A close friend has announced her pregnancy. We both struggled to conceive, and our shared experience brought us closer. I lost a pregnancy a few months ago in its very early stages and, though my husband and I are undergoing treatment, my prospects for conceiving are bleak.
Here is the real problem: we want the same name for our potential daughters. It’s not an odd name, but neither is it very common or trendy.
She has “won the prize”. Does that give her the right to the name, should she have a daughter? I may never have a child, so it seems only right that they should take it, but I have no way of knowing how painful it might become for me and my husband. I think that she may ask for my blessing when the time comes. What do I say?
Miscarrying a wanted pregnancy, no matter what the stage, is heartbreaking. And worse, your grief is hard for others to understand, so you are stuck with isolation on top of pain. Having a close friend announce her pregnancy at the same time is a potent cocktail of conflicting emotions: happiness for your friend, jealousy, anger, shame for feeling anger, and exhaustion from trying so hard to cover up everything you are feeling. Just know that it’s normal and try not to beat yourself up. Your friend will have to understand if you need a little distance. Your closeness can always resume at a later date – hopefully once you and your husband have a child of your own, either naturally conceived or adopted. Both options are a blessing.
The name part is tricky. I’m curious: would it have been OK with both of you to use the same name had you both become pregnant? Or if the outcome had been reversed and you had “won the prize”, would you have taken the name?
Of course it would be lovely if your friend was compassionate enough to intuit your despair and name her daughter something else, but I don’t know how important this name is to her. Is it a family name? Perhaps this is your friend’s only chance at having a child, and if that’s the case it’s understandable that she would want to name her daughter what she likes. If she comes to you for your blessing, the best you can do is tell her the truth. You really don’t know how painful it will be. It might be less than you think. I suspect when you look back on this, years from now, a name will not be the thing that matters most.
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