Miscarriage Support Group

I am so sorry for your loss - you are at the raw, raw stage of the entire grieving process and your questions and feelings have been expressed by many on this board.

Even though your husband says things are fine and you can try again, they are not fine and you cannot try again for THIS baby. You lost a child and the hopes and dreams that comes with expecting. It does not matter how far along you were in the pregnancy, your child died. You become a mother as soon as you see 2 pink lines on the pregnancy test.

Calling everyone about the loss is very difficult. Some women on this board have had close friends or family do the calling. I hope this may be an option for you. I told a few friends and then some of them offered to call others for me. In the end I still had to call some people. BE PREPARED as people do not know what to say and will say seemingly inappropriate things that will hurt you (even though they do not mean to). Miscarriages are very misunderstood by most people and so it is hard for people to say the right thing.

Unfortunatly, m/c are all too common. I have a healthy 2.5 year old and then have m/c 2 times in the past 6 months. M/C do not discriminate if you have other children or not - it is the unluck of the draw. There is nothing you did to cause it and nothing you could have done to prevent it.

The road back to a 'normal' life takes sometime. You are at the worst part of grieving right now -the pain is raw and all encompassing - it is very difficult to concentrate on anything else. THIS IS NORMAL, but difficult - especially with other kids. What I did find is that my toddler kept me sane through my losses - they need your attention and it is hard to focus 100% on the loss with active children around. Over time, the intense pain does decrease, but it never completely goes away. You lost a child - that will stay with you forever. But, over the next few weeks, you will start to notice the edge coming off the pain and down the road it won't repulse you to see other pregnancy women or small babies (it is ok to be jealous and mad that they have theirs and you don't have yours).

Take time for yourself. I would bawl my eyes out in the shower - a safe place where no one could hear me. Acknowledge the baby in some way. Women on this chat have done various things from getting a tatoo to creating a memory box to planting a flower, to having a formal ceremony. This is part of the healing process.

And finally, use this site to help you heal. Vent when you need to. Ask questions when you need to. Read the posts that are most meaningful to you. This is an incredible group of women who have been what you are going through. Eventually, you will get to a place where your words will help someone going through this too.

I'm so sorry for your loss.
I posted recently to try to help explain how miscarriage can just happen as part of the normal reproductive process - but I reckon it was probably too jargony!
I'll bump it up because it really helps me to understand things and you ask how this could happen; but to simplify - I think that making eggs (and sperm) with the right number of chromosomes is a tricky process and just goes wrong sometimes for everyone. It went right before to give you your beautiful kids and there's no reason why it won't go right next time.

Because I know about the risks, when I was pregnant I tried not to bond with the fetus or believe that it was OK until I had the amniocentesis results but I did then lose the pregnancy after I'd started believing it was going to be alright (due to an infection dammit - the chromosomes were fine!).

I don't think it makes a huge difference how far along you are - it depends how deeply you've convinced yourself that the pregnancy is going to give you a baby. Because you believed this and told everyone, then this is what you have lost and of course your grief will be deep. I think you're right that if you hadn't realised you were pregnant, your pain would be less but you can't un-know something :(

My Mum told me that when she was younger you didn't tell anyone until you'd missed two or three periods because they didn't have over-the-counter urine tests. I don't know whether this helped. I think that without a pregnancy test I'd still know because my periods are so regular and I've only very rarely been 4-5 days late (of course those occasions could have been very early miscarriages). I don't get any pregnancy symptoms until 6-7 weeks.

Don't feel guilt for your sadness - your grief is real. Take your time to get over it - you won't ever forget but the pain will become less with time I think.
Take care.

I'm so sorry for your loss. I have three healthy girls and before my miscarriage, I naively believed that pregnancy equaled baby. I never knew the other side - this all too painful other side where that is not always the case.

My baby died in April at 13 weeks along, but I can tell you that the moment I found out that I was pregnant (five weeks along) I was over the moon and in my mind and heart already had a baby in my future. If I would have miscarried a second after the confirmation I would have still been just as heartbroken at the magnitude of the loss.

Remember that men and women grieve differently. Also, your husband may not be able to relate in the same way as you did to the baby and your loss. Everything is altered with us when we are pregnant, not so with our husbands. I had to let my husband know that him apologizing for "MY" loss was not helpful. It was "OUR" loss. I got to the point where I didn't expect him to grieve like I did, but I did expect him to respect my right to grieve and to be there for me.

It has been nearly seven months since my loss and it is has been a rocky road with some good days and some bad.

I found the weight of my sorrow nearly crushing during the first four months and again before the due date. I found that crying and prayer, reading everything I could about miscarriage and people's experiences, journalling, online support groups like this one, and in-person support groups were helpful. I tended to get a feeling of strength and peace from them.

