A Name

For the past couple weeks, my husband and I have been attempting to choose a name for our baby, which has been easier said then done.  Without knowing the gender or not yet seeing the face of our beautiful baby boy or girl, choosing the right name has been a mysterious process.  So in the meantime, I have prayed many prayers that sounded like this:  "Jesus, you have spent time with our baby face to face, please provide a name that fits him or her well."

I realize that not all parents of miscarried children choose to give their babies a name.  There is no right or wrong decision.  This is just something we have chosen to do and is meaningful to us.  However, to be honest, it didn't start out that way initially.  Shortly after we found out that we had lost our baby, I almost immediately wanted to give our baby a name.  I longed for a tangible way to acknowledge the short, but significant life of our baby.  My husband did not feel this way at that time so I respected his feelings and dropped the topic.  This is just one example of how spouses or significant others may differ in the grieving process, and although it may be difficult at the time respecting one another's differences is love in action.

About four months after our initial discussion and much prayer and patience, I gently brought up the idea to him again to see if he felt the same as before or if anything had changed.  To my surprise, he immediately responded, "Yes, let's do it", thus commencing the beginning of our name hunt.  After looking at multiple websites and reading hundreds of names, we narrowed it down to a few gender-neutral names we both liked the sound of.  However, we struggled to find a name that rang beautifully in our ears and carried significant meaning so we continued to wrestle with the idea for the next several days.

Eventually we decided to go with a first name we liked the sound of and a middle name that was meaningful to our story, our journey, and our hearts.  So this marks our first moment of publicly revealing our chosen name.  Are you ready for it?  Here is it is...

Ashton Hope

"Ashton" was one of the few names we both liked the sound of and could imagine calling our baby boy or girl.  And "Hope", we choose hope because of the hope we have chosen to cling to throughout this entire process.  Hope that God will sustain us when it feels like hope is lost.  Hope that God will heal our hearts.  Hope that God will bring beauty out of this mess.  And finally, hope that one day we will see our baby face to face.  Thank you, Jesus!

Ashton Hope, it feels so good to call you by name.  Thank you for the honor and privilege it is to be your mommy.