To think most women have had a miscarriage at some point?

[brasty]

I get the impression from talking to friends, that most women have had a miscarriage at some point, although most are very early on. Is my impression correct do you think?

I've been pregnant four times and have four children and as far as I know I haven't had a miscarriage. I feel very fortunate as I know a few people who have had them. I think its possible ive had an early loss before a missed period though.

I haven't knowingly miscarried, but I've only consciously tried to get pregnant for about two weeks, compared to the rest of my fertile life when I very much tried not to get pregnant (except for the one careless morning I conceived dd). My periods have always been irregular and sometimes been very painful so I might well have had some very early miscarriages that I wasn't aware of. I assume that the NHS count is of women with confirmed pregnancies who then sought help when miscarrying.

My mother had two miscarriages and a still birth so I was very aware that losing the baby was a possibility during both of my pregnancies. Several of my close relatives have had miscarriages and one had a still birth. I don't know about my friends.

You're a better person than me Uterus - I struggle to properly sympathise with people who have basically had a late period, equating their loss with a late miscarriage or stillborn. It's not the same and I can't sympathise in the same way. All the talk of rainbow babies for a clotty period is nonsense. If it wasn't for early testing, none of these women would have known they were pregnant. These women are dealing with the trauma of dashed hopes, not the loss of a child

No, it's not most. It's 1 in 3. Around 20% of pregnancies end in miscarriage.

I think the figures make sense. Most women will have more than one pregnancy in their lifetime, so more than a 1 in 5 chance of experiencing miscarriage, but some women won't have any pregnancies at all, putting them in the 2/3, and some will only ever have one or two pregnancies resulting in children, because they just happened to get good odds and not have underlying issues which cause miscarriage. The later you get pregnant the more chance you have of miscarriage, and of course the more times you get pregnant the more chance you have of miscarriage overall, so women with three or more children are more likely to have experienced miscarriage - but then, some women decide after a miscarriage not to try again, or might have issues conceiving so have a smaller number of children not by choice.

I have had two at five weeks which is "one week" as you put it, I saw a doctor and was scanned and a pregnancy was confirmed even though it wasn't successful. My "period" would have been two weeks late. Yes, it is a miscarriage. It's referred to as such in my medical notes. Chemical pregnancy refers to a pregnancy which is lost so early that it's not possible to see any evidence on a scan etc so the period starts as usual or a few days late.

Noni's biology teacher's comment is baffling. I expect she meant eggs which are fertilised but never implant, but this isn't a miscarriage or a chemical pregnancy, because not implanting means no hCG is produced which means no positive test or pregnancy at all, medically speaking. But even this isn't 90%, it's more like 60%.

DH has a genetic issue which causes ours. Our miscarriage risk is much higher than the standard 20%. Before I met him I had DS without any miscarriages before him, and none of the other women in my family have had miscarriages. I definitely know people who have had miscarriages, but not all of my friends with children. Of course there are a few I know haven't, and a few I know have, and some others that I don't know because the subject has never come up or they've never explicitly said so.

I don't think an early miscarriage is the same as a late miscarriage or stillbirth, both of which must be a horrific thing to go through.

It's still a miscarriage, it shouldn't be dismissed as a late period. If someone has issues causing that then it should be able to be talked about and investigated. Whether people use terminology like rainbow baby etc is surely personal preference and something that helps some people but not others.

I don't feel like I've lost two babies but I do feel like I have lost two pregnancies.

@brasty you said, "in women under 30, 1 in 10 pregnancies will end in miscarriage
in women aged 35-39, up to 2 in 10 pregnancies will end in miscarriage
in women over 45, more than half of all pregnancies will end in miscarriage

I am in my mid 50s, so my friends are older. Hence more will have had miscarriages."

I think your logic is faulty. Even though a pregnancy is more likely to fail as women get older, fewer women are getting pregnant. Many have had their tubes tied or their partners have had vasectomies. Many of the rest are using birth control they are super comfortable with and find a breeze to use at this point.

The women I know who've had miscarriages had several. It was horrible. It also happened before their families were complete.

The rest of us skated through getting the children we wanted and then got very hard core about birth control.

There are some people like me who have lost 4 out of 6 pregnancies (I never test until 2 weeks late as my periods vary in length so may have had additional losses at an earlier stage too). If you average my experience with others who experience no loss and those who have fewer, I can see how 25% stacks up overall.

