What's in a name?

[megan163]

I recently picked up this key chain with my femme name on one side along with the words "Discover the Hidden Personality Behind Your Name." On the the other side it had the reveal - "A reliable and discreet person." Well, I thought, they pegged me right - especially the discreet part!

Anyway, I really never knew the meaning of my girl name. Just wondering how many of you deliberately picked your name because of its meaning? Or other reason?

[Georgette_USA]

Always liked that Georgette is also the name of a sheer lightweight crepe fabric. I have one dress made in that fashion, but that floats in the static of winter, and needs a lining.

That may or may not have had part of my liking the name. I am also part French.

[Maria Blackwood]

I just always thought Maria was a pretty name. As my feminine side began emerging from dormancy the name just sort of resonated.

Let's look it up!

IMG_0890.jpg

*sigh*

[Leslie Mary S]

while I did not pick the name for its meaning I have researched them.
Leslie means Valley of Holy
Mary means love
And my last name is Shy which is what I really am.
now the facts.
Leslie is the name I would have born if I had been born a female.
Mary was the name of my last true love when I started here. Mary has passed away. My first wife of 36 years passed away in 2000.
So I could have called myself Leslie Janet but it doesn't ring as well as Leslie Mary.
I can't use just Leslie because that is my half sister.

[GretchenM]

Hi Megan,

Back in 2012 when I came out I used Martcella, a feminine form of the masculine Marcello or Marcus which is a variation of my more Germanic birth name. That spelling is an ancient form. I thought that was cool. But last year my identity evolved dramatically and I am in only tiny ways like I was back then. I felt I needed a new name to celebrate the new and far more comfortable arrangement. Gretchen popped into my head. She was a beautiful girl back in high school who sat behind me in botany class and was one year ahead of me. She teased the hell out of me, but it was all in good fun. We had a great friendship but no romance. I have thought of her often ever since and my feminine identity sometimes plays with and teases my masculine identity. So, I decided Gretchen was appropriate and I love the sound of it, especially when combined with the selected middle name - Marie. Works for me and I guess that is what is most important.

Gretchen Marie

[Pat]

I just looked up Jennie -- it means "fair and yielding." I suspect that's fair as in physical description and yielding as in easy morals rather than fair as in fair-minded and yielding as in flexible to others' opinions. My actual name that I adapted from my birth name and use in real life transactions is Pat -- it apparently means "fish." Way to go, Mom.

[Meghan4now]

Name meanings are not consistent from source to source. Megan and Meghan mean Pearl on names.org

Maria is a variant on Mary, and I find it hard to believe it means bitter.

[Tracii G]

Looked mine up and it says "warlike".
Thats the last thing I needed to hear.

[mykell]

names.org,
Mikell[*]Gender:Neutral[*]#6777 All Time....so i took it one step further and used my birth name:

I do not know how you feel about it, but you were a female in your last earthly incarnation. You were born somewhere around the territory of USA South-Central approximately on 650. Your profession was warrior, hunter, fisherman, and executor of sacrifices.

always felt i would make a damn good female warrior princess....lets see how soon i can schedule me a good old "fashion" sacrifice....

[Lily Catherine]

I think mine is straightforward as it is - a symbol of purity, innocence... and death.
I have since adopted Lilian as my Mandarin female name, the characters literally meaning "beautiful" and "lotus/lily". It warrants mention that while Lily is ostensibly a Christian name in the Anglophone world, the Mandarin term for "lotus" crops up in Buddhist names more often.

[Judith96a]

Judith apparently means 'woman from Judea' - which I'm quite clearly not!

On a conscious level, I chose 'Judith' simply because I liked the name and it seemed to fit. On a subconscious level, the story is a little more complicated...
Just over 30 years ago, my very pregnant cousin and her husband were on a shopping trip and called in to see my parents and me. The conversation turned to baby names and Dad suggested 'Judith', noting that this was the name that he and Mum had chosen had I been born a girl!

I wasn't crossdressing at that time. I was on an extended hiatus and didn't restart until a couple of years later.

