How did you come to picking your name?

[Becks1979]

I didn't want to completely disengage from my birth name completely. I am who I am. I haven't gone anywhere. Some, if they can tweek their birth names do and thats what I did. Well, my first name any how. I can't tell you how many people compliment me on my name. Where are you from? That's a cool name! I pass 100% so for a male to have the name Beck is unsual. I took my mothers maiden name for my middle and of course I have my fathers last name. Looking forward to making some new friends here.

[ShannonD]

At first I desperately wanted to keep my initials, and after perusing some sites which listed the popularity of names by birth year, I came down to Cassandra March, then Cathleen March, and after a while I decided I didn't like that name at all. Whenever I said it, it wasn't me.
Since I'm both Irish and Danish, I decided I wanted an Irish first name, and I came across Shannon (i.e. the Shannon River). There were a couple of girls at my high school named Shannon, so it's not a terribly out of place name, and I decided I wanted my mother's maiden name as my last. It's a wonderfully long, convoluted, and hard to spell Danish name and I just adore it. It took me until I was about 8 to learn how to pronounce it correctly. 😀

[Anna++]

I've always been attracted to girls named "Emily" simply because it's a nice sounding name and I keep coming back to it after considering other names.  Now, my male name is 2 syllables but Emily is 3 so I may be willing to consider names with 2 syllables instead...  My boy name is the uncommon spelling of a common name, so another goal I set for myself is to pick a name that won't make me correct everybody's spelling all the time.

As for middle name, my male middle name is my dad's first name.  I was thinking I would keep the same pattern and go with my mom's first name.

[Trixie]

I haven't picked a name yet. I'm just not sure. "Trixie" is not my intended future name (though I do really like it).

I'm very indecisive. I don't know HOW I'm going to end up actually settling on a name.

[Embrace]

I haven't picked a name yet. I'm just not sure. "Trixie" is not my intended future name (though I do really like it).

I'm very indecisive. I don't know HOW I'm going to end up actually settling on a name.

I'm in the same boat.  I've been using Tammy for a while- I chose it as a play on my legal name and I've always been partial to it.  It's intended to be short for Tamara and is definitely in the running, but there are a few and I don't know how I'll ever decide!

I'm not out to my mom yet, but I really liked the idea mentioned of asking her what (if any) names she had considered had I been born a girl.

[Ventisia]

"Kris" is a shortened version of my legal first name. It's pretty androgynous, so I can use it without getting any weird looks/questions even with people I'm not outed to.

[Kayla]

I picked out my name in an odd sort of way. I wanted to go with a femmier version of my birth name, but I couldn't find a good one since my birth name started with a "J." Jennifer or Jessica would be weird, since I had too many friends named Jennifer or Jessica. All the other names seemed so plain; Jane, Jolene, Jo, and I just didn't like them. So I was like "what comes after 'J'? 'K.' Kayla.... I like it."

I found out later, though before coming out, that it was Hebrew for "purity" and liked it even more, feeling it was a good metaphor for transitioning.

[~RoadToTrista~]

I just did, it's been in my head for years. I didn't think it out nor did I choose it randomly, it just came. I've already known for a long time what my kid's names are gonna be too... Well, if I have a son anyway. Have no fricken clue what to name my daughter, would've been the one I gave to myself had I not taken it. >.<

My dad wanted to name me Suzanne if I was gonna be a girl, ew.

[AwishForXX]

I was 9 when my mother was pregnant with my middle brother, I overheard my parents discussing possible names.  I realized that they were deciding on both a boy and a girl name to cover both possibilities. Later I had asked my mother that if I was born a girl what would they have named me?  She told me I would have been named *******,  I didn't want to forget that name ever and I went to my room and in my closet I scratched that name into the wood on the inside of the closet door near the floor.  Years later after many struggles and self denials, while not in transition and not sure if I will or can, I still treasure that name as my own true name.  It was only two years ago when I finally admitted to myself that I have been suffering with GID and my deepest secret was that I had always felt as though I should have been born XX.  I still treasure that name.

If I do transition, or when I feel more confident about this, I'll tell you my treasure.

[OlivierDeSillegue]

I didn't choose my name so much as it came back to me.    I wore it from 1623 to 1645 and now I will wear it once more.