I used to work in admin for a women’s health charity and they said up to 50% of pregnancies end in miscarriage. Often it’s so early that you don’t realise you were pregnant.

I can think of four close friends plus myself who have had 7 mc's between us. We also now have 8 kids in total and another on the way but it's incredibly common I think.

Nearly all the women I know have had miscarriages or fertility issues so I can believe the statistics.

I had a loss at 16 weeks and to be honest do find it hard when people compare their loss at 5 weeks with mine. I have 2 children so far and another one on the way so I count myself very lucky.

It wasn't until I had one that I found out about other people's. It's just not talked about.

I'm in my 60's, had one miscarriage at 22 weeks when I was 37 and another early one, between 6 and 12 weeks, I think, when I was 41. I am very grateful that I was able to carry one child to term in between the miscarriages. After I had my first miscarriage, I was told, separately, by my GP in Switzerland and by a radiographer in England, that as many as one in 2 pregnancies end in miscarriage (very early on in the pregnancy, mostly). I know at least three women the same age as I am who have had late miscarriages/still births, at various ages themselves. I have no idea what that does for the statistics, but I still mourn my lost babies.

honeysucklejasmine You make a good point.

It does seem like most women have had one if you talk about it, especially if they've had more than 2 children.
I'm one of the lucky ones who haven't, but I've only tried to get pregnant twice so only have 2 children.

My MIL who is 87, told me that back when she was a young woman the doctor did not consider you pregnant until you'd missed 2 periods.

I've not had one, but I know quite a few people who've suffered a miscarriage and/or stillbirth. More family than friends, but I assume it's not talked about much.

My paternal grandmother had two still births which nobody knew about until I was talking about home vs hospital births when I was pregnant two years ago & she mentioned she'd done each twice. My aunt was born in hospital, she had a stillbirth at home then another in hospital then my dad was born at home. We always wondered why there had been such a big gap between them but she hadn't told a soul for 50 years.

You're a better person than me Uterus - I struggle to properly sympathise with people who have basically had a late period, equating their loss with a late miscarriage or stillborn.

I don't think anyone ever suggests that a miscarriage at five or six weeks is the same as a late miscarriage or a stillbirth. However, since empathy isn't actually a limited resource, maybe we could be nice to all these women, rather than deciding to play their pain off against each other? Losing a parent is almost always worse than losing a grandparent but I don't go around pointing that out to people who have just lost granny.

A lot of people don't talk about early miscarriages, especially if they have had successful pregnancies before or after. However when one person mentions they've had a miscarriage in my experience most people will then say 'me too'. Of the people I know well enough to know their history all but one person with 3 or more children has had a miscarriage and that includes my Mum's friends so no early pregnancy tests then.

Virtually every woman I know with three or more children has had a miscarriage.

I had a very early miscarriage, but I hadn't done a pregnancy test (on holiday abroad as part of a group) so wouldn't have known that it wasn't just a late period if I didn't have the sort of body that shows pregnancy symptoms early. I wasn't absolutely certain that I'd been pregnant until the next time I felt pregnant in the same way, did an early test and it was positive.

I'm lucky and have never had one, three pregnancies and theee dc, but nearly all my relatives and close friends have so I can totally accept the 50% statistic a pp quoted.

Also, while I take the point about how many more miscarriages are known now because of better pregnancy testing, I don't think that's as universally bad as most comments on this thread. I suspect that a considerable percentage of women in the past who 'couldn't have children' actually couldn't carry them for more than a few weeks. If I had always waited until two missed periods to test then I guess I'd be starting fertility investigations now, since we've been trying fourteen months. I think there are advantages to knowing whether you're not getting pregnant or if you are but not staying that way.

I agree an early miscarriage isn't the same as a still birth or late miscarriage but it can be equally as devastating to the woman who has maybe been ttc for 2 long years and this is the first glimmer of hope she's had in all that time. It's not a competition - everybody has their own struggles.

In my experience, I'm unusual amongst my friends in never having had one, I have three DC. Most women I know have had at least one, I can think of four (myself included) who haven't.

Right before my first child was conceived, I had a god awful period, unlike any others and I'll never forget it. I won't go into detail because it's unpleasant, but having thought about it I do think it was an early miscarriage. I wasn't upset because I didn't realise, nor had I done a test prior.

My friendship group are all early 20’s (and made up of around 18 people), every single one of them has had a miscarriage but one. And the one that didn’t, she had a stillborn due to GBS!
It think it’s very common!