I changed my name because I want to be happy.

I’ve been fortunate and blessed to have made it through what I hope was the most difficult period of my life.

And the name that I had — that was given to me soon after I was born — is not a name that I chose, and is a name so heavily burdened with memories of loneliness, trauma and depression.

Max is who I am now, and Max is who I choose to be.

We all change, when you think about it, we’re all different people; all through our lives, and that’s okay, that’s good, you’ve gotta keep moving, so long as you remember all the people that you used to be.

— Matt Smith as The Doctor, Doctor Who (“The Time of the Doctor” (2013))