31/10/2021
The Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness month is nearly over, but having been that 1 in 4 women myself just over a year ago, I’d still like to share some thoughts.
For those of you who don’t know, I had a “missed” miscarriage in August 2020 - that weird summer in-between lockdowns. A missed miscarriage is when the embryo stops having a heart beat, but your body doesn’t react to it straight away and it continues to produce hormones that make you feel pregnant.
As a therapist specialising in women’s health, I was very well aware of the incredibly high chances that my little embryo wouldn’t make it past the first 12 weeks. I remember thinking “I’m totally prepared to the fact that it could happen, it’s very common and it doesn’t mean I can’t get pregnant again soon after anyway”. That was my way of trying to preemptively prepare and protect myself, basically just focussing on the scientific side of the story - because everybody knows that you shouldn’t get excited until you’ve had your 12 weeks’ scan!
The truth is, no matter how much you’ve read about how often and why miscarriages happen, nothing can prepare you to the emotional rollercoaster that losing a pregnancy can be. I’ve personally gone from hope (maybe the sonographer was wrong?), to guilt (maybe I did something wrong?), to sadness (I will never meet my baby..), to confusion (why is my body not getting rid of it?), to anger (why did it have to be so painful and scary?), to discouragement (god knows when I’ll get pregnant again!), to awkwardness (“hi friends, you didn’t even know I was pregnant but I’ve just had a miscarriage - good luck coming up with something to say”), to loneliness (I don’t know who to turn to).
Thankfully I was lucky enough to get pregnant again less than 3 months later (as it’s often the case) and I love my beautiful baby boy to bits, but that’s not going to help anyone through their grieving process.
What I’d like to say instead is that, because I’ve been there, I would be more than happy to talk/listen/support in any way I can anyone who finds themselves in the same situation and feels as lost as I did ❤️
