Winter by any other name

Reflections on one year of a new name

Thanks for reading! Queerness is a complex and nuanced topic, and I am speaking from my own perspective on it. I encourage you to seek out other perspectives as well, and consider your own preconceived ideas as you read on.

I am coming up on one year of my name change at the end of this month, and I’ve been reflecting on my first full year as Wynter. I feel lucky to have been able to name myself as an adult. This change marked an entrance into a new chapter of my identity and life. I’ve been out as nonbinary since 2017, and for a while, I didn’t have any significant desire to change my name. But my given name has a very gendered connotation, and I eventually became frustrated with the biases and assumptions I encountered from folks who saw my name before seeing me. I decided to finally change it after several years of deliberation and trying on a few other options that ultimately didn’t fit. I started the process by having my wife and friends call me Wynter for a few months, and after I found that I liked it, I told my family and then the rest of the world. I still have yet to legally change my name, but my plan is to get the ball rolling in 2024 when I can get an X as my gender marker on my new ID in Illinois. 

People change their names all the time, and most are doing so for reasons completely unrelated to their gender. Someone might go by a stage or pen name, or have some other nickname or title that they are called at work (“camp” or “crew” names are very common in many professions). They might be honored with a new title after earning a new degree or certification. They might change their first or last name as part of a new family structure, with either themselves or their parents getting married, divorced, or otherwise changing the family unit. A person might be looking to honor their ancestors or a newfound family legacy or history, or similarly– they might be given a new name by an elder as part of a rite of passage, ushering in a new chapter of life. Someone might move to a new country and adopt a name that better fits within that language and culture. Conversely, they might seek a change because their name sounds like a slur or a naughty word in another language. Someone might need to change their name for their own protection, either formally through Witness Protection or informally to escape abuse or stalking. They might simply be getting older and want to shift to a more “grown up” version of their name– see: the Jimmy to Jim to James pipeline. It might even be as simple as correcting a misspelling of their legal name, matching or un-matching with a celebrity’s name, or even just not liking their current name and wanting something different. People do often change their names to more closely align with their gender identity, but they also do it for a variety of other reasons as well– and these other reasons are seen as normal, standard, and acceptable where the gender-related reasons are not.

ID: a video of a winter scene from my own backyard, taken earlier this month after snowfall.