My name then was Armand Olivier de Sillègue d'Autevielle d'Athos, and since I do not own Autevielle or Athos anymore (the sad part about dying >.<), I cannot wear these land names. Michel is what my mother chose because I asked her to give me a middle name, as she feels sorrowed that I am changing my name at all. Hence, Armand Olivier Michel de Sillègue. 

[Shannon1979]

Shannon was just a name i thought was nice sad thing is first time iheard it was on neighbours. 

[Gene]

I LOVE that book. For the longest time when choosing my middle name, I was totally set on "Phineas", but everyone I know hated it, so I went with my second favourite, Gabriel.

My family didn't like Gene. My sister said it sounded like a creeper name. She was joking, but that spurred a contest between us two to see how many people we could get to agree with our different viewpoints to determine if it did sound like one. We're tied, but I decided to go forward with it anyway.

If you had picked Phineas, you wouldn't have to worry about me jostling a tree branch from under you. But I'd have given you hell in Blitzball. XD

[Keira]

I picked Sky because it sounds sort of "freeing", and it's also a unisex name.

[Keira]

My family didn't like Gene. My sister said it sounded like a creeper name. She was joking, but that spurred a contest between us two to see how many people we could get to agree with our different viewpoints to determine if it did sound like one. We're tied, but I decided to go forward with it anyway.

If you had picked Phineas, you wouldn't have to worry about me jostling a tree branch from under you. But I'd have given you hell in Blitzball. XD

Rofl, I caught that reference!

[monica.soto]

I think I chose Monica some 30 years ago so it's always been with me.

It's the name of a girl who was very good friends with me when I was small.

[hazel]

I often go by haze online, so adding an extra l to make it feminine just seemed like a natural progression.

[Sam/Gabriel]

My family didn't like Gene. My sister said it sounded like a creeper name. She was joking, but that spurred a contest between us two to see how many people we could get to agree with our different viewpoints to determine if it did sound like one. We're tied, but I decided to go forward with it anyway.

If you had picked Phineas, you wouldn't have to worry about me jostling a tree branch from under you. But I'd have given you hell in Blitzball. XD

Haha I'm gonna watch out anyway 😛

[JenSquid]

I don't know if I'll stick with Jennifer for the long run, but for now it's nice. I like my initials, so I needed something that started with J. The feminine form of my male name just didn't feel right, so I went looking for other female J names, and ultimately Jennifer seemed to be the best fit. I would have gone with Jessica, as I love that name, but I already have several friends named Jessica so I view it as taken.

[Trixie]

I don't know if I'll stick with Jennifer for the long run, but for now it's nice. I like my initials, so I needed something that started with J. The feminine form of my male name just didn't feel right, so I went looking for other female J names, and ultimately Jennifer seemed to be the best fit. I would have gone with Jessica, as I love that name, but I already have several friends named Jessica so I view it as taken.

I'm Jessica. ^_^

Ha, just decided on that name last night. I love the name.

[Elspeth]

Hahaha!! Oh, Chinese moms!
I think my mom changed my Chinese name at least four times when I was a kid. Luckily, my official name is in English and my Chinese name was not documented on anything so she could do as she pleased given whatever her latest interpretation of fēng shuǐ was at that time.

I think this may have been (slightly?) simpler in the past. Or maybe this is a bias I have from one of my Chinese teachers? He was a relative of Yuan Shikai (袁世凱) so he was from one of those families with a book of names (or at least first characters for the 2-character given name) that were expected to be given to members of successive generations.

I have only considered a feminine Chinese name a few times, and would probably want to have it assigned by someone who was a mentor before I settle on one, especially considering I'm not completely fluent and could miss some unfortunate associations with anything I picked myself. Have had 2 slightly different ones given by language teachers, with the one I use having been tweaked by the aforementioned member of the Yuan family.

My male-associated one is Dai Borui (戴柏瑞), so I'll definitely want to change it some day.  At this point I'm leaning towards Eleanor as an English given name, with Ellie as preferred nickname. It's a reference to an ancestor I found in records during my teens, and also an allusion to Eleanor Roosevelt, something I'm sure my maternal grandmother, at least, would have approved of, and a reasonable reference considering my age and family background (though at the time maybe my father might have objected).  No one need to know, though, how much his politics have changed since I was born.