Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness Month 2020 and a Useful Tool

It’s October again which means it is Infant and Pregnancy Loss Awareness month. There have been some high profile stories in the media this year which reminds us how many of us are touched by loss. It is so much more common than we wish it were.

One thing that I want to focus on this year is the concept that there is a better or a worse time to lose a child. When someone has a miscarriage they are often told that at least it was early and how much worse it would have been if they lost the baby at a later time. Like so many hurtful things that get said to women who are struggling to have a baby, this sentiment is usually meant to be helpful and supportive but can be devastating to hear. I find that it is often said by people who have not experienced pregnancy loss.

One in four pregnancies end in miscarriage, which is defined as the loss of a pregnancy before 20 weeks (after the 20 week mark it is considered stillbirth). That means that twenty-five percent of us will go through it. And yet it feels like such a lonely and bespoke tragedy when it happens to us. We don’t like to talk about it. We keep our pregnancies quiet until we pass that apparently magical point of 12 weeks when we have been told it’s “safe” to share our news.

I lost my first pregnancy at 12 weeks. It was at the scan after which I was planning to start telling people that Matt and I were having a baby. It was after our very first IVF and I was feeling a little smug about the fact that it had worked the first time and that we had beaten the odds. I had weeks and weeks of imagining what the rest of my pregnancy would be like, of knowing the due date and thinking about how old the baby would be at Christmastime and how we would celebrate, of thinking up names and planning how I would deal with specific parenting challenges. And then in an instant, it was all taken away. No heartbeat. No growth in 2 weeks. This baby was gone. Nothing can prepare you for that and I was devastated.

I was lost. Matt and I were due to move from San Francisco to Abu Dhabi just 10 days later. Somehow I found the idea of leaving behind everything and everyone I knew to start a new life in a new country very comforting. But knowing I was going to have to start the IVF journey all over again in a place I was completely unfamiliar with was daunting. (It was that experience that led me to start IVF Support UAE a few years later, but that’s another story)

When, 2 IVFs later, I was lucky enough to get pregnant again with twins I could never really relax into the pregnancy. I referred to my twins as “clumps of cells” for months, refusing to let myself take for granted that they would be born healthy. I resented my friends who had gotten pregnant easily and never doubted that they would give birth to their babies. I was envious of their naiveté. I wanted it for myself. That is the legacy of miscarriage. It robs you of the innocent joy of certainty.

If you have had a miscarriage you are allowed to feel the real grief that it brings. If you decide to tell people about it you might want to prepare yourself to hear some unhelpful things. In an attempt to comfort you people may try to put a positive spin on it by saying things like “at least you know you can get pregnant”, “you can always try again”, or the one that bothers me the most, “everything happens for a reason.” Very often people don’t know what to say and they worry about saying the wrong thing. I really don’t think that people ever mean to say hurtful things but that doesn’t mean that you are responsible to try to make them feel better if they do. Your only responsibility in the wake of a miscarriage is to take care of yourself, both emotionally and physically.

I find the Silk’s Ring Theory to be especially helpful.

1. Draw a circle and put your name in it.
2. Next draw a larger circle around the first one and put the name of the closest person to you (usually your spouse)
3. In each larger ring put the names of the next closest people (parents and other children come before more distant relatives, intimate friends in smaller rings, less intimate friends in larger rings)

This is known as your Kvetching Order.

Here are the rules:

The person in the middle can say anything they want to anyone in the outer circles. They can complain, cry, whine, or moan. Everyone else can say those things too but only to people in the larger rings.

When you are talking to a person in a smaller circle than you are, someone closer to the crisis, your job is to comfort and help.

Comfort IN, dump OUT.

You can learn more about it here.

I have found occasion to use this model many times over the years. It is a very helpful tool to navigate a crisis.

There is no “good” time to have a miscarriage. But what I want you to always remember is that you are not alone. So many of us have had this experience and there is always someone for you to talk to. I am a resource for you and I am here to support you. Reach out to me anytime.