I'm sure a lot of people who clicked this thought it was about coming out. Nope. And it isn't about being trans either. it's more on the basis of names. I am a 15 year old girl. Last August, I moved to a different state just in time for high school. Back then, I was a very different version of me. I was shy, not confident at all, and pretty lonely. I knew I liked girls, but still felt like I didn't know very much about myself. Now, I am completely different and barely recognize that version of me. I have learned what it really is like being androgynous and queer, have more friends than I can count, and am very much confident and not afraid to show it. I have become much more androgynous, much to the protests of my mom, who doesn't want me to "look like a boy, or gangster". She does not let me buy snapbacks, and refuses to let me cut my hair in the style or shortness in which I want it. Anyway, to get to the point of this, I want to have other people call me by a more gender-neutral nickname, which is something that would have been much easier to do, had I thought about it when first moving. So how do I ask my friends to call me by that new name without sounding like I am trying to completely change myself?
I was going to say when you meet new people, the same way as if your name were Elizabeth, you could tell them when introduced, "My friends call me Beth." But then I saw you're wondering about existing friends. Maybe you could say, "I'm going by Beth, now." Or, "I prefer Beth. Elizabeth is just the name on official documents." I don't think it's that unusual for people to change what they want to be called. For any reason, at any time. If you change your display name on all your digital profiles, it will probably catch on quite quickly.
