AIBU to be upset I got nothing from work? (Miscarriage)

[LowestEbb]

I worked with this team for a year. We regularly gave leaving cards/sympathy cards etc.

I applied for another role and was due to start there on the Monday. Last day with old team was on the Friday, so just 2 days before my MC.

On the Sunday I went to A and E with bleeding and it was discovered my baby had no heartbeat, measuring 10 weeks but thought I was 12. Devastated isn't the word.

They knew I was pregnant (public service so changes what role you do, plus I had severe sickness)

I'm still in the work whatsapp chat and someone has just message thanking them all for their card as her nan died, another has replied 'Hope you're okay'

I got nothing, either for leaving or for my miscarriage, 4 weeks later.

I thought I was well thought of and they were my friends.

I wondered if it was because I'd left the team, but it was only a day after and I've had flowers and cards from numerous teams I've been on before, one I left 2 years ago.

I really don't know if I'm BU or just over sensitive.

Just a card would have meant a lot in the darkest moments.

AIBU????

I would never send a card or flowers etc to somebody in your shoes op. I just wouldn't want to offend/ hurt them. I would be mortified if they sent them to me

she means that the team had to be told so they wouldn’t expect a baby at the end of the pregnancy.

But the team “didn’t have to be told”. The manager / team leader isn’t allowed to reveal personal information about staff to other staff. Can you imagine the outcry if they did such a thing? And how did the the team know about the pregnancy in the first place? Who told them?

I'm so sorry for your loss OP. Many people don't understand the grief that accompanies a miscarriage, and treat it as a sort of manifestation of 'women's troubles' ie something slightly embarrassing, not to spoken of. Try to understand this as society's limitation, not your own, and seek loving support. All the best to you.

@DolphinDreams

I'm so sorry for your loss OP. Many people don't understand the grief that accompanies a miscarriage, and treat it as a sort of manifestation of 'women's troubles' ie something slightly embarrassing, not to spoken of. Try to understand this as society's limitation, not your own, and seek loving support. All the best to you.

Many women habe posted on here that they suffered the same and did not feel the same as the op. Do not invalidate their feelings.

Many people do not feel the same as the op. Many would be horrified at the thought of their work marking an early miscarriage and feel it’s deeply personal.

Your comment would indicate it is you who lacks understanding of the spectrum of feelings on this. Yes some women suffer intense grief. Others do not. There is no right or wrong way to react. And no way to tell how the person feels without directly asking them.

As someone who has suffered a stillbirth and 3 miscarriages my general colleagues didn't and weren't expected to say anything let alone give me someone. My closer real actual friends at work sent me a msg to say sorry / offer condolences. But I didn't receive a card. My life friends out of work brought me chocolates and ice cream

As someone who has experienced miscarriages and I know how badly affected I was I still wouldn't send a card.

I am so deeply sorry for your loss. I hope your ok and feel stronger soon.

@daisypond I was only responding to a pp who was querying the significance of the 9 month reference. The OP has said her team is were told so I think we can assume they were. Perhaps her manager asked her permission.

I think it's clear from this thread that people have very different views on how they want this to be acknowledged, or not acknowledged, by colleagues, so it's clear that a team not sending gifts/cards is not necessarily a team that's uncaring or 'wrong', just a team who may feel collectively that it's not something that 'you do'.

For my perspective, I've never wanted significantly personal, traumatic things marked by colleagues - when my dad died the last thing I wanted was my team sending me stuff - it wouldn't have made me feel better at all.

To be honest, the conversations I had with them in the weeks and months and even years after, meant much more, and were more helpful.

Maybe it's also that I'm a bit cynical, and I've often foudn that those in team who have been fastest to arrange collections and send gifts, aren't neccessarily the ones that actually 'care' that much, or have offered that much practical support.

For example, I recently have been struggling with my mental health, one colleague, who is the most cynical, moany, last to give to collections type of person, completed a peice of work for me that she knew I hated, especially when feeling anxious. She didn't ask me, even tell me, just with no song and dance, made my life a little easier - to be honest that meant much more than any gifts or messages would.

