What’s in A Name? For Me, Quite a Lot.
By Jade Runk
When I began modeling in the early 2000s, no one on TV, in movies, or in any other media mentioned anything about the possibility of being non-binary. How could I ever anticipate that someday I would take the time to examine my relationship to gender and discover that I’m not, in fact, a woman at all? I’ve always felt like I have both male and female within me, but since everyone around me saw me as a woman, I just stuck with it. I did all the things women are “supposed to do,” but the whole time, it felt like society had placed me into a role that wasn’t actually written for me. I played it well, and I just assumed that’s how everyone felt.
It wasn’t until the last couple of years, as I saw more and more people open up publicly about their feelings on being non-binary, that it dawned on me: none of my binary friends felt like they had to “pick” a gender and just stick with it. Their gender feels easy and natural to them, but that’s not my experience at all. Understanding that this made me different and that there was a whole community of others who felt the same way made me feel free, more in tune with myself, and more beautiful at the same time. I am genderfluid, and it would be a disservice to myself if I didn’t enjoy and embrace that. I thought about what I wanted to change, as I transitioned away from the gender that had been assigned to me, to fully embrace my gender fluidity.
Eventually, my deadname became a symbol, to me, of having been forced to live as someone else throughout my entire life and having been too naive to even realize it.
The first thing that had to change was my name. I had been going by “Jennie,” my whole life, but she was never actually me. I remembered a nickname I used to go by before I moved to New York. It was a mashup of my first and middle names, “Jennie” + “Darci,” squished together to form Jadar. I loved that name and I loved when people called me that name. So, I chopped that in half and shortened it to Jade and started introducing myself with my new chosen name.
As I got used to hearing it, I discovered that being called Jade feels like being seen, and it feels right. Eventually, my deadname became a symbol, to me, of having been forced to live as someone else throughout my entire life and having been too naive to even realize it. Every time someone calls me by my deadname, it rips the pain of that experience wide open. It feels like the role I’d been playing is more worthy of love and attention than the actor who had been playing her all along, and that the actor themselves is invisible, even worthless.
By the time I figured this all out, I’d been in the same career, working under my deadname for 20 years, and had built up an extensive catalog of past work under that name. If I changed my name within the confines of my career, would I lose access to my past accomplishments that are only searchable under a name I can no longer use for myself without enduring tremendous emotional anguish? How would people who know of me from my past work find me now, under this new name? What are the implications, in terms of my career, of changing my name this late in life? To be honest, these fears kept me from changing my name within my career for half a year.
I considered quitting to start over with something else, just so I could start fresh with a new name and never have to explain myself to anyone. I would have gone from being well known and well respected in an industry in which I have 20 years of experience, to an entry-level position in a field with which I have no prior experience whatsoever, just to avoid the pain of having to explain over and over why my old name doesn’t work for me anymore.
How many incredibly talented individuals are working in fields that don’t allow them to reach their full potential because they couldn’t face going through a transition while maintaining a career where they could build a body of work credited to their name? How many doctors, researchers, performers, writers, etc. are not sharing their talent and expertise with the world because of a name? There are so many factors that contribute to trans people continuing to be a marginalized community, and this is only one of them.
For six months, I thought I could just use both names. I could have my friends and family call me Jade, but at work, I would still use “Jennie” as my professional name. I play a role as a model, after all, and thought “Jennie” could just be that role I continue to play while I’m on set. I thought that could work for me, and I would never have to worry about the potential consequences of changing my name within my profession. But as time went on, I faced a problem I hadn’t anticipated. Being friends with many of the people I work with, some people would call me Jade on set, while others would still call me “Jennie.” Then, of course, people would ask me why I’m using two different names.
They would ask me, “What’s wrong with ‘Jennie?’ Why are you changing it?” And while I know questions like those come from a place of curiosity and only feel like small talk to someone else, repeatedly explaining why I no longer want to be called “Jennie” felt like reopening a deep personal wound over and over again. Having to do that while also trying to do my job became extremely anxiety-inducing.
If you’re reading this article to learn how to be a better ally to the trans and nonbinary communities, understand that while a first name might seem like a trivial matter to you, it’s not for us. If someone you know asks you to use a new name for them, listen, and don’t ask follow-up questions. You don’t need an explanation to change someone’s contact info. Something that might seem insignificant to you can potentially hold a lot of weight for someone else.
Working through my emotions surrounding the fact that I’ll never be able to fully separate myself from my deadname is difficult enough, without having to explain it to everyone around me on a near-daily basis. Going through with changing my name was definitely scary, but I know it will be worth it in the end, when I no longer have to hear my deadname at work, reminding me every day that I had to live a large chunk of my life as some person who’s not even me. So, if you don’t know me, hello, I’m Jade, and you can find my old work under a pseudonym I used for years, “Jennie” Runk. If you knew “Jennie” Runk, then hello again. It’s nice to finally meet you, and please—call me Jade. Q