Abby's Story - Part 10: Becoming Abigail Marie Colby

I mentioned in a previous post that Cheyenne had named her daughter Jenai Marie Cox. I also mentioned that when I first talked to Cathy she said that one of Cheyenne's requests was that she keep her name. But she also said that wasn't a demand, that it didn't have to be that way. And she also indicated she didn't really like the name. My initial reaction was that I didn't like Jenai at all, but I liked Marie so I told Cathy then that if we were to adopt her we would probably change her first name and keep Marie.

Ryan also didn't like the name Jenai so he didn't really want to keep it either. We never actually had a conversation with Cheyenne about the name but she knew we didn't like Jenai and would be changing it. Oh wait, that isn't true. I did have one conversation with Cheyenne about the name while she was still in the hospital, but that happened after Cheyenne had mentioned a few times in emails that she knew we didn't like the name.

So I had a few reasons for wanting to change her name:
1) When Ryan and I were first considering adoption we met with a social worker at LDS Family Services just to ask some questions and learn more about how it works with them. This was in June of 2008 (it happened to be on our 5th anniversary) so more than a year before we actually felt right about adopting and started the process. I had several questions (one of the most important being did they ever pressure girls to place for adoption - which was a big deal to me because if I adopted I needed to know that the baby was being placed because that was the decision of the birth parents, no on else.) One of those questions was about naming the child. I wanted to know if the baby had already been named by the birth parents if we would be able to change it, or how naming typically worked. I don't know if it is true of all adoptive parents but naming my child was important to me. As an adoptive parent it felt like there was so much I wasn't a part of - I didn't get to be part of the creation or birth story. I wanted to be able to name her. He assured us that even if the birth parents named the child it was still the adoptive parents right to change the name to whatever they wanted. All this to say that even before I knew anything about what Cheyenne named her I wanted the opportunity to name my child.
2) I didn't like the name Jenai. In truth, it did grow on me over time, but I never loved it. I did love Marie though. Marie is a name I had already wanted to name one of my kids. I just like the name for one thing. Also, my first name is Mary but for some reason a lot of people have thought my name was Amanda Marie, so in a way I felt like naming her Marie was like naming her after me. Also, Marie is an M name. My sisters and I all have M names - I like M names.
3) No one knows how to pronounce Jenai when just reading it, and hearing it no one would know how to spell it. (How are you pronouncing it as you read it? Is it a challenge for you? Well, it is pronounced like Janae, except I at the end instead of A.) I think that is hard on a kid.
4) I wanted to name my children either after someone in the scriptures or after a family member, or both.

Ryan and I didn't have 9 months to discuss names, we didn't even have 1 month, in fact, we didn't really discuss names at all. We had decided right away that we would change her name, but didn't even discuss what we would change it to.

I don't know how Cheyenne picked the name Jenai. I had never heard of it before. But it means "Gift of God" and that is one of the reasons Cheyenne really liked it, she felt her baby was her gift from God, and she is. I mentioned before how once I learned about Abby I didn't sleep so well. One night while I was up I looked up what names meant "Gift of God". I don't remember any of the other ones but Michaela also means it, and is one of my favorite names. The next day at the hospital I told Cheyenne I knew she loved Jenai because of its meaning but that Michaela also meant it, and we liked Michaela much better. She said Michaela was too common, she liked Jenai because it was unique. Well, since she didn't really like it and I didn't really want to have a double M name I decided against Michaela. (That was our one conversation about names.)

So during another sleepless night I looked up the meanings of Biblical names and picked out a few that I liked. I then looked at a family history sheet that I have to see which of those Biblical names were also family names. There were 3 that stood out that I really liked: Anna, Hannah, and Abigail. (Mary is the most common family name - hence my name - but Mary Marie wouldn't work.) I liked all their Biblical stories as well.

Anna was the prophetess that saw Christ in the temple. Hannah was the woman who pled for years with the Lord to bless her with a child and when she was given Samuel she turned him over to the Lord (I could relate to her). And Abigail was the lady who interceded on behalf of her husband when, after he offended David and David wanted to wage war on them, she pled with David to forgive her husband and took his blame on herself (in effect, she was the savior of her husband, his intercessor - she was a foreshadowing of the atonement.)

The next day I told Ryan the names. He said he didn't like Hannah, he liked Anna okay, but he liked Abigail best. So that is what we decided on - a 15 second conversation.

We wanted to test it out in our heads for a while before we fully committed to it. We did tell our families that is what we thought we would name her, but while she was in the hospital we never called her that, we didn't want to upset Cheyenne. But we also never called her Jenai - we just called her Baby Girl. Once we brought her home we didn't really consider any other names for her - Abigail stuck.

Cheyenne knew that we would change her name, and I knew that would be hard on her. I did encourage her to always call her Jenai. I thought it would be cute for her to have her own name for her. But she hasn't - she calls her Abby or Abigail. I first told her what we were naming her that first Monday out of the hospital when we were on our way to drop her off after taking pictures. She said she liked it - that made me happy.

Cheyenne has the original birth certificate and on it her name is Jenai Marie Cox. We can't get a new birth certificate or legally change her name until after the adoption is finalized - which will be on October 12th. Then she will legally be Abigail Marie Colby. On October 13th we will have Abby sealed to us in the temple - this will be a promise from God that she will be our daughter not only in this life, but in the eternities as well. On October 14th Ryan will give her a baby blessing, and at the beginning of it he will give her her name which will mean that her name will be recorded in the records of the church as Abigail Marie Colby. We are very much looking forward to that weekend!!!