What's in a Name?

After one heck of a meltdown, Isaac is sleeping soundly and I have a few moments to catch up on some blogging. Quick update…we seem to be getting past some of the setbacks we’ve had with nursing. Hopefully things will continue somewhat comfortably. Isaac is starting to make more sounds, cooing and ooing and ahing. He also smiles from time to time. I’m not sure it is a real smile yet…it is usually pretty random and not in response to anything…so it is most likely gas or something…but it is still stinkin’ cute! He can follow us with his eyes for a few moments and he seems to be able to focus on things that are pretty close to him. He loves to go outside. If he is in the middle of a meltdown and I take him outside he almost always calms down instantly. He also loves car rides. He hates sneezing, spitting up and burping. He almost always cries every time he does any of those things. Okay, now on to some of my thoughts…

It is still hard to believe sometimes that all this is really true. Jamie and I were talking last week about how it kinda feels like your just playing house at first. Nope, this child is mine. He’s here and we’re parents. Everything we had hoped and prayed for over 2 plus years has become a reality. Sometimes, I feel like we had no clue what we were getting ourselves into! But we are so happy and so thankful. I cannot wait to see what God has in store for this little guy. I trust that God’s plan for him is going to include great and wonderful things.

Before Mike and I ever even thought about having children, we used to talk about the names we liked. Early on we decided that we would carry on Mike’s middle name (which is also his father’s middle name) if we ever had a son. Years later when we found out I was pregnant and then found out we were having a boy we started narrowing our list of first name choices to go with our middle name. I was happy with our decisions, but I was starting to have second thoughts.

I started considering my father and how much I wanted to pass along some little part of him. I began to actually create pressure on myself, convinced that those who knew my father would “expect” me to use his name and would think I was not interested in honoring him if I didn’t use his name. The problem was…to be quite honest…I didn’t really like his name…I mean I liked it for him…but not enough to use if for my son...especially as his first name. Since we had already agreed on a middle name, I was kinda stuck. Mike and I talked about using my dad’s name as a middle name, or even having 2 middle names, but I knew passing on his name was really important to Mike and I didn’t want to take that away from him.

So, we made our decision and I was honestly okay with it. I decided there was so much more to my father than what’s in a name and that we could easily pass on his legacy to Isaac whether he actually had his name or not. Would he honestly honor or respect my father’s memory any more if he had his name…I really don’t think so. The point of this blog is to share something that I think is a really cool gift from God. Right after Isaac was born, one of the first things that Mike said to me was “He looks like your dad!”

He really does. Isaac is a pretty good mix of Mike and my dad. I feel like this is God’s way of honoring my dad. I was so worried about the name, but He gave Isaac a little piece of my dad and we will be able to say to him “you have your grandpa’s chin and his smile” or “you look like your grandpa when you do this”. I’m so excited for that and to be able to share all the stories about my dad with Isaac.