I spent quite a lot of time thinking about my name for a few reasons.
I actually like my birth name. In some countries it seems to be a male name, but it's generally not used here. In the places that it is, it's either an abbreviation of a girls name or a girls name anyway (had fun at school with that one). Due to this, my therapist thought that it was the name I had chosen for myself. Combine that with the fact that I very rarely ever see it and have never met anyone else with it, it feels quite unique to me. I really hate the idea of letting it go. Might be a good idea, but I'm still on the fence.
As for choosing a potential new name, I started by looking through lists of names and noting ones I liked. Once I had a list, I started looking over the list, eliminating the ones I liked the least. Once I had it narrowed down to a few, I spent some time each day looking over it. I would pick a name from the list and use it for a while in my internal monologue, to sort of 'try it on'. I eventually settled on 2 names.
That's where it gets a bit more complicated. I like both Kathryn and Naomi so much. So much so that I have found it very hard to choose between them. In some way, they both a bit of history behind them. It's strange, but I kind of see the names as representing different parts of me. Kathryn reminds me more of my kinder side, more innocent and more about the future. The woman I am growing into. Naomi reminds me more of my strength. Because of that, it feels a bit more tied to my past and who I tried to be. I always rejected the idea of being a 'man' even if I didn't understand things enough to be a woman. I just tried to be strong and survive in a world I didn't really have a place in. Now I feel I have more of a place (or am, at least, carving one) I kind of feel like I should move on from that a bit. But still, Naomi just seems to fit slightly better than Kathryn and if it wasn't for feeling it as being tied to past a little (longish story), I would embrace it rather than being stuck between them.
I wish I could get people to use either/both of them. Bit greedy, but it feels right.
Kathryn/Naomi
