What's in a name?

There's a question I get asked a lot that I find one of the most difficult to answer.

'What name do you prefer?'

It's a silly question to trip myself over on but I do every time it's asked and will usually reply something like.

'Either's fine, you choose'

I often end up in a back and forth with them along the lines of

'I'll call you whatever you prefer'

'I honestly don't mind' I'll say but the truth is, amongst friends, I probably do.

Anyone who has a keen eye for my social media will have noticed that I use different names in different places. On some, I use Chris. On others I use Ellie.

So why do I do this? Why do I find it so hard to give a straight answer to a straight question.

I'll come to that but first let me tell you how I came about my new name.

I was named by my parents as Christopher Martin Kane. I'm not sure where Christopher came from other than he's the patron saint of travellers and I know that's important to my mum. Martin was the name of my uncle who was my god father. As someone who was brought up catholic I was confirmed in the faith at the age of twelve and chose Robert, my grandfather's name on my mums side, who died long before I was born. My dad slipped in the names of his friends who were catholic priests as well so I have 3 confirmation names. Of course when it was my turn to go up to the bishop the music quietened down and the bishop proclaimed at the top of his lungs.

'ROBERT WILLIAM DERMOT'

so embarrassing.

And that's how I became Christopher Martin Robert William Dermot Kane for the first 37 years of my life.

It never felt like my name. It never sat comfortably and as anyone who ever called me Christopher rather than Chris would tell you, I flinched at it and quickly said.

'Do not call me Christopher' in a low kind of growl.

I know people were always taken aback by how strong my response to it was and I probably should have tried to work out sooner why I felt to vehemently about it.

So in my day to day life I've been Chris as long as I can remember. My parents still called me Christopher and I tolerated it but no one else ever did.

When I knew I was going to transition one of the first things you have to do is change your name as part of proving your sincerity to live as a different gender. It's a pretty key change to being allowed to have medical treatment for gender incongruence. I think that is overly paternalistic of the medical profession but that is a discussion for another day.

As such I needed to choose a new name. Ultimately I wanted to pay respect to my parents and I knew I wanted to keep Chris. I needed to choose another name to go with that.

As a twenty something doing anaesthetic core training and a wife doing Emergency Medicine core training I had a lot of time on my own. I played a lot of a game called World of Warcraft. In fact for a long time I was the top discipline priest on the Saurfang server no less (gosh I'm so very sad). My characters name? Eledrial.

So for about 10 years I was known by a group of Danish internet people as Ellie. 3 nights a week over the internet that was my name and it felt so comfortable.

Ellie it was then, or Eloise, as we'd just been watching Bridgeton.

Chris Eloise Kane, Sorted... Not quite

'Clare I've finally sorted my name'

'Oh no you need another one you can't have the same initials as me!'

And so another search began. For weeks I tried combinations of names. I really liked Thea but I just couldn't make it work.

Eventually I was down to Charlotte or Sophia. I spent ages walking up and down just saying

'Chris Eloise Charlotte Kane'

'Chris Eloise Sophia Kane'

on repeat. I'm pretty sure everyone thought I was mad. Eventually I settled on Charlotte.

And so on the 16th of June 2021 that became my new legal name.

So why do I still struggle to answer the question 'What name do you prefer?'

I've thought about this a lot and I am genuinely fine with Chris but I wonder If my motivation for keeping it was also as a way to hide.

I feel very exposed being trans, I feel very noticed. I've spent my whole life trying to hide and not be seen. To walk through an existence in the shadows unseen for who I really am. I think my name is symbolic of how deep that blending into the background went. I still want to hide in a corner and not been noticed. I still want to glanced past rather than focussed on. If I'm Chris I still can, to some extent, hide when I want to.

Someone once said me as I was part way through transitioning.

'You're not exactly being obtrusive about this'

I think about that a lot. I absolutely have tried to do this in a way that makes other peoples lives as easy as possible in the hope it will make mine similarly so.

As Ellie, I'm front and centre, unashamedly me. There is no way for people to not be confronted by me being trans. They have to process and deal with it and they can't just wander past it and pretend it isn't there.

That's hard for some people but in my mind making them make that choice increases my fear of them rejecting me.

So why can't I answer that question with a straight answer?

Because I'm afraid. Afraid that it draws attention to me, afraid that people I care about will reject me.

It's a work in progress, and I've come a long way but my fear of other peoples response to me is still one of the hardest things I grapple with.

So:

'What name do you prefer?'

Ellie please but for now, for the time being if you'd prefer to call me Chris that's fine too.