To think it is ok that I will never get over my miscarriage?

[Whatsername17]

Around about this time two years ago, I got pregnant with our second baby. On December 23rd we went for a scan and discovered the baby had died. I miscarried shortly after, in traumatic circumstances, after the hospital refused to do a D&C. I experienced contractions and pain like labour before delivering my tiny baby in its sac alone and terrified in the early hours. We buried the baby under a special plant in our garden. A few months after, I fell pregnant with my rainbow and I now have a beautiful 8 month old whom I adore. If I'm honest, I feel a bit battered and bruised after a difficult couple of years. My pregnancy was tough following my mc and dd2 was resuscitated at birth having been born with the cord around her neck. I'd been induced because of reduced movement. I don't talk about my mc much, except to try and help other people going through the same. I follow Tommy's on Facebook and I'd like to something to raise money for them which I've mentioned to family. I'm helping my best friend through a pregnancy after loss and I'm finding it tough going as it hits a raw nerve. I want to help her though. I mentioned this to my dm and mil and the general consensus seems to be that they feel I should be 'over it' by now. That I have dd2 and that fixes everything. When I talk about running a race to raise money they give me a look. They think I shouldnt follow Tommys or talk about what happened because 'its over now'. Mil tells me that everything happens for a reason and I'm lucky it happened because I have dd2 and my mum says 'it's in the past". Aibu to feel that I'm never going to be the same as I was before and just be ok with that? I dont expect on going sympathy, but I don't want to pretend it didn't happen either.

I remember as a young pregnant district nurse sister caring for an old couple. He had chronic lung disease and she had altzimers. Both 80.

She once massaged my bump and told me about their baby who had died and that the midwife had ‘taken him away in a shoe box and for her to not worry as she could have another one’

They never did.

He was listening and started to cry. They had never ever talked about this before. Baby had died in 1938.

I’m so sorry OP.

I miscarried 4 days before Christmas. It had taken 2 years and fertility treatment to get pregnant. I had an incomplete miscarriage and had the pregnancy tissue removed in hospital immediately following a scan as they discovered it was ‘stuck’. I was awake and had no pain relief. My husband and I were traumatised by the experience.

Four weeks later I was pregnant again, naturally and unplanned. I struggled with anxiety and grief throughout the pregnancy.

We love our daughter more than anything. She’ll be 1 this week. But our experience has changed us. We talk about it a lot and get sad at certain times of the year. My husband broke down in tears at a MC storyline in a soap. We know we’ll never forget and I know we’ll never get through it.

Some people are dismissive as we have a baby. And she makes us so happy. But that doesn’t change the past.

We have made donations to Tommy’s and have our own way of remembering our first baby.

Sending you lots of love OP.

You never get over losing a much wanted baby you simply find a way to live with the loss. I found that the only ones who understand this are the ones who have also lost babies.
The most precious item that I own is the scan photo of my second baby, it was my 12 week scan but it showed my baby was only 9 weeks & 2 days with no heartbeat. My consultant took some images during the scan most of which were put in my notes. He also gave me one and said that I wouldn't appreciate it right now but I would in the future. He was so right and I'm so grateful that he gave it to me.

Everyone is different but my experience is you don't 'get over it'.

I lost 3 before dd, eldest would have just turned 26 just over a week ago. I have 2 aunts who had losses and they still remember every date, the genders where they were known. My grans (who'd be late 90's now) also had losses and while they didn't speak as openly as we do now, both spoke to me about this shared experience and it was clear they very much still felt pain and grief of the children they'd lost.

I've also done as you have op and supported (I hope) others who have been/are going through similar. I had a lot of support from miscarriage association and the endo society. So I do fundraising and raise awareness for them when I can.

The post re chromosomal abnormalities was insensitive at best. There's very little evidence that is the case - largely because research into pregnancy and infant loss is woefully inadequate in the uk.

Op your dm and mil haven't experienced this so they cannot understand - as such they shouldn't comment in such a cruel way.

It does feel very much more distant now I am ten years on, so your feelings may still change.

I don’t think you need to have lost a baby to be a basically kind and empathetic human being!

Loss is loss. We thought we had lost our dd then 12 and were warned to prepare for the worst. She made it.

Wtaf is wrong with people who cannnot fathom that loosing a child whatever age or stage can be totally traumatic and you should never ever gloss over other people’s feelings.

It’s what makes us human and kind.

True joeymaynard but sadly as we see repeatedly on mn there are far too many who completely lack empathy or even sympathy.

Yes Graph it’s beyond baffling and totally disgraceful isn’t it.

Ffs can people lack the basic human feeling of putting themselves in another’s shoes!