I also got a locket and put the baby's ultrasound picture on one side and a picture of our family on the other. I got a sweet tiny blanket that reminded me of the baby and held it and cried into it when I needed to. I also picked out two tiny outfits to hold for the baby.

We finally did the memorial service on October 24th. (I wasn't ready to say goodbye in the beginning and then later on didn't know how to go about doing the service so had to get information about that).

Still it has been painful and hard. Give yourself time to grieve for this sweet child. You could have 20 more babies, but nothing will replace this sweet child that you cradled inside of you. Take all the time that you need. You are not alone.

I want to thank you all for your kind generous words, it is nice to know that someone knows what I am going thru. Noone in my family has ever had a miscarriage and they are speechless on what to say. My husband is a truckdriver and I want to belive that he has his own way of greaving when he is out there on the road, I try to be strong for my children and him when he is home, however there are just times when I have to get away and cry. I know that I was only 5 weeks pregnant and everything but the pain is still there, how can I get past this and move on? I want to be strong for my family, but yet I don't want to forget what happened either. I keep thinking if I don't think about it that much the pain will go away, if I bury myself into school, kids, and my daily life that the pain will go away, but by the end of the day when i am all alone and lying in bed, the tears start to fall. What are some ideas for me to greave and get over this. I don't want to sound to pushy, it's just I am not 100% sure on how long you are suppose to greave or if it is normal to greave for a child that was only 5 weeks old. I keep thinking about what week I will be heading into and what the baby would have been developing is this normal? should I have a service of my own? I am not for sure on what I can do to help me get past this great loss. Please help me Thanks to all of you.

I lost my baby at 10 weeks, and that was almost a year ago, and I am still grieving. The time frame is different for everyone. Be patient and gentle with yourself. Allow yourself to feel the grief and deal with it at whatever pace you need to go. Doing something to acknowledge your loss and memorialize your baby may help. I have a special bracelet with baby feet that was a comfort to me in my darkest times. *hugs*

I, too, have just had a miscarriage, 1 wk ago today. I have a healthy 18 y/o daughter & a healthy 23 mth old son. My husband also says we'll try again, but I'm very afraid to go through this again. I know in time I will want to & I will never forget this baby. I was 11 wks 3days and started to bleed heavily. I didn't have any cramping. Thay ran blood tests and an u/s. My baby didn't have a heartbeat and I had them repeat the tests and u/s the next day with the same results. I had a d&c and went home to grieve. Then 2 days later my brother was killed from a freak accident at work and now I'm cramping and bleeding heavily again. This has been the hardest week of my life. I just keep praying for strength and relief. I will cherish every moment with my kids and my husband. My sister in law is pregnant, due the day before I was due and she just lost her husband. She had 3 miscarriages in the past & has a 1 y/o daughter & is pregnant now. She gives me hope that I can have another child and to never take for granted the time you have with your family, you never know when it will all be gone.

R.I.P: Peyton M.
Conceived: 9/2/09
Returned to Heaven: 11/14/09

R.I.P: Heath P.
11/24/78 - 11/17/09
Father, Husband, Brother, Uncle, Friend, Son
Now he's with my little angel.

Honey, I know how you feel. I've had four children prior to the two I lost. That's where I'm at--trying to figure out why I can't seem to get past the first trimester anymore.

When I lost Angel I was ten weeks along. When I lost Angelica I had no sooner peed on the stick and she was gone. Guess what? I grieve. I still grieve for Angel and I grieve for Angelica. My doctor tells me that with Angelica there was no baby, just a handful of cells--well, it was MY body that carried those cells and it was MY body that felt those cells leaving me. That gives me the right to grieve.

You will move on with time but as far as letting go, that is something that none of us completely do. It's just that as time passes we feel a little stronger to the point where we can think about our babies without being crushed by the pain and grief. We still grieve. I think we will always grieve to some degree. We're just not as consumed. Some of the things you can do to help your healing is maybe purchase a special ring or a piece of jewelry in your baby's memory. You can make a memory box or a collage. You can also make online memorials, some of which are free, and you would not believe what a source of comfort they are (check out www.mybabymemorial.com, www.virtualmemorials.com, www.gonetoosoon.org). I have teddy bears that were sent to me from different sites that give bears to grieving parents and I have one that I purchased through www.littleangelsonlinestore.com. It sounds foolish but I have carried that bear everywhere with me and when the pain got to be too much I would hold that bear as tight as I possibly could. Write letters to your baby. Tell him/her everything you would if he/she were here. That is also very healing.