Would you ever change your name?

I've had a love-loathe relationship with my name since I was a toddler, but I no longer have an insatiable itch to change it. I was named in memory of my mom's brother, who also was my dad's best friend. They had intended to call me Alexandra Kate, but when my uncle passed away shortly before I was born they decided to name me in his honor instead. They attempted to add feminine flair to his distinctly masculine name, but really that makes it seem even more unconventional. Adding to the oddness is that the male version of the name is quite rare in the US, whereas in the UK it isn't. Some of my favorite singers and artists have the name, but of course, they're all male. There is a little-known Greek goddess with a similar name to mine, but I've only ever met one other girl in my entire life with the exact same name as mine. She's a stand-up comedienne who happens to go to the same church as me, and when I met her at a Christmas party and she told me her name, I genuinely believed she was joking. She had to actually show me her license to prove that some other parents in the world were as eccentric in their naming as mine. Anyhoo, so yeah, as a kid I really hated my name. I was teased for it, and adults were actually the ones who commented on it more than children. I mean, the first lie I ever remember telling was when Santa asked me my name and I said Katie because I hadn't wanted to explain that yes, my real name really was my real name. I even refused to answer to my name for a long time period, and finally my family settled on a nickname my great-grandmother had given me instead. She called me Lark because I reminded her of the little songbird. To this day I still go by it.

As a child I craved a normal name and dreamed of being a Kate because it was a nice, simple, classic name that everyone knew was for a girl. For years I intended to change my name to Kate, and it's even what I chose to use as my alias on another website since my mom didn't want me to use Lark or my real name there. Now I'm more at peace with my own name. Some days I even love it. I started getting complimented on it rather than ridiculed for it in my teens, and I've grown to see the qualities of it. I love that I'm named after my uncle, who was a sincerely awesome person. You're probably curious as to what my name actually is after rambling on about it, but I no longer disclose it on public forums.

I think Kylie is an adorable name, and to me the way you spell it seems more "correct" since it's the feminine version of Kyle. It's how I would spell it if I heard it without seeing your name first, and it doesn't make the little Yahoo pencil pop up to tell me to correct my spelling. Kiley looks more like a surname than a first name to me. I do see the appeal in it, though, especially since one of my favorite bands of all time is Rilo Kiley. : )

*Looks up at my looooong answer.* I think if babbling was an Olympic sport I'd at least get a bronze, haha.

~ skylark : )

Edit - Ha, I just met this badass snowboarder named Kylie this morning and thought of this. : )

Yes, I'm actually considering it too. I have an ugly-sounding name. I like the meaning, but not the sound of it. I just don't feel like it either. I mean, do you feel like a Kylie? I want to name myself fancy like Elise or Cassandra, but that will never happen.

BQ: Kylie. Kiley looks like a wrongly spelt word(even though it's not wrong haha).

I wanted to in the past but I think now I'll just stick with it, only because I think it would be too much of a hassle to change it now. If I get married then I will take my husband's last name

BQ: Kiley

xoxo

I would only change my last name, and that's when i get married. I plan to take my husbands last name.

BQ: I like Kiley better, very unique spelling :)

I like Kiley best.

I changed my name from Jane to Jay.

I always wanted to change my name to a name that is unisex, and can serve as both a male and female name, like Taylor or Jamie.

BQ: Kylie sounds so much cooler. I don't understand why you'd want to change it!

Yes, I've considered changing it to Jayne. I go by this online, but it's not my legal name.

BQ: Kylie, definitely.

No, I really like my name.

BQ: Kiley.

Nope I like my name.

Kylie

I've actually had my name legally changed before, when I was 10 years old. My family immigrated to America from Russia, and we all changed our last and first names to sound more American. I say go for it, its not like you are changing the entire name anyway.

Nah. I like my name and I like the reasoning behind it.

BQ: Kylie. It's cuter!