The OP has long gone but it really is the case that your colleagues don't get what you're going through half the time, they don't understand that it is a thing that has to be 'got through' if they haven't gone through similar. I've struggled emotionally, practically and financially (sporadically) with being a single parent to two children one with sn and working full time and just trying to make everything work and not lose my job and stay sane and stay on top of washing, shopping, kids' educatons, teachers' meetings and not run out of money at the wrong moment. It's been really hard at times, and often, you're judged/excluded/othered as well on top of doing everything and bending over so far backwards that you think you're going to break, but I don't think anybody at work is going to sympathise. But if they went through something personal and then got annoyed with me that I hadn't raced to them offering sympathy, I would feel a bit ''hang on now''. That is not aimed at the op. It's just aimed gently at the whole world!

When I returned to work after my MMC I broke down after a couple of hours. I'd only been off for four working days from the scan to the op and came straight back, but just wasn't ready.

My manager told me to take the rest of the day off but to "give yourself a kick up the arse" and she'd see me tomorrow.

But the team didn't have to be told. It was none of their business. The boss could be hauled in front of HR for being so unprofessional. It's not legal for a boss to disseminate someone else's private business especially medical private business to others, even if given permission. They were coworkers, not close friends, OP no longer worked on the team, why would the team care? Maybe one or two if they were close friends of OP, but I see no reason that anyone else would care or need to know. And if my boss had told my team that I had miscarried, I'd want to take my boss through HR and possibly get them sacked! I could never forgive or forget my boss doing that.

Sending a card and or flowers to someone who has had a miscarriage would feel like one is rubbing it in and as others above have said, would risk upsetting, offending and triggering that person. If someone made me dwell on my miscarriage, @LowestEbb like that I would be offended. It would be like rubbing it in, and I would lash out at the person sent it to me. It is simply not a good idea to trigger a woman who has had a miscarriage by sending a card or flowers.

Paradoxically, as others said, you can't compare a miscarriage to the death of born, walking, talking relative, and I say this as someone who has had a miscarriage. You just can't, and it's deeply offensive and insulting for the OP to think they are the same. Putting my pro-choice hat on for this, but you cannot compare something you've not held, talked to, walked with, that doesn't have a working brain stem or nerve receptors thus has zero sentience, to an older relative. You just can't, @LowestEbb . And imo as one who has experienced it, it is not just offensive and insulting but it is disingenuous to even remotely compare the two. Speaking from my personal experience only, but one that is clearly backed up by the vast overwhelming majority above.

My mother told me I had no right to be upset after my miscarriage as she said “it wasn't even a person yet. My mum died (at 78) and she was a person so I can be upset but you can’t”

That was 20 years ago and I've never forgiven her.

Ah I’m so sorry op, that’s a horrible experience to go through. I think many people struggle to know how to respond to a miscarriage and in their not knowing it can all go silent. I don’t think I would have expected a card or flowers but I would expect those who know to check in on how I was coping x

Cokie3 above puts it in a nutshell, and I can’t help wondering, also, why the DH’s colleagues were so invested in this that they sent him flowers.

I think with the miscarriage it's more to do with society's attitude to miscarriage being "just one of those things"

I think it’s more that miscarriage is seen as something very personal to the woman/the couple and isn’t a “public” event in the way that a death is, where other people have met/have memories of that person. And so there isn’t an established etiquette as there is with, say, sending a sympathy card in the event of a death.

I sent flowers to a close friend who lost a baby, because I know her well and was pretty sure that she would appreciate that. I didn’t - and wouldn’t have dreamed of doing - when the same happened to a colleague, as it would have seemed intrusive.

I'm so very sorry for your loss OP

Perhaps it says more about me (and your colleagues) but I genuinely don't think it would occur to me to send anything other than my sympathies in the event of a miscarriage, whether it be a colleague or friend. I honestly don't think it means they don't care.

When I suffered one some years ago only a few close friends knew I'd been pregnant but I'd have been absolutely staggered to have received a card or flowers from anyone, and I don't think I'd have wanted them in the house if they had.

While I'm not for a second suggesting that a miscarriage is any less painful than any other death, I do think it's a different process. When my grandparents died I wanted to remember them, talk about them, look at photos, enjoyed hearing other people's memories of them. When I had a miscarriage I wanted to grieve quietly and move on from it.

