Layla Grace

For a few years now, ok more like 10 years now I've had the idea that if I ever had a baby girl I'd really like to name her Layla Grace. Layla is Egyptian for Born in Night and Grace is Latin for Blessing from God. Regardless of whether or not my child was born at night it would be born from the darkness which is the infertility issue that I've known I've had since before I knew I'd someday marry and be actually able to concieve. For me infertility was my darkness and the name like my faith in God held flecks of hope for me. "Born in the darkness, a blessing from God" would be my daughter.

Not long after my husband and I started the dating part of our relationship we talked about kids a lot. I thought I'd scare him off for good but as it turns out he was willing to discuss a lot of the future without getting so much as a wrinkle on his forehead. We talked about baby names a few times, luckily for me he had no preconcieved names he wanted to use. So when I told him I liked unique rock song sounding names he said "like what?" and when I said Layla he said... oh I like that. That was it. It was decided. It was decided before the wedding bells, it was decided before the two pink lines, it was fact. (Once there were two pink lines I of course gave him the option to back out but he didn't. We liked the name and we were using it.)

A few months before out wedding I sat at a table with Jon's mother and my sister-in-laws and we talked about baby names. At the time I brought up the name Layla and one of my sister in laws confessed she almost used the name for her newborn daughter, one had no interest in the name and the other one said her first pick name was Nicole. I sighed a great sigh of relief. I was safe.

I was safe until January. In January, I was joking with my sister in law (formerly found of the name Nicole) she informed me that she was both pregnant and planning on using my baby name. I didn't panic. She might have a boy. Until yesterday, I held hope. I never prayed about it. I never really worried about it. I thought God had my back, I thought my sister-in-law would see my overwhelming desire to use the name and drop it, I thought a lot... but I should have picked a battle.

Now I wait, I wait to see if the baby in my stomach is also a girl. I wait to see if this is going to be an issue. Because I know it will be an issue. My husband and I have talked and we are using our name either way. (Assuming of course it's a girl).

My sister-in-law is the kind that will probably make drama out of this. But really, isn't my & my husbands wishes for our daughter more important than what she wants... we think so, too. At first I told myself it wasn't Christian to want a name so badly you'd yell at someone about it. Then I decided the not Christian part was just the yelling. So there will be no discussing- only doing.

I guess now is when she starts praying I have a boy.