Miscarriage bereavement leave -a sensitive well thought proposal or would there be unintended consequences

[mids2019]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cz9k12w5j54o

This is extremely sensitive but I wonder if this well meaning proposal would become a reality in the workplace. I think in terms of employment the application of the rules may result in a scrutiny that would be potentially intrusive.

For example how would you prove to your employer you were pregnant?

Would the period of gestation count towards the leave given?

Would a father of the unborn child be entitled to similar leave to grieve and support their partner?

I think in the whole this is compassionate and a good stride forward but I do wonder about its practical uptake.

In terms of taking advantage of employers...I don't think it will happen in reality, except in exceptional cases where the employee was really problematic in which case there will be other signs/issues to which that individual would be appropriately managed out of the business assuming the org has solid policies and processes.

For a shift in abortion...I don't think this is the governments agenda. This change is part of a wider set of changes that have been in the works for years now "The Good Work Plan" to make things more equitable for women and increase flexibility in general. Abortion rights is a whole other realm to which if there are changes, there will be a huge fuss.

Lastly employers are going to have to up their game with their policies and processes in a whole range of areas but particularly recruitment and induction, as well as managing sexual harassment in the workplace. When you look at this in the context of the other employment rights bill items, employers have some work to do to protect themselves and make sure they have an inclusive culture and the right people.

It’s not about you.
What you did or how you feel is not particularly relevant when it comes to a policy for all women.

When I miscarried I used normal entitlement to sick leave and did not have to tell my employers exactly why. The clinic supplied an NHS headed letter confirming that I had been receiving medical treatment and would need recovery time for (specified but I can't remember exactly how long). I didn't want it to be discussed or acknowledged at work. Given the choice I would rather use existing generic systems for leave of absence from work, rather than a specific right that would require me to broadcast my personal tragedy more widely.

I don’t think it’s about ME. It doesn’t change my view that a miscarriage before 12 weeks is an extremely common occurrence.
We already have practically half the country off work due to “mental health” conditions. Medicalising everything takes away from the people who really are ill physically or mentally.

A miscarriage isn't a sickness.

Great for you that you only felt "a bit sad" after your miscarriage. I'm sure you are intelligent enough to understand that people experiences can be different from your own.

I also have this clotting factor V, so i am also very glad that we are medicalising early miscarriages as my great aunt died from this many years ago after having her baby.

I thought miscarriages came under pregnancy leave anyway? My old work certainly categorised it as such. I do think that would make more sense pre say 18 weeks.

It is probably a worthy and desirable policy but in small firms/companies will ve tricky to cover operationally. I have no issue actually with women getting it, but giving it to men too is OTT frankly - or at least, giving more than a day or so.

No they aren’t bad luck. They don’t ’just happen’. Luck has nothing to do with it. There’s always a scientific and medical reason for a miscarriage. Advances in the last few years mean that more reasons for recurrent miscarriage have been identified and more treatments are available. Just in the last 3 years alone progesterone has been added as a recommended protocol for all women who have had 2 or more miscarriages - previously it was only used if there was bleeding.

Not bad luck. Medical. Scientific.

These early miscarriages are so important to have investigated as they often mean something is wrong with the mother, whether this needs a massive dose of vitamin D, Anti D, blood thinners, progesterone, or something we don’t even know about yet. In 30 or 40 years even more of these conditions will be identified.

So what if you have the same condition as me? That doesn’t mean you can speak for me or tell me at what point I’m allowed to grieve. I don’t think you speak for most people in regard to early miscarriage. I think your reaction to your own early miscarriages is unusual and you are in the minority. That’s fine though, everyone is different. That doesn’t mean it’s ok for you to minimise it for everyone else. Their feelings are also valid. You can respect that.

It's not extremely common in that it happens to a woman multiple times a year, like say a common cold or covid. Which would also be a legitimate reason to be off work.

A woman may have 1, 2 or 3 miscarriages in a lifetime, more than that and they are very unlucky and deserve more compassion not less.

Your attitude towards it is very strange. Nobody is saying you have to take the leave if you have an early miscarriage, but if you feel you need it, then you can.

I’ve had four miscarriages, and they were at 8, 14, 18 and 19 weeks. The early one actually took the longest (three weeks for the process to complete) but the later two involved actual inductions on a labour ward.

