On Deadnames and the Person You Used to Perform

A deadname is not just an old name. It is the name of a performance you gave for years so that other people would be comfortable — a role you played so well that some of them mistook it for the whole of you. Hearing it now does not feel nostalgic. It feels like being handed a costume you finally took off and being asked to put it back on.

This is why “but I knew you as” lands the way it does. You did not know me. You knew the version of me that was safe to show you. The fact that the real one was underneath the entire time is not a betrayal of you; it is the thing I was most afraid to tell you.

Use the name someone gives you. It is not a lot to ask, and it tells them you are interested in the person, not the performance.