I wrote a memoir, and my character’s name is different than mine by Brandi Dredge

Can a wife say she is a wife if the law identifies her as her husband’s victim? Can a mother say she is a mother if her child’s DNA is evidence of the crime? Can a woman love the same life she pities?

Yes, a wife can be a wife and a victim.

Yes, a mother can be a mother, and her child can be a crime.

Yes, a woman can love her life and pity it at the same time.

I can answer those questions with confidence today, but in 2015, I couldn’t because I didn’t know how to hold two truths at the same time when it came to my life. I believed one had to cancel out the other, that if I accepted one as truth, then by default, the other couldn’t be true, I thought it had to be either/or, but something happened when I unknowingly went on the healing journey of writing a memoir, I learned of the power of yes/and.

Yes/and it meant I could accept the truth of what happened to me and embrace who I was. Yes/and meant acceptance of the version of myself I created to survive and the release of that version to be who I am. Yes/and represented the freedom found in change, and as I continued writing my story, change is what I wanted to make.

“You can’t change your own name in your memoir; that will never fly in this industry because it’s your story.”  Well-meaning advice from a writing mentor responding to the question I had asked her about changing my name as I was working on the fourth draft of Girl, Uncoded. I respected her guidance; she had a twenty-year history in the industry I hadn’t yet entered because, at this point, I hadn’t published anything.

She went on to tell me how we can and should change the names of all the people in the story who could be negatively affected by what is written, but when it came to changing the name of the memoirist, it was an absolute no-go and that I could consider writing under a pen name or changing the manuscript to fiction.  Not wanting to betray the genre or its readers or be the debut author of a memoir that completely disregarded the rules, I turned to the internet to make sense of why I couldn’t because the whispers of knowledge from within were saying I should.

I found articles, books, and videos that offered much of the same advice as my mentor’s. The emphasis was on changing the names of the other characters in the story, never specifically on changing the name of the memoirist unless it was pertaining to writing under a pen name. Most cited legal reasons as to why you should change the names of the characters; I understood that, but my desire to change my character’s name was to honor my path of healing and reflect the power of letting go.

With memoir writing, it has been said that there comes a point while crafting your story where you realize that you are no longer writing for yourself; you are writing for the reader to apply their own understanding of their own experience to your story. The fourth draft is when I realized I was writing to give someone else the courage to release their secrets too, and by the time I signed with She Writes Press in early 2023, with draft six in hand, I knew that I (Brandi) was the only one who could write my memoir, but I also knew I didn’t need to live in it any longer.

A few months later, I had a conversation with Brooke Warner, the publisher, about my desire to change my name in the story, and she thought there was a precedent for it.

Yes/and that is what I heard.

So, in the final manuscript, Brandi gets to release the story, and Caroline gets to take the readers of Girl, Uncoded, on an unforgettable journey through it.

Author Bio:

Brandi Dredge is a mom, encourager, and author dedicated to empowering survivors through storytelling and service. Her journey is a testament to resilience, and she shares her experiences to inspire and uplift others facing similar challenges. She enjoys swimming in the deep end of mystical thoughts, wading into emotions to pen poetry, and sipping a strong cup of coffee. She is a member of The National Association of Memoir Writers, The Junior League, and the National Coalition to End Child Marriage, contributing her voice to important causes close to her heart.