I've had quite a few people ask me lately how I came up with the name Little Wings Publishing.
Before I can explain this, I have to jump back to July 2022. I was 8 months pregnant and in full preparation mode for bringing my son into the world. I had IUGR (Intrauterine growth restriction) in both my pregnancies. As the name suggests, it is when the baby has growth restriction. My daughter was born in 2012, weighing a little over 2kg at 36 weeks.
This meant my second pregnancy was flagged as high risk for also being IUGR. Extra scans throughout my pregnancy revealed this was true, and by my 36-week scan, my son had dropped in the percentiles and was not growing at the rate he should be. I was booked for an induction the following week.
I planned to spend the next week making sure everything was ready: the hospital bag packed, the freezer full of food, etc. But Covid had its own plans. Since Covid-19 crashed into our world in 2020, I had managed to avoid it. That all changed when I was 37 weeks pregnant ... I'd been sick with what I thought was a cold for a few days and ended up in the hospital, where I tested positive for Covid. I spent the next few days feeling absolutely horrible. I was limited in the medications I could take due to being pregnant, and my induction date had been moved to the following week to give me time to recover.
I was full of fear ... will Covid hurt my baby? Will my placenta do enough to survive pushing the induction back a few days? Will my son keep growing? Is he going to be ok?
On Sunday, I hit rock bottom. I felt so sick ... I was so exhausted ... by now, Covid had also hit my husband and daughter. I remember sitting out on the couch with worship music playing. I was reading my bible and praying. "God, you have to help me. I can't do this. I'm so scared. I'm so exhausted. I can't deliver a baby like this. How can I bring a tiny innocent baby into a Covid-infected family?"
While reading my bible with tears streaming down my face, I came across a verse in Isaiah.
But those who trust in the Lord will find new strength.
They will soar high on wings like eagles.
They will run and not grow weary.
They will walk and not faint.
Isaiah 40:31 NLT
I held onto this verse. I even put it as the wallpaper on my phone, so every time I looked at my phone, I was reminded of it. I dug deeper into the verse. I read a devotional about what it meant to surrender and put my trust in God.
That night, I had a dream about an eagle soaring over a picturesque mountain landscape. Song lyrics were flowing through my head as the eagle soared. After a quick google I realised it was a song we would sing at church when I was a child called Eagles Wings. Can you see the theme here?
Monday at 5 pm, my husband dropped me off at the hospital. He wasn't allowed to come in because he had covid. I waddled myself and all my bags up to the hospital and waited to be admitted for my induction. My husband was allowed to come back at 8 am Tuesday morning just as they broke my waters. My labour progressed quickly, and I soon reached the point of 'I can't do this' (if you've ever been in labour, you will know what I am talking about). I was still recovering from covid, and my energy levels were already low. My husband was next to me in full PPE, and I had been told I might not get skin-to-skin with my son. We needed to keep him safe. As the contractions came fast and strong, I closed my eyes, and I could see an eagle soaring over the mountains. With each contraction, I closed my eyes and saw this eagle. It was a reminder that God was my strength. He was renewing my strength, and I could do this. With each contraction that followed, I closed my eyes and focused on the vision of the eagle. Before long, my son Nathanael had made his entrance into the world. The name Nathanael means Gift of God.
Nathanael weighed just a little 2.4 kg but was otherwise healthy. Well, he appeared healthy for the first few weeks before we ended up back in hospital when he was 3 weeks old. This is where the next part of Nate's medical journey started. I won't go into heaps of detail here because you can read about it in my other blogs.
As a result of the journey I went on as a medical parent and not being able to return to work, I started a little side business called 'Keep Soaring' I was making custom decals and products using my circuit machine. This was a way for me to bring in some extra money to help with our finances because we were struggling to live off my husband's wage and the small amount of Centrelink we were given.
In early 2024, I self-published my first children's book. This was a book about my son's oxygen journey. I launched my business 'Little Wings Publishing' to sell my books.
So, if you have read this far, you may now see the link between my business being born from my son's medical journey and the promise God gave me using the eagle. Eagles have wings and my business was aimed at children's books. The word little often comes along when we think of children. I wanted to use a different name to my previous 'Keep Soaring' but stick to the eagle theme. So that is how Little Wings Publishing was created!
