When I woke up to the pregnancy announcement about my favourite star of The White Lotus, Aubrey Plaza, I thought, “That was quick!” The social media comments confirmed what I suspected: everyone has an opinion about how the 41-year-old actress, whose husband Jeff Baena died by suicide last year, should grieve. Plaza and Baena separated several months before his death, and she is now expecting her first child with new partner Christopher Abbott. But I’m the last person who should be judging another widow’s decision.
When I was 34, I spent Valentine's Day in a hospital bed, two curtains down from my husband Erik's. I was hospitalised for losing too much blood while miscarrying our baby; he was there for what would become a terminal cancer diagnosis. When he died 18 months later, I looked out over the infinite blank canvas of my future and saw nothing. The seedlings of the life I had built were ripped out, and there was no Plan B.
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