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Feeling uncomfortable with my name

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Jo_B1_Kenobi
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18 Aug 2016, 9:27 am

LittleLu wrote:
This is why I go by Lu. XD

My birth name is Hailey, but it stresses me out when I hear it, mostly for gender-related reasons. I feel androgynous, and Hailey is a cute, feminine name. I don't mind cute, but it has a lot of previous attachment to it that I feel uncomfortable with, namely because it's the name everyone knows me by in my old church community where I was forced to wear very feminine dresses and act in a certain way. Seeing as how I hate that community now and have broken away from it, I no longer feel comfortable holding that name or hearing people use it.

Anyone here actually legally changed their name because they've been so uncomfortable with it?


Yup, I legally changed my middle name to Joanne. I was uncomfortable with both my forenames but I didn't want to upset my parents so I only changed my middle name legally, but now I go by that name and not my first name (except at home - again I don't want my folks to feel bad.) I did it by deel poll and then had to change my passport, drivers Licence, bank accounts, everything. It took a few months but I am SO happy with my new name. It's been 3 years now since I did it and I have never regretted it. The new name kind of marks a big change in my life - when I came to faith, which made me feel whole inside and OK with myself. My new name feels like who I am whereas when family use my old name I feel like their addressing someone who isn't really there anymore. I don't mind though if it helps them feel OK.



(Edit - grammatical mistake corrected.)


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LittleLu
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18 Aug 2016, 9:30 am

kraftiekortie wrote:
For what it's worth, Hailey is actually a pretty gender-neutral sort of name.

I'm wondering if it, through "evolution," somehow acquired a "feminine reputation," like "Ashley" did. Ashley was meant to be gender-neutral, too. All it means is something like a "clearing in an ash-tree forest."

This is very true. I think over time Hailey has gotten pretty feminine. For my reasoning though, it's because it has very church-y aspects to it that I wish to leave behind. The only "Hailey/Haley/Hailee/Haylee" I know who is a boy is the actor Haley Joel Osment.

And with all those variations of spelling, it's really unsurprising how much my name is misspelled, even on legal forms, lol. That, and its meaning is quite literally "field/clearing of hay." <__>


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EzraS
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18 Aug 2016, 8:15 pm

kraftiekortie wrote:
Yep....as Lindsay Nelson, past Mets announcer used to say, we used to go to "Beautiful Shea Stadium."


Everyone in my family calls me Shea.



TheSilentOne
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19 Aug 2016, 1:46 pm

LittleLu wrote:
This is why I go by Lu. XD

My birth name is Hailey, but it stresses me out when I hear it, mostly for gender-related reasons. I feel androgynous, and Hailey is a cute, feminine name. I don't mind cute, but it has a lot of previous attachment to it that I feel uncomfortable with, namely because it's the name everyone knows me by in my old church community where I was forced to wear very feminine dresses and act in a certain way. Seeing as how I hate that community now and have broken away from it, I no longer feel comfortable holding that name or hearing people use it.

Anyone here actually legally changed their name because they've been so uncomfortable with it?


I'm in the process of legally changing it. As I understand, it is going to be a long and tedious process, because of things like my license and credit cards. There are still some people who call me by my birth name, but to my friends and people at school, I'm Gwen. I hate being called by my birth name, because I can't say it properly and then I start to feel really awful and embarrassed.


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north404
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20 Aug 2016, 11:08 am

saxgeek wrote:
I used to hate my name, but now I'm okay with it. I have a hard time addressing people by their names, though. It feels very uncomfortable for me to call out someone's name to get their attention, so I normally just get in front of them and say what I'm going to say.


Same here. I actually do the same thing with my parents too; I haven't addressed them as Mom/Dad since I was maybe 11 or 12, and I can tell it kinda hurts their feelings, but I have trouble doing it. It just makes me feel uncomfortable for whatever reason.



north404
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20 Aug 2016, 11:17 am

I like my name, but not on me.

Also, I grew up sort of resenting my culture (doing ok now), so whenever I had to introduce myself I'd pronounce it differently (still feeling uncomfortable about it, but to a lesser extent). My family would pronounce it correctly and I don't mind that. But in school, when say a TA happens to be the same background as I and would correctly pronounce it during roll call, I'd be slightly annoyed but wouldn't bother correcting them to my preference.