I've just spent the last 3 days and 38 hours in hospital having a traumatic miscarriage at 10 wks. What I want to know is this -
If 1 in 4 pregnancies end in early miscarriage why don't more people talk about it? Why doesn't the midwife explain about the risk? Nearly every nurse, ward assistant and doctor I saw while in hospital told me either A) they had had a MC themselves, or B) MCs were "very common" or "not unusual".
So why don't women talk about it? When I had my first MW appointment she asked me how I was feeling, I said while it was a planned pregnancy (my first) I was a bit scared - she immediately said "nonsense, there is nothing to be scared off you should be excited" with odds of 25% of pregnancies ending is MC - surely that's a risk to be scared of? I know I sound angry, and I am, I'm still under the effect of general anesthetic and I'm grieving. But it wasn't until after a visit to the early pregnancy unit, when we left no clearer (this was post spotting and pre bleeding) we went to our GP who was brave enough to say "the information on this early scan would indicate you should prepare for the worst" (they had booked me a repeat scan for 2 weeks time) within 30 mins of getting home the bleeding started, we went to A&E were I lost so much blood I ended up in the resuss unit with all the machines bleeping and a very worried looking DH. No one spoke straight to us, right until I saw a consultant yesterday afternoon. I never knew how painful, traumatic or lengthy a MC was. One of the nurses summed it up to me when I asked her why no one spoke about it, if it was so common she said, "British people feel uncomfortable talking about death and this falls into that category". I'm going to return to work next week, and part of me thinks that if people ask me why I've been off work, I'm going to tell them I had a MC. As if it?s that common, then there is nothing "wrong" with me and I've got nothing to be ashamed of, and maybe that means more people will feel comfortable talking about it.
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miscarriage - if its so common why don't people speak about it?
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Twig79 · 30/07/2009 09:01
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