Christopher-Reid.com

For the first 27 years of my life I was known as Chris Barber not Chris Reid

I WAS BORN as Chris Reid, lets get that straight. That is the name on my birth certificate but it was not the name I used growing up in the working class suburb of Hilton near Fremantle, Western Australia.

The beginning:

When my mother was a teenager she met a young merchant sailor from Greece or Yugoslavia (my mum cannot remember) who’s name was Christopher and was in port for less than 2 weeks.

They had a short affair, Christopher left and my mum became pregnant.

She decided she would raise me on her own as a single mum which of course wasn’t easy back in 1975.

So I was born as Christopher Michael Reid because that is the name of my mum.

Thanks mum for giving me life!

How I became Chris Barber:

A short time after I was born (less than 1 year) my mum met a man named Allan Barber and they got married.

They had a son (Ronald, my brother) and I became Chris Barber by default.

Less than 2 years of marriage and my mum Debbie and Allan split up, leaving Debbie with 2 young boys to raise on her own. She continued to use the name Barber.

As I went through pre-school, primary school (Hilton Primary), high school (South Fremantle High School), and junior football (Fremantle Hawks) I just assumed that name and never did much about it because you don’t when you are just a kid. You just accept the way things are.

Debbie had 2 more children, Neil and Katrina, both to separate fathers and now had 4 children, all from different men and all using the name Barber.

How things changed:

At 16 years of age I moved out of home, became a street kid in Perth for a while, met some nice people with dreams and a better outlook on life then I was brought up with who helped me out of that situation and slowly I started to see life differently.

At 19 I caught a Greyhound bus to Sydney and arrived with nothing more than a copy of my birth certificate and around $200 in my pocket.

I got work in bars and in the fashion industry and worked hard for 2 years before I managed to get myself into a TAFE course.

I paid my way through 4 years of fashion design school (still as Chris Barber,) when I finished I just kept working and saving with the idea to leave Sydney and travel around the world.

Becoming Chris Reid:

It was the decision to travel that led me to change my name from Chris Barber to Chris Reid.

As I needed a passport to travel, and I had my birth extract I came to the decision to become known as my rightful name of Chris Reid.

To get my passport I needed to use my original birth certificate and that is when I realized that I am and always have been Chris Reid and simply started calling myself by that name.

Time flies:

What is interesting is that using the name Chris Barber was a decision by my mum, it was not written in law. Changing my name to Chris Reid was a decision by me that took a long time to make, and has essentially felt like giving away an old life that was full of let downs and disappointments.

Since returning to my original name I have come to realize that what happens to us in life and what we make those events to mean are two separate things.

Whether I was Chris Reid or Chris Barber, I still have experiences and memories that make me uniquely who I am today.

An Exciting Future:

With the internet and Social Media sites like Facebook available to connect us with our past friends and relatives, I realize that through all my schooling, jobs and sporting teams, I have met thousands of people over the first 27 years of my life, and if any of them were to try and find me, they wouldn’t be able to because Chris Barber just disappeared.

So I decided to make this post with the hope that I can get it to show in the search engine results for Chris Barber so any old friends, team mates, school friends, family and work colleagues who look for me can find me, know what happened and get in touch with me.

We all have stories of how our life has evolved, and this is part of mine. Through self discovery and personal growth I have come to accept my unique life so far and to embrace its lessons that have helped to shape who I am.

I am not ashamed, embarrassed or resentful, in fact quite the opposite. I am a positive, healthy happy young guy with the world at my feet and my experiences have allowed me to meet amazing people and to experience life unlike most will ever have the chance.

So if you are an old friend of Chris Barber, you are my friend still. I just have a new name, my original name of Christopher Michael Reid.

Please contact me, it will be great to catch up with you and share our life experiences.

All the best Chris Reid.

**Please do me a favor by retweeting this and share it on Facebook. It just my help me to connect with an old long lost friend again.

And leave me your thoughts below. I would love to know what you are thinking.

Thankyou.

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