Bubbles
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Our guest writer today is Megan, a psychology professor living near Portland, Oregon. Megan lives with her husband and six-year-old son. She lost her baby girl James to a sudden placental abruption in April 2021. She was 37 weeks pregnant.
I always loved bubbles. There was something magical about them with their beautiful rainbow hues that would twinkle if the sun hit them just right. I would play with them for hours, watching as they floated away from my wand until I could no longer make out their shape. For my sixth birthday, my parents surprised me and took me to a bubble show (that’s actually what it was called) where a woman literally put herself inside a giant bubble. I remember thinking how safe she looked. Nothing could touch her. Bubbles were safe. Even that strange plastic wrap made up of hundreds of tiny air pockets signified protection to me. As I moved from city to city, decade to decade, those bubbles protected my most precious belongings.
Over time, those belongings, objects I had once deemed irreplaceable were in fact replaced. Not by other things but by people. My people. Shortly after getting married, I told my husband that I wished I could put him and all of our future children into a bubble. He laughed and said, “If only such a bubble existed.”
But that’s the thing. That bubble did exist and it was no ordinary bubble, but one that evolved over years and years, a womb designed by nature to keep you safe while you grew inside of me. Sometimes I would think to myself that those nine months would be the most I would ever be able to protect you. I had forgotten that bubbles can break, even the most perfect ones.
I relive every moment of that night. I remember falling into bed, trying to negotiate my enormous belly and all the oddly shaped pregnancy pillows tucked around me. I had the distinct thought that I was safe. My son was asleep in his bed and my husband next to me. You, my sweet girl, were soundly sleeping in the bubble. I had everything and everyone I needed. And just like that, I didn’t. Just like that, you were gone.
The doctors would later tell us it was an abruption — something inside had torn away, severing the connection between us. I had never even considered this word. Now it haunts me. Abruption. Bubbles break. My bubble broke. I was wrong. There is no perfect bubble. I can’t decide if that terrifies or frees me.
How has the death of your child affected your sense of ‘the order of things’? Has anything about this experience been freeing?