Choosing a Name for our Angel Baby

This is the first installment of my 12 part series on miscarriage, which you can read about here.

This month's topic is choosing a name for a baby lost in miscarriage.

There are many views on this, and from what I have heard and read it seems to depend on the circumstance and feelings of the family who has lost the baby as to if they choose a name.  If the mother had a strong feeling about the sex of the baby, or it was already determined because the miscarriage occured later during the pregnancy, it makes sense to choose a name. 

A name allows you to refer to the baby so it has a unique identity, and also makes it possible not to say "he or she" or "it."  You can easily add the name into a prayer list, discuss the baby with children, and have a clear sense of the baby's unique identity.  (Some people choose a name that could be either male or female, but that doesn't prevent the problem of choosing "he" or "she" to describe the baby.)

Though we have considered giving the baby a name, we've decided not to name our baby but will call it our angel baby, as we do not want to assign a sex to it especially as we are unsure what it was, and do not feel the name to assign a unisex name.

We also feel calling the baby our angel allows us to concentrate on the baby's spiritual identity instead of focusing on a material existence that is not really worth contemplating over, because it will just remind us of what was "missed."

Assigning a name - especially a girl's name because I really do feel it was a girl - would remind me of all the physical experiences we lost out on having with our baby... not being able to hold her, to play with her, to watch her grow up, to teach her, to learn from her, our boys to have a sister, the list goes on.

However calling the baby our angel, reminds me that the spiritual identity is the MOST important - in fact the only important - identity, and that is why we have chosen this name.  It reminds me the baby is here always, with me in spirit, and that our souls will always be united in the spiritual realm.

So to name or not to name... it just depends on the individual circumstances of the family who has lost a baby.  For us, we will refer to the baby as our angel.

The picture in this post is the current draft of a piece of art work we are having done in our angel's honor.  I will share the final piece in a later post.

To see all posts related to miscarriage you can click here.