@Whatsername17 I remember you as we went through pretty much the same thing only weeks apart. I could have written your post word for word. I'm finding it harder now as wouldn't have DS now if it wasn't for our MC but it still hurts and I will never get over it. I think it's ok, I acknowledge how shit it was and that I will never get over it.

Sorry where did come from?! Sorry - how inappropriate!

I don't know if I will ever get over my miscarriages

My womb wasn't able to support a pregnancy and we lost two chromosomally normal babies

The top miscarriage Dr in the country has confirmed my womb cannot sustain a pregnancy and I will never be able to carry

We're unable to carry on IVF because my womb won't cooperate and we can't even try with our remaining embryos

Surrogacy is the only way forward for us, and I am coming to terms with the fact that I can't have children - and the ones we lost are as pregnant as I'm ever going to get

The miscarriage narrative is full of rainbow babies, but not everyone gets their rainbow baby. I don't know if I will ever get over that

This really resonated with me

www.tommys.org/our-organisation/help-and-support/tommys-pregnancy-stories/childlessness-after-miscarriage-untold-story

I had a late miscarriage at 19 weeks.
I never felt the baby move and when he was born I didn't see him ( I was advised not to by the doctor)
I knew from early in the pregnancy that I wouldn't have a baby at the end. I think I grieved from 6 weeks when I started bleeding till the end when he was born at 19 weeks.
I don't think about that time at all now. It's not unusual to grieve 20 years after losing a baby or to be ok 12 months after

I had a miscarriage at the same stage as you OP. I went on to have my DD and honestly, never thought of my miscarriage as a baby - I couldn't even tell you the due date. I was devastated at the time as I desperately wanted a baby. That was my experience. I would have hated anyone telling me I needed to remember or feel more - none of their business. Ditto you remembering and still feeling it - your business entirely.

My grandmother had 6 children and 2 miscarriages. My mum told me that years after her mother died she had had masses said for those lost babies - that would have been 60 years after they were conceived and 30 years after her mother/my grandmother died. My mum still felt them as part of her greater family.

You deal with your life the way that you want. Your MIL and mother can deal with their own.

My only comment is that how you decide to feel about it should be for your benefit. If holding onto the pain helps keep the love you felt, then fair enough. Different situation if holding onto the pain was a destructive thing for you.

Just chiming in to say that no, having another child doesn't cancel out a miscarriage. (First lost at 19 weeks and scan photo is behind a family photo). I think of it like a scar on my heart.

bananafish I'm so sorry for what you've been through and what you're going through. I think you're absolutely right that people tend to only share these stories when they have happy endings, and the specific form of happy ending that is 'we had a biological child'. DH and I were discussing the other day that if we do ever have a baby we both want to be open about how hard getting there was but that neither of us feel we can share how we currently feel, while we don't know whether it'll work. That, of course, means you only ever hear happy endings (and the couple of people I have told came straight out with 'my hairdresser's mum's friend from bingo's daughter had twenty-eight miscarriages but now she has seven children!' type stories), which means that, as you say, all those other stories go unspoken.

Claireshh I feel just the same.

I think it's that it adds another heartbreak on top of what's there from the loss(es). I've been relatively lucky in the grand scheme of recurrent miscarriage because mine were all natural and all before eight weeks, one of them before I even got to five weeks. The first two I was sad about but did feel like another pregnancy would heal. After the third I went into a pretty deep depression which I think was because I was grieving but also because I was (and am) so scared for our future. I also now feel like even if I do get pregnant again and carry to term this now isn't going to leave me because it's a whole traumatic period of my life that I think has changed me.

Yes it's lovely that you got your dd2 but you should never be expected to get over the loss of your other precious baby. I guess you learn to live with the loss.

Sadly yes I have friends and family who also never got their rainbow babies. They've also had the insensitive and ignorant 'well you could always foster/adopt' comments. Which of course is a wonderful thing to do - but is not easy and not for everyone.

Whatser I lurked on the posifrickintive threads throughout my successful pregnancy and just wanted to let you know how much you helped me without realising. It takes a lot to turn your experiences into support for others. Thank you.

your DM and MIL are of a different generation where forgetting was the norm, you don't ever have to forget, its part of who you are now and always will be, don't shy away from it let your greif be processed or it will become overwhelming.

Much love. I've had three miscarriages and like others I am a different person now. It's always with me. It's no comfort my DM is all you have to pit it behind you like your gran did. Gran now has dementia. Turns out those traumas are still with her too. She was glossing over it as she was supposed to all those years ago. It's so sad this is all the support my family expects/ expected.