My name is Liana Hale, and like most mothers with their first child, I was obsessed with developmental milestones.
First laugh, first crawl, first tooth — I recorded everything in a cute diary with watercolour rabbits on the cover.
But most of all, I waited for her first word.
My daughter Ella was just over ten months old when it happened.
It was a Sunday morning.
We were visiting my mother — Ella’s grandmother — in upstate New York.
I was in the kitchen making coffee, still in my pyjamas, while my mother and Ella were sitting in the living room.
The television was on, showing some children’s cartoon I didn’t recognise — bright colours, squeaky voices, the usual chaos.
And then I heard it.
Ella pointed at the screen and shouted loudly:
‘Bimbo!’
I froze with the mug in my hand.
‘What did she just say?’ I shouted.
Mum laughed:
‘I think she said “bimbo”! That’s hilarious!’
I walked into the room, confused.
‘She doesn’t even babble like that. Usually it’s “baba” or “da-da”. Where did that come from?’
Mum shrugged, rocking Ella on her lap:
‘She probably heard it in that cartoon.’
I looked at the screen.
On it, a cartoon dog in a blue raincoat was flying back and forth and shouting:
‘Go, go, go, Bimbo!’
‘Oh my God,’ I muttered.
At first, I laughed.
We both laughed.
I filmed her saying it again — Ella pointed at the screen again and shouted ‘Bimbo!’ as if it were her best friend.
I thought it would be a funny story someday.
But that night, when I told my husband Marcus about it, he turned pale.
‘She said what?’ he asked.
I showed him the video on my phone.
He watched it twice, then slowly looked at me:
‘Liana, that’s… weird.’
‘It’s just the name of a character.’
He shook his head:
‘No, I’m saying it’s weird because my mum used to call me Bimbo.’
My heart sank.
‘What?’
‘When I was little. It was my nickname. I don’t even remember why — maybe from some book. She stopped calling me that when I was about five. I haven’t heard it in decades.’
‘Does she watch this cartoon?’
‘No.’ I think it only came out a couple of years ago.
We both stared at Ella, who was chewing on the ear of a stuffed giraffe.
Marcus continued in a quiet voice:
‘It’s not a common name. I’ve literally never heard anyone else use it. It’s… weird.’
The next day, my curiosity got the better of me.
I searched for the cartoon — Brave Bimbo — and found several parenting forums.
Most were typical reviews: ‘Too loud,’ ‘My kid likes it,’ ‘Cool colours.’
But one comment caught my attention.
Does anyone else find this cartoon creepy? My little one says ‘Bimbo’ even when the TV is off. We hardly ever turn it on, but it’s as if she remembers something I thought she hadn’t seen.
I scrolled further and found similar comments.
A whole thread of parents said that their children had become strangely obsessed with this dog character.
Some said that their children had started talking in their sleep.
One mother even wrote that her son kept drawing the same character, even though he hadn’t seen that episode again.
I showed this to Marcus.
‘That’s not normal,’ he whispered.
We decided not to let Ella watch the cartoon anymore, even though she had only seen it once — at my mum’s house.
But then a second strange moment happened.
We were talking to my mum on video call a few days later, and Ella reached for the phone and shouted again:
‘Bimbo!’
My mum laughed:
‘She still remembers!’
I asked cautiously:
‘Mum… have you ever used that word before? Ever?’
She hesitated:
‘Actually… yes. When you were little, your grandmother used to call you that. I just remembered that now.’
‘What? Why?’
‘I don’t know. I never wondered about it. I just thought it was a made-up nickname.’
Something clicked in my head.
I took out the box of childhood photos that I had inherited after my grandmother’s death last year.
One photo caught my attention — a black-and-white picture of my great-grandmother holding a chubby baby.
On the back was written:
‘My dear Bimbo, 1938.’
I called my mum again.
‘Mum, look. That name has been in our family for at least four generations.’
She narrowed her eyes:
‘Wow.’
“So… it’s not about the cartoon. Ella didn’t just repeat what she heard. She KNEW that name. Somehow.
To be honest, it scared me a little.
Because it wasn’t just her first word anymore.
It was a name passed down through generations of women, whispered through time.
A name that wasn’t on paper, wasn’t in books.
It was simply remembered.
And now, somehow, my little girl had brought it back.
In the weeks that followed, Ella stopped saying that word.
She finally said ‘mummy,’ then ‘dog,’ ‘book,’ and ‘no’ (her favourite).
But sometimes, when playing with the stuffed dog that once belonged to me, she looks at it and whispers something under her breath.
I don’t always hear it clearly.
But once, I swear, I heard it.
‘Bimbo.’
Now it doesn’t seem scary to me anymore.
It seems beautiful to me.
Because maybe language isn’t just something you learn.
Maybe it’s inherited.
Maybe some memories live deep in our bones, waiting for the right soul to awaken them.
So yes, my child’s first word wasn’t ‘mummy’.
It was a name that no one thought anyone knew.
But it was always ours.
