A Name and a Blessing

Lily and mommy snuggling in the hospital bed

Tuesday night Craig and I came up to the hospital to visit Lily. While we were here she had quite a few desats (her oxygen saturation declined drastically) and was having a hard time coming back from them. In fact, Lily's been fading away a tiny bit every day. Watching her last night it was so apparent that she's ready to go home, to her heavenly home. The nurses told us that they weren't sure she'd make it through the night. So they set up a private room for us in the NICU so we could spend time with her before she left.

While they were setting up the room we decided to go ahead and give her a name and a blessing. Now, we'd already named her Lily Grace Church and filled out the birth certificate paperwork as such so she did already have a name. Giving her "a name and a blessing" is a tradition we do in our church (The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints); it's our way of formally presenting the baby before the Lord and having her name put on church records. We don't believe it's necessary for her to go to heaven or anything like that. It's just a nice gesture and a little milestone in the baby's life. Usually it's done at church on Sunday by a few men who are either members of the family or close friends. But since we didn't think Lily would be around for very long Craig went ahead and did it himself. Just before he did it we both decided to change Lily's middle name to Jane, in honor of a certain nurse who has loved our baby with all her heart and looked after her as if she were her own. There were so many nights we were comforted knowing that Jane was looking after our baby; there was no one we'd rather have. So I must apologize for the previous post announcing Miss Lily Grace Church. I should have said Miss Lily Jane Church. It sounds right, doesn't it? I love it.

Lily and her namesake, Jane

After the blessing we took Lily into our private room and unplugged all her monitors and tubes. She was so beautiful! We always think she's beautiful, but she's just so precious without all her accessories. We snuggled up with her on the bed and spent the night drifting in and out of sleep. We really enjoyed the time we've had with her in our little room. It's sweet to just watch her sleep. And, as it turns out, she decided to stick around for a bit. She's still with us and has been doing great so far. But Tuesday night made us re-evaluate everything and what our goals are for her little life and how she'll pass away. We're still making some decisions, but, as always, we'll keep updating the blog as events unfold.

Lily's photo shoot