Mumsnet Talk

Please don't read my theoretical wonderings if this is a subject close to your heart.

On anther thread someone suggested looking at old papers in the British Archive online - a real treasure trove!

I put in a family name, and found a ref to my long deceased grampa, and a sporting event he was in. It mentions that his wife had just presented him with a son and heir, and sure enough it was just three weeks after my dad was born.

No mention, sadly, of my dad's twin, who died a week or so after birth.

Of course, this could have been unknown to the paper, or thought to be insensitive, but it made me think of the great turmoil of emotions my granny and grampa must have been feeling at that time.

But I also wondered if infant mortality just wasn't talked about then - think 1920s/1930s. Was it just never spoken of again? Did mums - and dads - get support?

I seriously doubt it - time of the stiff upper lip, wasn't it?

I have a few relatives who had a sibling die at birth yet didn't know anything about it.
My father recently found out that he had a sister who died as a toddler - he knew nothing about it at all. Must have been hell for his parents

I often wonder this.

My GGM had a baby after my GM that died. I would never be able to ask her (they are both still alive) for fear of upsetting her. But I often wonder about the circumstances and how they would have been supported. It would have been late 1930s.

My Dad's sister would have been born in around 1930, and didn't survive infancy. I think it was relatively commonplace at that time. When my cousins baby was born v premature my grandparents were pretty indifferent about it all - like they were holding back until the baby was more likely to survive.

It sounds callous now, but to be brutal, in the first 12 wks of pregnancy the risk of m/c is about 25% or so? And therefore people often don't tell family/freinds until after the dating scan at 12 wks, when everything is "safer". IMO it's the same kind of thing.

My dad had a twin. My grandma didn't tell him until the day I was born. I'm 33 and she's never mentioned it again. That's once she was talked about in 62 years

Oh these stories are very sad.

My first DD was stillborn. I don't talk about it in RL at all really, although I have mentioned it on here a few times. That was in 2006 so in many ways a different world to the 1920s, but I still feel it's something I'm not expected to talk about, better swept under the carpet kind of thing. I do feel a great deal of guilt to this day.

DD2 is 3 and knows she has a sister, though I doubt she completely understands.

Oh Bri, I am sorry, and sorry you feel a residual guilt ((hug))

My nan had a brother who died as a toddler by tipping a pan of boiling water on himself by pulling a table cloth.

My grandad had a sister who died in childhood of illness (not sure what)

What's strange is that my nan had sisters and the only boy died and my grandad just brothers as the only girl died

When I was younger I knew this and just thought that's how it was in those days. It's only recently I've thought about how awful it must've been for ggps

Bri I'm really sorry

MY nana lost a baby we have rhesus blood anyway the baby only livd 2 days she never spoke of it, infant mortality wasn't really spoken about women sometimes had a lot of children and a husband to care for so just got on with it,

saddest story I heard from a friend who was speaking to her husbands grandmother when she had dementia, the granny had a baby who 'didnt look right' and was put out for god to take care of the baby died we were all in tears when she told us

I think it must have been spoken about, as it was so common: in 1870s the infant mortality rate was about 15%, by 1930s it had fallen to 7%. You can see infant funerary monuments in probably every older church in the country, showing that grief could be publicly expressed and acknowledged.

There would be support, because so many people went through it. But the sources of that support would be the unsung sort that came from families and communities (in the places where there were settled communities; industrialisation had changed how many people lived, but even urban areas could be socially close knit, even when physical conditions grim).

My first dd was also stillborn in 2006. I do speak about it a lot, and my 4 surviving dds know all about her. My brother also died after he was born, almost 40 years ago. Full term, healthy pregnancy, but it was assumed my mum had placenta previa, she had a cord prolapse (which sadly, ironically, was why my daughter was stillborn) and my brother was brain damaged. It was pretty much swept under the carpet, but within my immediate family it was spoken about. My mum's mum was pretty rubbish and my parents struggled to get a proper catholic funeral for my brother, her brother, a catholic priest, was the only priest who would bury him.

To a certain extent, my ability to talk about losing dd1 has made it easier to deal with in a sense that I can talk about her happily (eg, how she resembled my other 4 dds etc, without having that agonising pain each time I mention her name). I cannot imagine never being able to talk about losing a baby if you wanted to. It would make it sooo much more painful. When dd2 came along, the bereavement midwife mentioned that lots of people call their next baby the same name as the baby that died.

Thanks Threemen and mrsjay. I do have reason to feel guilty, I was on a number of illegal substances at the time which may have been a contributing factor. It's not a period of my life I'm proud of.

I think Meditrina's right in that there would have been support from within the community in the 1930s, no one seems to know what to say today because so few people experience it in comparison to the past- miscarriages are far more common than stillborns in today's society. I've had people point out to me a few times in the past that it was probably for the best, because had that baby lived I would have a 7 year old and a 3 year old at 21. Admittedly I dread to think how I would have coped had my first daughter lived, but that's not exactly the point.

