Before we start, a quick disclaimer: we’re not sharing her actual name yet.
My family has always believed that telling too many people the baby’s name before they’re born is bad luck. Is there any evidence to support this? Not that I’m aware of. Am I willing to test the theory with my first child? Absolutely not.
Call me superstitious, call me paranoid, call me a first-time mom. Whatever the case, the name is staying under wraps for now. But I can tell you the story of how we chose it.
When I first got pregnant, I was convinced I’d be having a boy.
We already had a boy name picked out over a year ago. In fact, if we ever do have a son someday, we still plan on using it. So when we found out we were having a girl, we suddenly realized we had absolutely no idea what to name her.
Picking a girl’s name was surprisingly hard.
For a while, I was obsessed with floral names. Willow. Daisy. Rose. Then I swung completely in the opposite direction and started loving regal names like Elizabeth, Charlotte, and Francesca. I swear Hector and I went over like more than 100 names. Every name one of us loved, the other wasn’t completely sold on.
Eventually, we found ourselves returning to something that mattered more than finding the prettiest name on a baby name list: family.
I’ve written before about my complicated relationship with my biological father and my relationship with my stepdad. Patrick may be my father, but Efrain is my dad.
Efrain never tried to replace anyone. He never demanded the title of dad. He simply showed up, over and over again, for years. He sat through the disappointments. He listened when I cried. He celebrated my successes. He loved me without ever making me earn it.
As we were discussing names, I kept thinking about the people I wanted my daughter to grow up knowing she came from.
And if I’m being honest, becoming a parent has made me look at my own parents differently.
I’ve always said that I don’t want to beg my biological father to be a part of my life. Now that I’m pregnant, I don’t want to beg him to be a part of my daughter’s life either. I want him to want to be there, but after all these years, I know that’s probably not something I can control.
What I can control is recognizing the people who have shown up.
The funny thing is that Efrain knew I was pregnant before I even told my parents. I called to share the news, and before I could get the words out, he asked, “You’re pregnant, aren’t you?”
I was completely shocked.
The thing is, calling my parents isn’t unusual. I talk to my mom almost every day, so it wasn’t some obvious giveaway. Somehow, he just knew.
And that’s kind of who he’s always been.
Present. Paying attention. Invested.
Pregnancy has brought up a lot of emotions I wasn’t expecting. It’s made me think about the kind of parent I want to be. It’s made me appreciate my mom and Efrain even more. And yes, it’s made me more angry with my biological father than I have been in years.
Because now that I’m preparing to raise a child, I understand even less how someone can choose not to be there.
I know parenting is hard. I know people make mistakes. But I also know what showing up looks like because I had someone who did.
So when it came time to choose our daughter’s name, we went back to family.
We chose a name inspired by the man who taught me that being a dad isn’t about biology. It’s about consistency. It’s about love. It’s about showing up.
And that’s a legacy worth passing on.
