The Bell Jar: everything I Googled for the first four months of my baby's life

Background: Being pregnant, giving birth, and parenting are often challenging; however, the COVID-19 pandemic introduced new anxiety and forms of isolation for pregnant people and parents. This research project used digital autoethnography to investigate and map the types of anxiety experienced by a first-time mother confined to an inner-city apartment for the first four months of her baby's life due to Victoria’s pandemic response and its second 112-day lockdown (the longest continuous lockdown worldwide). Contribution: ‘The Bell Jar: everything I Googled for the first four months of my baby's life’ is both a poem and a small sculpture. Slender canvas strips, cut up and stuffed into a bell jar, feature text in capital letters (like the news ticker or crawlers we diligently watched as the pandemic unfolded). The text records everything I Googled during the first four months of my baby's life, illustrating how the lack of direct contact with family members and mother’s groups, along with reduced hours and visits by maternal health nurses because of pandemic lockdowns, led to a reliance on digital platforms and search engines like Google. The text reflects the constant anxiety and questions that often come with new parenthood, as well as how pandemic-related worries further intensified these concerns. Significance: This work was published on the front cover of issue 96 of Street Cake—an online magazine for experimental writing.