Baby Cakes is an exploration of women’s relationship to loss and birth, the hypocrisies of motherhood, and the death of loved ones.
A group of women who have all lost children cope with that loss by attending support meetings at a local church. HELEN, a new addition to the group and a recent transplant to Pennsylvania, creates tension and raises suspicion within the well-established bunch with her reticence to open up about her past. Helen tries to win over the women’s affections using her astounding baking skills, but it only creates more distance, especially as the annual community fair approaches and the women are asked to participate in a bake sale. Helen, feeling isolated by the women, starts paying her cable guy, TIM, to come over and keep her company, probing him about the town and its inhabitants. Tim, unfortunately (and unbeknownst to Helen), happens to be the begrudged ex-husband of one of the group mothers, and tries to use the information to get closer to his estranged ex. The other women simultaneously struggle with their own personal lives. SARAH is attending night school and getting very little sleep, MARY is feeling more and more distant from her husband, PAM and TONYA are dealing with menopause and LYNN is trying to convince people to attend her yoga classes. Tim, in an act of desperation, follows his ex-wife, Sarah, to class, revealing Helen’s personal struggle with infertility. Sarah confides in the other group mothers about both Helen and Tim, causing infuriation and confusion. On the day of the fair, the women confront Helen about never having a child which they feel is a betrayal to the sanctity of the group and belittles their pain. Helen explains that she doesn’t have the ability to conceive, which she feels is just as tragic as losing a living child. The group must then grapple with the exclusivity of loss and what it means to be a mother.