You may have noticed that my website received a facelift recently, along with a very big change – a name change, which also means a branding change. As writers, our name is very much our brand. After a lot of deep thinking, and one very jolting question, I decided to change mine. Here’s why.
The Story Behind the Name
I was never a huge fan of my birth name. I don’t need to mention it here, but it was one of the most popular girl’s names in the U.S. In the fifth grade, I had a modest twenty students in my class, three of which had the same first name as I. Because of this, I was identified by my first name and last initial, always. I hated this.
At a rather young age I petitioned to go by something else. I told my grandparents I wanted to be called Rose. For a time, they obliged. I asked my mother if I could go by my middle name, Elizabeth; however, with every suggestion I gave, she provided an argument against.
“Can I go by Elizabeth instead?”
“No. That’s the neighbor’s daughter.”
“How about Beth?”
“No. That’s your aunt.”
“What about Lizzie?”
“That’s the name of a famous axe murderer.”
I gave up.
Establishing My Identity as a Writer
As the years passed by, I embraced every nickname that was given to me. In dancing school, they called me Grassy because my long blonde hair reminded one of the older dancers of wheat fields and dry grass. In high school on the cross-country team, I was known as IHOP and/or Little Denny because one of my older brothers was nicknamed Denny for a dumb story that I won’t reiterate here. As I aged into the developing internet and gaming world, I was anything but my first name.
When I started publishing professionally, there was a need to come up with a more serious identity. As luck would have it, my birth name (first and last) was already taken by another author. Years later, I discovered that particular author was using it as a pseudonym. How original. However, I suppose I should be grateful as it prompted me to look elsewhere. It didn’t help that my birth name was also that of a musician, and a “professional spanking model.”
Ladies and gentlemen, whatever image just entered your mind – that’s exactly what it is. I was curious enough to click on the link and confirm.
I tried using different initial combinations and different identities altogether (some of them a version of my given names). Nothing felt true to me. Switching to my middle name and keeping my surname was the obvious answer. Yet, it was still rather common. So, I opted to keep my first initial to separate myself from the crowd. This had unexpected difficulties.
You’d be surprised how many people chose to address me by first initial only, like I was a rock star. After moving to Europe, I had a hard time explaining to people that I went by my middle name. At least in Germany, people acted like it was rocket science and made it way more difficult than needed.
One Jolting Question
As our marriage date approached, I considered changing my legal surname but originally decided against it. After all, it’s mine. Why should I change it? Then, one day, my soon-to-be husband turned to me and called me the future Mrs. Gregory. Alarm bells rang in my head. RED ALERT! That’s my mother’s name.
For those of you who know anything about my relationship with my birth family, you know why this set off alarms in my mind. It dawned on me that marriage was an opportune moment to ditch the ties to my toxic life in the U.S. and truly start fresh. Fabricius is Latin-based and occupational. It was used for craftsmen and artisans. Overall, it seems especially fitting for a writer.
I was not forced to change my name by some antiquated marriage law. I was given a choice and empowered to make that choice for myself – an important distinction in this modern age.
New Obstacles
Lastly, you may think that from a publishing stand point it’d be fairly easy to switch everything over to my new name. Not so fast. It took weeks to update my published manuscripts, cover art, website, and online profiles. Amazon alone took a month to fix the paperback version of Painting the Whiskey Blue to the new name.
But was it worth it? Absolutely.
Thank you for reading.
Eliza
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