or pen or anything with my name on it. That perhaps I, too, could find a keychain with my name on it every time searching the alphabet, disappointed every single time. (There needs to be a store for people with the most unique names. No Rachels, no Kimberly’s, not even the ones with the -leys. No. You can’t come you can’t shop here! You don’t deserve this. You’re not worthy!)

Most don’t know what it’s like for people to butcher your name and your culture and your heritage and all of who you are simply because they hate you. Simply because they don’t believe that you are worthy of being known.

People with unique names have unique stories. Okay, all people with all names have unique stories. But my story is especially unique because every time I’ve had to say “Hi, my name is Joval”, so many times when I share how I got my name people still, still will not listen to understand or hold it dear or close to their heart. What more can I tell you other than my name is quite literally Joval. Two syllables. It sounds exactly how it is spelled. And yet even with my naming story, you are committed to misunderstand, to not knowing.

Before working clinically as a registered nurse, I had this really big fear that I should take a new name or that I should go by J or Jo or literally anything else because I don’t want people to know me but not know how to pronounce my name. Because hearing J-oval is like a thousand nails on a chalkboard.

A name tells a story and mine most especially. I’m really proud that I get to use my full first name. And honestly, I have to use my name at work. I work with a J and a Jo and a Vee and a Val . Unless I wanted to be the Black Jo or The Female J, and who wants that? There was nothing left other than L and who wants to go by the last letter of their first name?

Embracing My Name: Personal & Professional Growth

So at work, I go by Joval. I rarely do the name story with my clients because sometimes it feels too personal, so I repeat my name or I spell it for my clients. And each and every one of my clients— 100%, 10/10, alladem have remembered my name and the correct, accurate, precise pronunciation.

And not only do they remember my name, but they pronounce it correctly, too! And 100% of my clients who don’t know how to pronounce my name correctly, of which there have been all of 5, they’ll just say, “Hey, how do you say your name again?” Or when I introduce myself to them they’ll immediately offer “I’m so sorry, I’m terrible with names. How do you spell it?” And later, a sweet “I’m so sorry, can you tell me your name again?”

There’s this special love that exists in this sacred space where I work.

Not for anything else other than because I know these people see me in a way that other people do not. I know that my clients really do see me and they respect me and they even tell me they love me!

They might be at a low or at their lowest, but the reality is my clients know me. They know the truth of me. They see the truth of me even when they can’t see the truth of themselves because sometimes it’s easier to see something in someone else than to examine yourself. Oftentimes, it’s easier to examine someone else than it is to examine yourself.

That’s why you’ll see time and time again, people will rather criticize other people and tear them apart and tear them down than do the introspective work. Then say who am I? Who am I really? Who do I want to be?

How do other people see me that work? They see me as brave, that is bold, that is courageous. But it’s easy to criticize. It’s easy to complain, it’s easy to lament. It’s easy to condemn.

My fear was averted in this space where I work which I now know is sacred. I want to say I condemn the person who insists on calling me anything but Joval simply because they can’t remember my name because in now 7+ months time since I’ve been at this job, 100% of my clients say my name correctly time and time and time and time and time again, including at 4 am when I wake them up from their sweet sleep to do their assessment and my final question is “Who Am I?”

And without hesitation, without pause, my name rolls off their tongue like it rolls of my own and I’ll even get “my favorite nurse” or “my angel”.

A Prayer for Identity and Vision

God, thank You for the clarity, purpose, and vision You’ve bestowed upon me in this sacred space. Thank You for the strength to choose faith over fear, and for the courage to embrace my true identity. Lord, I am grateful that in this place, my clients see me as I am, and that they recognize the truth of my name and my spirit. May we all learn to see each other as You see us, with love, respect, and understanding. Help us continue to honor each other’s identities, acknowledging the beauty and strength that each name and story carries. Guide us to see beyond the surface, to the heart of who we truly are, created in Your image and likeness. Thank You for this sacred space where I am seen and respected. Let it continue to be a place of healing and maturing, where faith triumphs over fear, and where our true selves are recognized, acknowledged, honored, celebrated. In Your holy name, I pray. Amen. And so it is.