Sunday, 27 March 2016

my names and which to use (thanks)

So, the name on my ID is Jonah Mateo (legal since August 8th 2015), but different people call me different (nick)names and I just wanted to make a post about those names with some "explanations":

Appropriate names to call me:

• Joe
Most of my friends call me Joe, also some family members. I actually used "Jo" shortly after my realisation / coming out to myself as a short form of my birthname (you can't deduce my birthname from this) when I didn't know which name(s) to choose.
I really like it and I really felt like a Jo(e) so I looked for a name starting with Jo... I didn't want to have a very common one (like Jonathan - I really like this name, but I know some Jonathans) or old one (like Joseph) so I found Jonah and chose it.
Later I found out that it's gender neutral, but I had chosen a second (definitely male) name before anyway.
I also started using Joe because it looks more masculine (and better ^^).

• Mateo
I actually wanted my second name to be Samuel because I really like the short form (Sam of course), I just really didn't feel like this name would fit me. So I talked to my mum about this and she suggested the name Mateo because she likes it and also thought it would fit me. I didn't even think about it for long and changed it (already during the process, but that's no problem).
I wasn't using this name until the trans workshop weekend in September last year. There were so many non-binary people and because Jona(h) is neutral there were quite a few with that name. So because I wanted to feel special (*cough*) I used Mateo there and I really liked it. After the weekend I started to use the name on the Internet more. I didn't ask my mum / family to use it because they had already had the first change.
So yeah, I really like this name. ☺

• Joey
• Matt(ie) (English pronounciation)
• Jonny
• Jon

Inappropriate names to call me:

• my birthname
Well, that's kinda self-explanatory. I mean, I really like my birthname, but - as in a post some time ago - just don't use it when referring to me.

• Jonah
Only my mum and my close family calls me by my full name and I kinda dislike it. I don't really know why, but I kinda regret chosing it in the first place now. I should've just used Joe as my first name...

• Matty (German pronounciation)
That just sounds stupid.