My dmil lost her dad recently. The night before his funeral her and her sisters mentioned 'Alice'. None of my DHs siblings or cousins had heard of Alice before. Turns out that she was dmil other sister who had died aged 5. She was never spoken of and her(sadly i thought) not mentioned at the funeral. Another sister was referred to as firstborn when really it was Alice. Really sad - sign of the stiff upper lip maybe?

I should mention that my mum assumed that because my brother was brain damaged, they left him to die. Maybe they did try to keep him alive iyswim.

Leaving the baby out for god, how sad. All so sad. The pain of losing a child is all consuming. Before I lost dd1, I did not believe that people in this day and age lost babies. Once I got past the 20 week scan, I thought it would all be ok. I imagine back in the day there was probably an acceptance that even throughout childhood there was a very real risk of losing a child. Would not have made it any easier. Losing my daughter redefined who I am.

All of my great grandmothers lost children. One lost 2. As a family we did talk about them. The only one that was a surprise was my grandad's sister but his family were considered a bit common by my granny.

My dd2 was stillborn and my side of the family do refer to her. And I do routinely include her in conversation. She is one of my 3 dc.

The difference 100 years ago was that it was so bloody common. Many more women knew how you felt. There was no need to be afraid. But equally there was a need to get on with stuff and there weren't the public records of grief like today.

I remember reading Bill Oddie's autobiography and his poor mum lost 2 children and it possibly contributed to her mental illness which blighted his life and led to her being institutionalized.

I suspect there was a fear that if you did lose the plot with grief that you would be banged up in the asylum. So you just carried on.

Very sad.

I suppose loosing a baby is a private matter and you dont need to talk about it years later A parents grief is no different then than it is now

MrsJay, I disagree. Dd2 will be talked about to the day I die. Time doesn't heal that wound.

There are lots of touching and very sad references throughout history concerning infant and childhood deaths. Of course it is something any parent in any era would feel deeply even if religious feeling (the feeling that anything that happens is part of God's plan so we mustn't question it) or realism (the fact it once happened so commonly and was almost expected hence early baptisms etc) got in the way.
There are lots of references in literature and art from many ages. I think Bill Bryson refered to an extract of one that is called Orinda Upon little Hector Phillips written by his mother in the 17th century

I did but see him and he disappear’d,
I did but pluck the rose-bud and it fell,
A sorrow unforeseen and scarcely fear’d,
For ill can mortals their afflictions spell.

And now (sweet babe) what can my trembling heart
Suggest to right my doleful fate or thee,
Tears are my Muse and sorrow all my art,
So piercing groans must be thy elegy.

I am sorry I didnt mean to offend anybody what i meant is people don't need to talk abput anything if they dont want to and perhaps some of these women didnt think they could so didn't

It's not that long ago that people didn't talk about it. I had a baby born 18 years ago tomorrow who only breathed a couple of breaths. He was just too young and too small. There wasn't photos or memory boxes or anything then. All I have is a wee hospital tag. It's like he never existed at all. Except to me. I may not talk about it, mostly because, I don't know why - even when I say how many kids I have it feels so odd to say 6 not 5 because then you have to start the whole explaining thing and I don't feel that's appropriate, but every day I think of him.

My mil (70 odd) had a stillborn girl after my dp, apparently my fil (they split when dp was young) was a right shit about it and refused to even see her .

From what she says she had no support whatsoever and her dd was buried with somebody else?? I still have no idea why they split tbh, but even now she seems to hold a lot of anger about the stillbirth and dp's Dad.

I don't really feel it's my place to pry more details out of her, but she does tend to talk to me seeing as dp is useless on the communication front.

Mil says she was told that she cannot carry girls, and to get pg again asap, not sure if this is true or not, but she went on to have 2 more boys.

I do feel very sorry for her, Delores her dd was one of the first things she talked about when I moved in, so still very raw even decades later.

I think it was very different in the 1920s. It probably was more common and perhaps there was more fellowship to be found amongst other parents who had been a similar situation. But there does seem to have been a taboo around talking about it or acknowledging the loss publicly.

I lost my eldest twin dd at at 3 days old in 2008 and the doctors who cared for my daughters strongly advised me to tell DD2 that she was born one of twins. Several of the doctors mentioned that it could be a very difficult thing to handle finding out at a later date and that she might somehow 'know' anyway.

I don't know if there is any truth in it but I have told her and talked about her sister to her ever since she was a baby. Not formally, just in passing or when something crops up about her as a baby. She's only four and sometimes gets cross with my insistence on this additional family member who she never sees and consistently refuses her invitation to come to a tea party!

I would not have coped if I had been expected to never mention my dd1 again. As imip says so perfectly, her death has redefined who I am and made me the person (and the mother) that I am today.

Your poor granny and grampa, that must have a terribly difficult time for them.