How to support someone through a miscarriage at 20 weeks

[AddictedToSausageRolls]

My friend miscarried last week at 20 weeks and I'm so desperately sad for her.
We've been messaging a lot and she says any words are a comfort but I don't want to say the wrong thing and want to be there for her in the best way I can. Any advice on what others in her situation have found helpful would be much appreciated.

(We don't see each other often so much of our friendship is online although we are due to meet up soon).

(I've also had an early miscarriage in the past but I can't imagine that even comes close to what she is going through now.)
x

I lost a baby at 22 weeks. It is horrible and there are no words to ease the pain I can think of. What I remember are the words I hated and still remember.
Dont say:

1. anything related to angel/better place/ with God/ ...
2. statistics such as 1 in 3 woman has mc, or age, or data, facts, ...
3. you will have another

I hope someone can come forward on what to say. Say you are sorry

Thank you so much. I'm so sorry for your loss.

I've completely avoided what you hated hearing so that's good.

x

I had a still born baby girl last summer, my friends sent me flowers, a card saying they were there for me if I needed a hand to hold, talk, a cry or to just sit in silence.

I lost a baby at about the same point as your friend last year and I remember a colleague just saying "I'm sorry for your loss. What happened to your baby?" Then she just listened to me talking and crying for the majority of our lunch hour. I appreciated that massively as most were too scared to ask/oddly making me feel like I had to comfort them.

Also let her know that if she wants a coffee or a lunch date (when she's ready of course) that she knows where you are.

You sound like a good friend and I'm sorry for her loss

Don't say
'Everything happens for a reason'
'It wasn't meant to be'
'At least you know you can get pregnant'
'There was probably something wrong with the baby'
'You'll have more'

Thank you all. I really appreciate your comments and it breaks my heart that so many people have been through this.

We are meeting up soon and she said she'll tell me everything so I've deliberately not asked what happened. That was something I was unsure of whether I should ask at all. I've always been blunt with things like that but I'm treading very carefully.

"I know how hard things are for you and I'm here if you want to tell me everything, sit in silence or somewhere in between"

Ask her if she'd like to talk about it and if she would just listen. Ask her if she'd thought about names or ways to remember her baby.

When we lost our son to a stillbirth the things I found helpful/thoughtful:

• my sister telling me immediately that there are a multitude of ways to make a family and I will get my dream family some day. (We had no idea what went wrong so this gave me something to hold on to..)
• colleagues giving us a name a star gift box to name after our son
• colleagues giving us a bouquet of paper origami flowers so that they wouldn't fade

Just little thoughtful things like letting us remember him and acknowledge our loss.

Also a friend saying we can talk about whatever you'd like.. if you'd like to talk about it I'd be honoured to listen but if you'd rather not that's perfectly okay too.

One small caveat is to just follow her lead. Some women do find it easier to manage their grief by referring to the loss as the loss of a foetus or calling it "it" etc, while others prefer referring to the baby as their son or daughter and naming him or her etc. There is no prescribed way to grieve so whatever gives her comfort is fine. Just don't swing one way or another until you can ascertain how she prefers to handle it iyswim?

Thank you all so much. Your comments have been so helpful. I've just said to her what @Bisquick suggested. x