identity cr!s!s

Question: What’s your important personal property which is meant to be used by others? -- Answer: No other than your NAME!

What is a name?

According to the dictionary,

name [naym]

noun (plural names)

>what somebody or something is called: a word, term, or phrase by which somebody or something is known and distinguished from other people or things [Microsoft Encarta]

In other words, we can equate that a person's name is equal to his/her identity.

For almost 6 years I’ve been dealing with “identity crisis” – not with sexuality or gender but with my identity, in other words, it’s a problem about my own NAME. I hate talking about “NAME ISSUES” because until now I can’t get over with my own. Imagine changing it after using for more than a couple of decades?

Let me give you a short background. I’ve been conceived out of wedlock. My parents parted their ways before I was born. At that time, my mother, her brothers, and sisters decided to have me baptized (which of course I wasn't aware of). They’ve done it as if they were doing a role play. My mother omitted her surname; she used the name Mary Pee and one of her brothers, my uncle, acted as my father and used his real name Joe Tee. My name turned out to be James Pee Tee. When I was already going to Secondary School and a Birth Certificate (BC) was a requirement, I’ve learned that I wasn’t registered at the Municipal Civil Registrar.

I patiently urged my mother to secure a BC for me and asked her to correct the “role play” that they did when they put me unto “forced baptism.” I’ve requested her to register me under ‘single parent’ following her name; after all, nothing will change with my name.  So my request was clear, she asked some help from her friends to secure a dozen of requirements. It was only after 5 years when my BC was then registered and signed by the Civil Registrar. I was then a College Graduate and was one year late for Board Exams… guess what happened? – my name, James Pee Tee, became James Pee! They did accept my mother’s request to register me under single parent. To my extreme disappointment (times ten raised to infinity), I found out that they only considered one particular document - my Baptismal Certificate and since it was written there that my mother’s name was Mary Pee (which is not her correct name, because she is actually Mary Pee Tee) they entered it on my BC, not considering the other papers that were submitted. Where is logic, justice, respect and consideration here?!?! The time I’ve learned that my name was changed, I almost erupted in anger!!! My mother together with her friend begged me to accept the name. They explained and convinced me that it was already forwarded to the National Statistics Office (NSO) and it is also legal to have a name without a middle name. It was only after a month when I’ve decided to consider it without fully accepting. If I don’t, it will again take me a year or more before I will be qualified to take the Board Exam. So, what I did was to request to change my name on other important papers like Transcript of Records (TOR), Diploma, etc.. just to be able to take the Board Exams.

If you are a very sentimental person like me, you wouldn’t allow changing your name, not unless if you were involved in a crime and your name was already tagged as a criminal.

This was the time that I’ve reflected, what is so important with a name? If you change your name,would it change your personality? If you change your name, would it decrease or somehow increase your person? Would it add more wisdom?

I’ve realized that whatever I’ve done in the past, with God’s help and mercy, was not actually to build up my name but to develop my person. Whatever I’ve done, was not to make my name good in another person’s eyes, but to shape my person in accordance to His Commandments of course with His help and mercy. I’ve realized that our names don't define who we are, but we are actually the ones defining our own names.

[This is a true-to-life story of a friend of mine. Names were changed to protect his identity as well as the persons involved. In cases of similarity, it is purely coincidental. This is published to share an important lesson and not for anything else. My sincerest thanks and apologies.]