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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

to think losing a baby at 22 weeks is potentially as hard as losing a baby at full term?

138 replies

onemissing · 01/03/2010 00:40

Not much more to add really....having been through the former, I'm often confronted with comments alluding to an earlier loss being "easier" than a later or full term one.

Wondering what you lot think, really.

OP posts:

Bonsoir · 01/03/2010 08:48

I think it is wise, when pregnant, to try to remember that your chances of carrying a healthy baby to full-term increase with every day of pregnancy.

Always best not to be too excited in the first three months, when the statistical risk of miscarriage is quite high. Thereafter, as your bump becomes visible and you need to tell other people, it is quite natural to start assuming that you will carry a healthy baby to term. And yes, I think losing a baby at 22 weeks of pregnancy probably is pretty devastating.

I've had several miscarriages at around the three month mark and it wasn't a big deal for me.

Morloth · 01/03/2010 08:52

People just say stupid shit before thinking.

When my friend's perfect, healthy, term baby was stillborn one woman said "Nevermind dear, you can have some more, we just won't talk about it again".

Bonsoir not everyone can think like that.

knowmyrights · 01/03/2010 08:53

Comparisons are useless and often offensive. One of my twins was stillborn at very nearly full-term, and sadly a number of people thought it was a comfort that "only" one of the babies had died. What I found strange was that many of these people were parents of more than one child themselves - how would they feel if one of their children was taken from them?

Yes of course I was happy one of the babies had survived (against the odds) but funny enough I wasn't exactly whooping with joy that I'd had to bury his brother.

NormaSknockers · 01/03/2010 08:56

That's an awful for someone to say.

A loss is a loss regardless of what gestation it occurs at. My SIL lost her little boy at 26 weeks, her grief was as real & as a raw as anyone's. It's almost 5 years on now & though she has 4 adorable DC the pain of losing her DS still lingers behind her eyes.

NormaSknockers · 01/03/2010 08:56

Awful thing

thesecondcoming · 01/03/2010 08:58

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

wannaBe · 01/03/2010 09:12

This really isn't a topic for ibu.

But while comments from others can be insensitive, equally it's wrong for anyone to make comparisons with anyone else. Your grief is your grief. It doesn't compare to the grief of someone who has lost their baby at full term or at six weeks. Because that grief is not yours - it is theirs, and you have no idea whether they are feeling that grief harder than you or not.

I am sorry for your loss.

But it's not a competition.

Coldhands · 01/03/2010 09:21

This was a ridiculous thing to say. Some people are really stupid.

A friend of mine lost her baby at about 8 months. It was awful. About a year later a mutual friend and I were talking about it and this 'friend' turned around to me and said "well, its been a year, she should be over it by now".

I was too shocked to say anything (this person is no longer a friend) and as she had children herself, I couldn't believe how she could ever think this. Surely no one ever really gets over it.

kreecherlivesupstairs · 01/03/2010 09:33

Agree, this is not a topic for AIBU? Secondcoming, mine was an incompetant cervix which should have been spotted but wasn't.
Try not to worry yourself, OP, I think I'd ask for this to be put somewhere less controversial.

Glitterknickaz · 01/03/2010 09:42

YANBU.
I've been through it, same gestation.
Having to go through labour, knowing your baby is dead is hard at any gestation.
I'm sorry for your loss x

TheShriekingHarpy · 01/03/2010 09:51

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn

confuddledDOTcom · 01/03/2010 09:59

I'm sorry BrownSnow0, rereading this morning before reading I'd got it wrong I knew that I had, was rather a busy day yesterday and I was shattered.

wannaBe, I think you've missed the point. When you lose a baby people treat you like the earlier you lost it the less it hurts. People don't see that it's your baby, you wanted and loved it, you have hopes and dreams for it, you have the next 18 years and more planned out. When you lose a baby, it doesn't matter how old, you lose all of that, everything you look forward to.

My pain may not be comparable to the next persons but it's not about someone else - that's the point, I think the OP is getting at - my pain it's not lessened because my baby died at 20 weeks rather than 40 weeks.

AliGrylls · 01/03/2010 10:00

It's always hard dealing with a baby that is lost no matter when it is and I am sorry to hear that you have lost your baby. It must be hard to come to terms with.

I do think it is different at different times of gestation - when I had a missed miscarriage (not discovered until 14 weeks) I found it hard but I did get over it.

I think once you are beyond the first 12 weeks it starts to get much harder to deal with the loss because you build a relationship with the child.