I wasn’t able to take any time off work for any of them, unfortunately, I think I should maybe have done so but I’ve never had any access to any kind of sick pay and so time off work would be unpaid which was not an option. Completely unaffordable with bills to pay and mouths to feed and as many have said, letting an employer know about a pregnancy can be a risky strategy. I’m not sure if I’d have done anything differently unless I had both sick leave and full pay available to me. Miscarrying at work wasn’t my favourite thing to do and was very hard to manage with customers right in front of me, and shouldn’t be happening, but I don’t know how we legislate against that. Pregnancies are unpredictable unfortunately. Women should be supported but I’d prefer to see everyone have access to sick leave and sick pay, perhaps, more appropriate.

I don't really see the point. When I had miscarriages I was signed off work by the GP afterwards. I wouldn't have wanted it registered as miscarriage leave.

@BabyCatFace I assume it was registered as sick leave due to miscarriage so treated as related to pregnancy so didn’t count towards days off sick.

There is already sick leave so I'm not sure how this helps apart from to make it look like gov are doing something instead of other things they should be doing. I'm wary of them pushing all these things through without much thought just to look good on the surface of things.

I mean people get sick/can't work for all sorts of reasons, it doesn't have to be under it's own box. Menopause should also come under this. I wouldn't want to put in an employer's mind that women are not worth employing and need to be kept at home.

I was in hospital for a week when I miscarried at 9 weeks. I was bleeding so heavily but my blood tests were still showing me to be pregnant. They said I needed a scan to confirm it wasn't an ectopic pregnancy but for some reason kept delaying it.

We had to tell my work why I was in hospital for so long. I was then signed off for another two weeks to recover at home.

I had been TTC for 7 years by this point and it was the first time I'd managed to get pregnant ( weirdly this was a natural conception after 4 previous failed IVF cycles)

So I disagree that there needs to be a different policy for early miscarriage. It was a huge deal and incredibly distressing. I wasn't right for ages and even though this was 23 years ago I still get very sad when I think about it.

When I went back to work my line manager was amazingly supportive ( his wife was pregnant at the same time) but his boss was utterly vile.

I was made to have a back to work interview where he quizzed me on my future plans.

I told him that given I had only managed to get pregnant once in seven years he really didn't need to worry about me negatively impacting his department by me going on maternity leave.

I was treated terribly after that and was basically written off as far as my career was concerned so I looked for another job and left ( after16 years loyal service)

I never had another pregnancy and in the end I adopted two children.

I assume sick leave doesn’t apply to a partner after a miscarriage whereas this policy will

Recurrent miscarriages needs to be investigate, but they only start investigation after 3 in a row because miscarriages are so common that 2 or even 3 in a row doesn’t mean there is an issue. The NhS hasn’t got the resources to investigate every miscarriage.
I am coming from the point of view that actually miscarriages very early on are so common it’s almost to be expected. It’s better to be realistic about that than as a society being told this is a bereavement and you need to take sick leave.

If you need more time, speak to your GP as perhaps you actually need to talk to someone about it anyway.

Anyone can be signed off work for stress/depression which would potentially apply to either party after a miscarriage

Who gets to define "early" though? Someone could have a miscarriage at 7 weeks after knowing they are pregnant for 3 weeks, somebody else could have a miscarriage at 13 weeks after only finding out at 12 weeks. Who gets to decide who is more devastated and more worthy of time off?

All bereavement leave is subjective depending on how close you are to the person. It doesn't mean it shouldn't exist.

@BabyCatFace but I assume for the partner that would count as sick days and in some companies would trigger warnings etc depending on how much sick leave already taken for other things

@Caramelanie that is an interesting point. Defining an 8 week old foetus as a person to be grieved could have exactly those consequences.

Are you including chemical pregnancies as a miscarriage? Because that’s approximately a third of all pregnancies and for many women is no more than a late period and they wouldn’t have noticed if early testing wasn’t a thing.

I did take 2 weeks for my miscarriage as my employer already offers this, but I only really needed a couple of day, and that was at 12 weeks so it was mostly physical symptoms I was dealing with.

I support the leave but there does need to be a common sense application.

I had 2 early miscarriages, I bled heavily for days, and was in a lot of pain. Of course it’s a medical issue.

You took 2 weeks off when you didn’t need it, so you think policy makers should be careful not to craft a law that allows people to take the piss?

If you have 2 weeks entitlement for grief of a child under 18 and 2 weeks for a very early stage miscarriage won't this look like the law is really not proportionate and actually look quite callous?

It should remain as sick leave IMHO.