Wishbone

I think it was right around Janae’s first birthday…we were in the library one day and there was a beautiful little girl with blonde bouncy curls and an adorable fur coat and hat…the epitome of femininity. Her mommy called to her, “Kerrigan, it’s time to go!” I immediately loved the name. I had only heard it as a last name, Olympian Nancy Kerrigan. But as a first name...wow, gorgeous! But alas, I knew that we weren’t planning to have anymore children with all the issues we had dealt with during pregnancy, delivery and the weeks following delivery. Nooo thanks! But if we want more children, we’d consider adopting. And if we adopt, well, of course, we would want a boy. So nope, no Kerrigan being used here. Why couldn’t I have heard that name a year ago?

Two years later, we got the surprise of our lives…and that is another LONG story. But in short, we found out we were expecting a child. And so the name game began again.

I was extremely sick and had a very strong feeling that it was a girl before they did the ultrasound. But just in case, we were able to quickly decide on a boy’s name…Cale Jordan Andrés. Tony always wanted to do the initial thing…C.J. so here was his chance (slim though it was!)

Now you would think after all the thoughts presented at the beginning of this post, that the girl’s name would be a no-brainer. But realizing that this was mostly likely going to be our very last child, we really wanted to put a lot of thought into this last chance. Many of the names that we had considered and abandoned with the previous pregnancies came to the surface…Samara, Brooklyn, Mariah, Jessamyn, and more. We finally narrowed it down to Kerrigan Brook or Jessamyn Kate but we just couldn’t decide on a final name.

Thanksgiving came and went. My parents sent us home with the wishbone…for the girl’s to wish on when it dried. Suddenly I had a brainstorm. Britnee loved the name Jessamyn Kate and Janae loved Kerrigan Brook, so why not settle it this way? Whoever pulled the biggest side of the wishbone got to name the baby. Looking back, I can see how totally cruel it was to pit one child against the other in this monumental decision. But at the time I thought desperate times called for desperate measures.

So, we were all standing in the kitchen. Rules for play had been explained. Britnee, age 5 yrs 5 months and Janae, age 2 years 11 months stood poised with wishbone between them; Mom on one side; Dad on the other. We counted off and held our breath. Neither Tony nor I knew until that exact moment which name we REALLY wanted to win. We were a bundle of nerves, certain that Britnee, being the oldest, would pull off the biggest piece.

SNAP! The wishbone broke and we were afraid to look. But wait! What?!?! Janae stood with her whole side of the wishbone and half of the other side proudly in her hand like a little Statue of Liberty! Janae?!?! Janae is the winner? Kerrigan Brook would be the baby’s name! Tony and I breathed a collective sigh of relief. And there was never another thought of changing our minds.


Editor’s note: Britnee’s psyche was not permanently affected by this cruel baby-naming method. Also, the Derscheid’s have decided that should they ever get another surprise they should reject any thoughts of male names starting with “C” as well as the middle name Andrés in hopes of getting a boy.