West-coast Japanese Americans were seen as the enemy and incarcerated in “relocation centers” = “concentration camps” after Japan bombed Pearl Harbor in 1941. When my parents met and were married after World War II, they, like many of their Japanese American peers focused on being seen as ALL AMERICAN; when they had kids, our names reflected this desire: Joyce Lynn, Susan Jean, John Douglass, Sheila Jan Okamoto. (More about this in future posts.)

When I married Tom Lane, it didn’t occur to me that I could/would do anything other than take my husband’s last name, so I became Susan Jean Lane. For years after, when I saw my full name, I wondered, “Who is that?”. It felt like an important part of me had been erased.

I contemplated changing my name, practicing writing out different versions, and began informally going by Susan Okamoto Lane, but there’s a big difference between informal usage and legally changing one’s name (even just one’s middle name!).

**Daunting**

Think about the myriad of cards you might have in your wallet: Driver’s License, school or work ID, Social Security card, charge cards, library card, medical insurance, PLUS changing one’s name with your employer/school and all your medical providers (I have a lot!).

Finally as a gift to myself for my 60th birthday (see title of previous post), I gave myself a legal name change: Susan Okamoto Lane.

Sundee Tucker Frazier expressed what my name change meant to me in her book, “Check All That Apply: Finding Wholeness as a Multiracial Person”:

“You can’t change your identity, but you can change how you identify.

Accept who you are and then be who you want to be.”