A month later, when I visited my cousin and her new born daughter in the hospital, my cousin told me, "We liked what Uncle xxx suggested, so she's sorta going to be named after you. Meet little Judith". My cousin did not, and still does not, know anything about my crossdressing! But the outcome is that I have a very beautiful 2nd cousin, half my age, who is both "sorta" and (unknowingly) actually named after me!

[DIANEF]

Diane (or Diana) derives from an Indo-European root word meaning divine. Not why I chose it

[gownman]

Mine is literal. I chose it because I love silky nylon nightgowns.

[Lorileah]

I looked and most say I am named after a tree (historic reference the song Green Grow the Laurels from where the Spanish derogatory term for whites came from). But the best was this one "The Most wonderful person in the World. Kind, Sweet, Loving, Caring, Gentle. Perfect in Every ways. The one you love for all your life. " sums it up I think

[mykell]

Looked mine up and it says "warlike".
Thats the last thing I needed to hear.

well you do have those crazy ninja self defense moves....

[Tracii G]

LOLOL
Self defense is a big thing with me I suppose.Ninja level not quite sadly.

[Marianne S]

Name meanings are not consistent from source to source. Megan and Meghan mean Pearl on names.org

Maria is a variant on Mary, and I find it hard to believe it means bitter.

Megan is from Margaret, which means "pearl" in Greek. It's much the way "Karen" is really "Katharine" with the edges ground down, so to speak. "Meg" used to be a common diminutive of Margaret, commoner than it is now anyway.

The problem with "Mary" and "Maria" is that the name is so old, nobody is really sure what it originally meant! One speculation is that came from an ancient Egyptian word meaning "beloved." Nicer than "bitter" anyway!

One of the best sites for meanings of names is behindthename.com. Scads of information there.

[IamWren]

I don't recall having a femme name when I joined the site which is why my username is as it is. I thought I'd give a nod to ancestors who inhabited the Iberian peninsula and settled on an Arabic word for my first name, Sayyidah, which means "lady" and a Hebrew word, Neshama, as a last name, which means "spirit". I love it.

[Lana Mae]

OK, I will play! I had to go look mine up! First let me say, I chose Lana from my sort of first encounter with a female in a dress who lived down the street. We were both pretty young. She used to pull her dress over her head and expose her panties. I thought it was cute and wished I could do it! (probably under 5) So, I adopted her name from my memory of that experience. Mae is my mothers middle name. When I looked them up, They both mean beautiful! I found it interesting in light of my story that Lana can mean child! Also (Svet)lana means holy or blessed. Mae (May) means goddess of spring or growth. Also kinswoman! Hugs Lana Mae

[Jaymees22]

I just used my sometimes nick name "Jay" and added the mee because it's all about ME. Jaymee

[TrishaTX]

For me, Girl I dated in High school and really liked, she turned out to be lesbian a few years later(well always I bet)....anyway just loved the name and her for a short while..so Here it is or there it is

[CDJoyce]

When I looked up the meaning of Joyce a few moments ago I found it means 'happy'. That's not why I choice it. One day when fully dressed as a teenager I looked at myself in a mirror and knew, instinctively, that the woman looking back at me was called Joyce. I never have and never will consider any other.

[Ineke Vashon]

Boohoo. "There is no definition for the name Ineke". So says "behindthe name." Ergo, my female persona doesn't seem to exist

Originally I was going to go with Ellie. Except there were a bunch of Ellies already. Whereas the only Ineke I found was a perfume outfit somewhere in California. So it's Ineke, in memory of a former girlfriend by that name.

Ineke

[Becky Blue]

Rebecca means 'to tie firmly' I chose it because I love the name, I like the shortening to Becky and Bec. I liked the roots as it is part of my culture and it has nothing to do with my male name.

I did not know the meaning when i chose the name, it just seemed like me. Now knowing what it means I guess she is tied very firmly to my life.

[Emily Ann Brown]

With no thought when I saw I needed a name Emily Ann Brown came to mind. A couple of years later a bought a used car only to later found a document that showed the first owner was actually a Emily Ann Brown...how weird is that??....Em