Are you suffering from the silent pain of miscarriage?
You are not alone
You feel the pain of loss. The pain of what might have been. The pain of the dreams that were shattered but not forgotten. You’re not alone.
Miscarriage affects 1 in 4 women. In the UK that stat would suggest that 2.75 million women of childbearing age have lost a baby during pregnancy. Whether you’ve experienced an early miscarriage, missed miscarriage, blighted ovum, recurrent miscarriage, ectopic pregnancy, late miscarriage or a stillbirth – the emotional pain of miscarriage and grief this leads to can feel can be overwhelming.
I lost my baby at 24 weeks
This put me in a place of loss and isolation suffering with grief. This was the silent pain of miscarriage. I didn’t want to talk about it and pretended that I was fine. Truthfully, I did want to talk about it with someone who understood and had been there. This stuck with me, fast-forward to today and my focus is to help women navigate the trauma of losing a baby during pregnancy and to find a way to move-forward.
The pain is real
It’s hard to put into words the horror you feel when you discover there isn’t a heartbeat, or when you start bleeding or when you discover an anomaly halfway through your pregnancy. Nothing can describe those feelings of loss; it just feels like the bottom has fallen out of your world. It’s a pain that you never believed you could feel, so deep, so dark, so traumatic.
You’ll experience a myriad of emotion when you discover you’re no longer carrying your child. For many women, sadness is the most heart-wrenching emotion and one that consumes us. As it’s part of the grief cycle, we must feel it, face it, embrace it. It’s important to say that this feeling may always be part of you, just not as intense as time goes on.
The 7 stages of grief
There are 7 stages to grief: shock and denial, pain and guilt, anger and bargaining, depression, upward turn, working through, acceptance and hope. Everyone goes through this grief cycle in one way of another, and it can take anything from one to two years to complete the cycle. I remember thinking “why do I not feel better by now”, but although there are 7 stages it doesn’t mean that it’s a succinct flow to acceptance and hope; everyone’s journey is different and for some it takes longer.
Allow yourself time
You need to heal from your pregnancy loss in a holistic, energetic, psychological and physical way. As human beings we are mind, body, soul and energy all of which needs time to flourish and heal after experiencing such a trauma. Some women disconnect, which is something we as humans do to protect ourselves from feeling. It’s a coping strategy. I urge you to feel the pain and let is pass. Be kind to yourself, be aware of what you’re feeling but don’t place too higher expectation on yourself.
You will never forget
Losing your baby is something you’ll never forget. Unresolved issues and feelings around it can weigh heavily in your life. If you hold onto or suppress these feelings, after time your body will begin to show signs of disease. This could be a skin disorder, poor immunity, exhaustion, depression or insomnia.
Contact me if you need help
I work with women to help them explore their emotions and the impact their miscarriage is having on their relationships. Through various coping strategies and my experience as a holistic therapist I help women to recover from their trauma and learn to move on, but never forget; because your baby is and always will be a part of you. Contact me here or join my Facebook Group
Leave A Comment