Susan's Place Transgender Resources

I think the title is pretty straight-forward, but I'll reiterate.

I think it's safe to say that very few of us here have not changed their birth names somewhere within their coming out/HRT/GRS processes, and I'm curious as to if the name has any significant meaning to you. I chose Reuben partially because I really like it. I'm currently reading a book written by Anne Rice called The Wolf Gift, and the main character's name is Reuben. The origin of the name is Hebrew, and its meaning is "Behold - a son." I thought it was perfect for my situation. Gabriel will (I think) be my middle name. Many of my friends wanted me to make it my first name when I was choosing a new name, but I just loved Reuben and its meaning. I also was supposed to be named Gabrielle when I was born, but my father wanted Samantha. ::) So it has a more personal meaning to me than just a name I like. Also, myself not being religious in any way (perhaps even anti-religion), Gabriel's meaning of "God has heard" just doesn't sit well with me. But, I like it otherwise and I feel I have a birth connection to it.

Anyone else here have a story behind their new name?

I still use my birth name that my parents gave to me .. I am Thai .. my Thai ID still have Mr. in front of my name (cant change that, super suck i know)..

but right now , I live in Australia (been living here for 8-9 years now) nobody knows that my name is male or female ... but everyone here thinks that I am female , noone knows unless I tell them ..

so it doesnt bother me .. anyway, I love my birth name, it has good meaning (my name means "fearless brings me success") & unique  ;D

My middle name begins with J, so I looked up male names beginning with J. I love names with a cool meaning, but I just wanted a name I could connect to. I'm connected to my birth name, it's been my name since the day I was born, so it was very important for me to choose a name I could actually see as me. So I came across the name Jason and decided that it fit well with my last name.

As it happens, it's also the name of the singer of letlive., my favourite band, and that guy is my number one role model/inspiration, so I suppose that can be an added meaning to me.

I really don't know it just felt right.  I have been using it in my mind for decades (even though I was also denying to myself my GID).  After my then wife found out and we had talked she told me I needed a name.  I told her to choose one as I had never given it any thought.  A couple of days later she came up to me and said she had decided.  I had no idea what she was talking about and then she said I am going to call you Christine.  I almost passed out from shock.  So I guess it fits me anyway.

*shrugs* For me, there was no question - it simply was Cassandra. As for the subconscious reasons why, for me it suggests an air of confidence and compassion, and also functions as a means of 'reclaiming' it from its rather unfortunate origins (the Cassandra myth and all that).

I haven't decided on a new name yet, but I want it to have a special meaning that sort of explains me.  I'm still searching for something that has does that, sounds pleasing to me, and ultimately will have my mom's approval cause I'm a total mommy's girl. 

As for now, I'm going by as Mattie which is my childhood nickname that I've always been called by most in my family and others even to this day.   

Well, several years ago I was active one the roleplay board of a different TG forum, and went by Jaime.  Jaime was the first name to really fit when my first name, Natalia, stopped feeling right after a decade of use.  Once roleplaying turning myself into my real, female self got old and tiresome, I fell back into my loving of creating and fleshing out new, original characters. 

One game asked us to relinquish full control of the after character and let the game master set some of the parameters of who your character becomes.  This pushed me outside my comfort zone and the result was a character that came to life in a way none other had before, both in the game and in my mind.  She was so far outside my comfort zone the only way I could write her was throw myself totally into her head space and essentially give her control.  She unearthed parts of me that had been bury, aspects of my full self that had long since been suppressed.  When it came time to name this character in game, Callie was the first one to jump into my head, and it felt right so I used that.

The game ended, and life went on, but Callie stayed, rooting herself into my psyche as an almost second identity, taking for herself the parts and aspects of myself that were used to create her.  We are one and the same, and yet two distinctly different and separate personas.  Like yin and yang in a way.  My two sides.  It is hard to really explain.

A few years after this game, I finally learned what I would have been named had I been born female, Colleen Marie.  I liked the name, a lot, but it took a while to embed itself and replace Jaime as how I thought of myself.  It fit better as well.  Colleen turned out to mean "girl" and Marie, "Wished for child", which together sort of translates to "Wished for girl."  Which was fitting, even if I wasn't sure whether to take as the universe mocking me, or as a sign I really was born the wrong gender.

There have been a lot of serendipitous coincidences, but the biggest by far was discovering that Callie, in place of Collie, is a widely used and common short form for Colleen.  The two names that are me, unconnected in choice and circumstance just happened to go hand in hand already.  Kinda felt like fate we I discovered this actually. 

So people can call me Colleen or Callie, either is perfectly fine, and it's fun to see who gravitates to which name as both names really do fit the side of me they represent, kinda says a bit about how they see me. 

Fyi, my current avatar is Callie, the character.