Thinking of you.

gtamom · 01/03/2010 10:03

I'm so sorry for your loss, and for anyone who has suffered the loss of their child. You had plans, dreams, you already loved your baby. People can be insensitive, sometimes not ever realizing that they were. I am sorry.

confuddledDOTcom · 01/03/2010 10:10

Cldhands, I get that too. It was my first and noww I have more so that's another reason I should be "over it".

MummyTumble · 01/03/2010 10:17

It's just such devastating news that most people don't know what to say and come out with garbled nonsense in an attempt to try and make you feel a little better.

We lost at 20 weeks and have had all sorts of daft things said to us (and many more since very fortunately having gone on to have more children).....I have tried to take it all with a pinch of salt but often it really upsets. I don't think people set out to deliberately upset (or would like to hope so).....

So sorry to hear someone else has gone through this

twotimes · 01/03/2010 10:21

I think that it is quite a terrible comment to make although to play devil's advocate, I think maybe someone may say it in order to kind of suggest "it could have been worse". which I don't actually think helps and it rarely makes the person feel better.

I don't think the competition helps, as another poster says, pain is pain and nobody has the right to overlook it.

I remember overhearing my young 10 year old cousin being told not to cry at her fathers funeral because she must remember her grandmother had lost a son (as though her pain was worse). People can be so insensitive even if they mean well.

jellybeans · 01/03/2010 10:25

Hi I lost 2 girls at 20 and 23 weeks. Just a few days/weeks later they would have been official people/stillbirths. I think it is just as hard in many ways but having never had a loss at full term it is something I can never really know. I can imagine the shock etc may be more intense. However, the hard part of the loss is the lost future with your child and sense of misjustice and isolation which would happen at any stage, esp 2nd trimester onwards when most people think they are 'safe'. I know my early m/cs were awful but with my girls I had felt them kicking, been for scans and knew they were girls and gave birth to them and held them. Many people acted as though my losses were just heavy periods or simelar though.

Original poster

onemissing · 01/03/2010 12:09

Firstly thank you for all your kindness and I'm so very sorry that lots of you have had to go through similar experiences.

I probably was wrong to post in AIBU, but I wanted to get a broad range of responses, not just from people who had been through this, as I suspected I'd be likely to find in the bereavement / pregnancy loss boards.

However, I'm not sure why posting in this section is remotely "controversial" kreecherlivesupstairs, care to elaborate?

I agree that, in many instances, people's intentions are good, but last night I was at a support group (which I was running!) and when I told people that I lost my son at 22 weeks, one lady (who'd lost her son a tfull term) said it was "easier to understand" than a later loss, at which everybody murmured their agreement.

So it wasn't somebody trying to make me feel better, rather someone who couldn't (or didn't want to ) understand how our losses could be comparable.

Anyway, thanks again for taking the time to respond to my post, it's nice to know that so many of you care.

OP posts:

Morloth · 01/03/2010 12:12

I think even us venomous vipers in AIBU can spot when a thread is not an opportunity for a piss take.

porcamiseria · 01/03/2010 12:18

onemissing

I am so so so sorry for you, hope that you start to come to terms with this.

I would only advise against posting here as this page as you know can get NASTY and I think people would hate to see that in your situations, thats all. so thats why ppl prob said it was contraversial to post here, purely out of concern for you.....

people say thoughtless things when trying to be sympathetic, sigh, they do more harm than good

hand on in there XXXXX

knowmyrights · 01/03/2010 12:43

onemissing, I don't find the subject matter controversial, but for me personally I find it very hard to see these topics brought up in AIBU or chat. It's been more than seven years since my son died, and tbh there are times when I'm feeling delicate that I just don't want to see stillbirth or miscarriage threads. There are other times I feel fine with the subject matter, and will actively participate no matter where they are.

That may be all that people are trying to say to you about the place it's been posted.

Original poster

onemissing · 01/03/2010 12:53

Ok fair enough.

To be honest I've only just discovered Mumsnet and didn't realise how inappropriate an area of the forum this was to post on.

Sorry, knowmyrights and anyone else who could have done without seeing such a thread.

Thanks for, on the whole, going easy on me.

OP posts:

knowmyrights · 01/03/2010 12:56

Come over to bereavement - you'll be very welcome there (not that you're not welcome anywhere if you see what I mean).

confuddledDOTcom · 01/03/2010 14:00

onemissing, it's not that this is an inappropriate area, but this is a forum that invites people to give their opinion and it can get quite harsh here.

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