“Art makes you feel” and sometimes it helps us process our feelings as we work through the sadder parts of life. Today I am so honored to share with you Megan’s story and her quilt “It’s Not A Fish”. For those of us who love someone who has experienced a miscarriage or for those like myself who have been there first-hand this story resonates with the hope that connection is made on many levels and the universal truth is that we need each other and sometimes quilting in order to grieve and to move on.
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Some of my best quilts are confessional. I’m compelled to make them to help process life events. “It’s Not A Fish” is one of those quilts. It was made in 2012 after a miscarriage. I was working on a pretty row quilt for a guild challenge at the time. This quilt demanded that space and took over my creative time for nine days.
This quilt started with a nightmare. In the dream I was in the bathroom with a couple of kids as if we were having a goldfish funeral. You know, “fluffy was a good fish but I fed him too much.” Flush. When I realized that it was my miscarriage in the toilet I started screaming, “It’s not a fish, it’s not a fish!” The dream was a perfect tell. See, I had a miscarriage before the baby was even old enough to be called a fetus. It was an embryo and a secret.
Secrets, to me, can feel shameful. Once I started talking and making art about my miscarriage the burden of grief and guilt started to lift. I talked and cried with my friends and family. I sewed pieces of fabric together. I stitched the pain of loss and the hope of becoming a mother into it. I mourned my mother’s death and celebrated that she may be with that baby now. Then, taking a brave big-girl breath, I shared, “It’s Not A Fish,” with my guild.
The art itself was shared, not my story. The only information the guild got was its title. Yet, it won 3rd place in viewer’s choice that night. A woman approached me at a quilt show it was in a few months later and said, “This is about losing a child, isn’t it?” We shared a teary-eyed hug. I was shocked! It’s another layer of wonderful when something that helped me heal also touches others.
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The Quilt Naked series strives to highlight the quilts we have created that have made a difference in our lives. If you have a story you would like to share drop me a note at maddie@badassquilterssociety.com and we will work out the details.