I liked names that can be shortened, I think it is cute.  I've never known a woman named Melissa so I ran with it.


Melissa > Mel

My middle name is a female modification of my father's middle name; Karlee (Mine) Carle (His).

-AM

I chose the name Umiko, which means child of the sea  :laugh:

My name is Victor. Guess why I chose it.  >:-)

btw, my friends called me Diana because they know i love wonder woman lol ;D

I changed my name entirely and didn't feminize any part of my birth name. I just picked out 10 names for first, middle and last and whittled it down until I had one that I liked. No one could understand why I chose Squirrel for a surname, though.

:D Just kidding...or am I? ;)

My birth name is unisex, but is more associated with females, at least where I live. I wanted a name that was male, and similar to my birth name. So irish and starting with an SH-sound. So I picked the name Shawn and it just fits. Might chose a longer middle name so it fits better with my last name though.

I spent a while trying to keep my old initials, but couldn't find anything starting with a P that I liked.

When I finally chose my new name I had 2 days to go before coming out at work so I needed to make a decision fast.  I'd recently been watching Firefly and realised how similar I was/wanted to be to Kaylee in it - cute, tomboyish, brunette just starting to explore femininity, laid back technical geek and a propensity to use the word "Shiny" whenever I liked/wanted something!

I didn't bother replacing my old middle name, I decided that they were pointless and just made it take longer to fill out forms...

I ended up deciding on Evan for a few reasons.  First: I think it's a nice name. Second: I don't really know anyone else with this name. Third: It's the only name that fits the first two criteria that my mom said she really likes.  Fourth: It ended up just fitting. The meaning of Evan is really cool too which is important to me.  It means "God is gracious" also "Young warrior" which I find very fitting, "Rock" and then also "Good messenger" if you stretch it a bit. It just simply... fits. It's also the name of Evan Roberts who lead a revival in Wales some years ago which I think is kinda cool. I was originally going to go with Asa because it has a good feel to me.  It has that mysterious gut feeling that is just "right". Even though it's not a very popular name, my mom hates it, it's kind of feminine... somehow it feels almost like my spiritual name or something. It means "doctor" or "healer". I don't really know what it is, it just connects. I wish I could choose it but there's too much against it and Evan really does fit well so I've decided Asa will be my middle name.

First and middle just came to me a few years before I transitioned, except I changed my family name at the insistence of my mother who didn't want me to 'embarrass the family name'.  Now, in the time of social media, I get asked all the time about why my last name is different than my sibs... I would keep my old last name if I had it to do over, but now it is too much work to change it.

No particular meaning. I just wanted to keep my nick name and honestly I like being known as Chris. I just don't like the ring of Christopher anymore. Hym unless I could find a way to squeeze that in as a middle name.
Christine Topher ........ Hym... Not really working.

Kimberley Beauregard doesn't have any special meaning, I just had a fixation on the surname and I like the way it flows with the forename.

I was always drawn to Alexander for reasons I'm not really sure of. When I get asked why I went with it, I bring up an old acquaintance of mine who I met on a movie fan forum. He is/was a filmmaker and he kept me motivated and driven to become a filmmaker (That was roughly 10 years ago).

Middle name was an adventure in of itself. The summer I was out to myself, I just went by Alex and I was hung up over a middle name. I had one of those writing boards that had the three color LED light up backgrounds and I wrote down all the names I could think of to pair it with. For some reason, I stuck with Js. James, Jason, Joshua (which was oddly enough what I would have been named ), Jordan, Jesse and Jayden to name a few. I forgot which I went with initially, but over time I turned to name websites and I found way more that got my attention; Jackson (tribute to my stepdad), Tobias (tribute to my bio dad), Atticus, Holden, Skylar, Kai, Jett, Mason and a few others.

I was a Mason for a long while (I still get emails from websites with the initials AM) until last year or so when I switched it to Jerick as homage to the actor/musician/drag artist Jerick Hoffer. It's a bit unconventional and quirky, but my fiance said it's pretty fitting and he likes it too.

I don't know if I'm going to change my last name right off the bat if I could hypothetically get it done now. If I could, I considered going with a pen name which, if I was going with keeping it in the realm of my name being one huge tribute, then I'd probably change my last name to Browning (tribute to the filmmaker Tod Browning), but I don't know if I'll bother since I plan on taking my fiance's last name (though he said hyphenating last names is common in Hispanic cultures but I'm on the fence about it).

Meredith is a name that used to be a Welsh male name and then later transitioned into a female American name. :) Also, it means "warrior from the sea" and I am indeed a trans warrior from the sea!

My story is nothing special...I basically just needed a new name since I planned on coming out, the name Caleb popped into my head, and I took it. My middle name was the same. I needed a middle name for my research ethics form, and I was like "oh, I like *insert middle name here*" and it's stuck ever since.