When it comes to your leaving, if you've left the team but are still within the company then I don't think it's that unusual not to receive anything. My company certainly wouldn't count it as 'leaving'.

Sorry for your loss.
I’ve never thought about sending a card following a miscarriage. I don’t think your colleagues were insensitive because it’s not something that’s a norm if that makes sense.

When I suffered one some years ago only a few close friends knew I'd been pregnant but I'd have been absolutely staggered to have received a card or flowers from anyone, and I don't think I'd have wanted them in the house if they had.

By comparison I had a MC last year (just after covid kicked off!) and two close friends sent cards and flowers, rang, asked after me repeatedly. I told them that I was hugely upset about it, and they reacted to that upset rather than to the loss itself iyswim. It meant the world to me.

I guess you can take away from this that women's reactions to their losses vary hugely, that there isn't an established protocol, and both those things together make it near-impossible for an employer to get right. But I'd still expect - yes, expect - some sort of human warmth and empathy from friends in that situation, and if OP felt that some of these people were friends then a bit of contact wouldn't have gone amiss IMO.

@miserableannie
Your post is vile as I suspect are you.
I have seen a lot of your posts on here always full of bitterness and nastiness.

Take care OP I can appreciate what you have experienced.

As a line manager, I always try to keep people's grief private, so it's their call whether they want to tell anyone.

I express my condolences, I arrange compassionate leave, I keep a closer eye than usual on their work and how they are treating others/being treated by others, and discreetly intervene if necessary. But I certainly don't organise a card and/or tell people.

Regarding a normal leaving card - it's the sort of thing that could easily slip through the net with working from home. I think you're reasonable to feel a bit disappointed leaving wasn't acknowledged if a card is typically the done thing in your workplace, but I think your expectations for how people should react to a miscarriage are not commonly shared.

None of this makes your grief any less valid. I'm truly sorry for your loss; it's clear this would have been a very wanted and loved baby.

I do usually mind my own business but reasons like this is why it’s so difficult to see posts on here about abortions for unwanted pregnancies. It’s the same ‘bundle of cells’ / baby but people are expected to have very different views depending solely on the feelings of the mother 
Sorry for your losses all 

Totally inappropriate to bring abortion into this

Sorry for your loss op, I've had a miscarriage too so I can understand some of your feelings but you are being very very unreasonable to expect a card - extremely unreasonable. Sorry.

[quote gypsywater]@miljea
It sounds like you had a VERY early loss though?[/quote]
I had two, 9 weeks and 11 weeks.

So both pre-12 weeks. That appears to be a line in the sand that is acknowledged.

I would have hated for anyone who didn't need to know I was pregnant, at work, knowing prior to 12 weeks.

Again, I was replying to the poster who 'wanted to make it clear' that we were all to regard a miscarriage, however early, to be akin to losing a baby, because that's how she regarded it.

Whereas I considered, on both occasions, that my body had rejected a bunch of non viable cells, pre 12 weeks.

I’m really sorry for your loss, OP- but people don’t tend to give people cards for miscarriages. Especially not to colleagues.

I think it’s not fair to expect that as it’s not a normal social convention. The colleagues were probably very sad for you (if they knew) but weren’t sure how public you were being with it, or if their sympathy would be welcomed.

Have you moved teams within the company? If so I wouldn’t expect a leaving card for that either I’m afraid.

So sorry for your loss .

I’ve had three miscarriages (two were discovered at the 12 week scan after no symptoms of miscarriage at all) and nobody really acknowledged them. It’s a lonely grief, nobody really feels it except you and if nobody you know has had a miscarriage then they simply won’t understand how it feels. I made sure I sent my friend a card and flowers when she had a miscarriage because I wanted her to know she wasn’t alone. I just don’t think people who haven’t experienced the loss understand.

@LouiseTrees

You can call them out on it In a sly way by saying “ sorry I was so consumed by my own grief that I didn’t send you a card x ( insert name of person whose nan died), hope you and the family are keeping well”.

So basically, have a dig at the college who's nan died because the rest of the office didn't send you a gard or flowers?🙄🙄🙄