The M Word: Coping With Miscarriage
By Joe Cassara • Category: Cover Story, Fatherhood, Relationship
Before my wife had two miscarriages on our first two pregnancies, whenever I heard the word “miscarriage” I thought about an old baby carriage, and a young couple living in the 1920′s who lose a child, and how it must be pretty terrible for them to have to put the carriage back into a closet. For some reason it was always the wrapping paper closet in my mind, and they would forget it was there, and then over and over, while they were trying to rush out the door and having to wrap a present really quickly, out falls the baby carriage and they just start crying… and they probably miss their party… and I always finished this whole thought process by thinking, “Just throw out the damn baby carriage!”
The thing is, when it happens to you (and then it happens again), the reality of losing two babies really sucks. The truth is there were times when seeing a Huggies commercial or eating a baby shrimp would put us over the edge. We were the wrapping paper people, leaving parties early because someone brought their cute kid and going to Red Lobster for the Admiral’s feast and beers on the days after both our miscarriages (making the best of being able to drink and eat shellfish for the first time in months).
Backing up, it started as something like… Dating, engagement, wedding, honeymoon, apartment, house, dog, vacations, “the itch,” pregnancy!
Well what’s so hard about making a baby? Only took us about 6 days, if that. Everything is filled with newness… reading the books about trimesters and cravings and circumcision, arguing about names and joking about whether we would let him dance if he really wanted to. I’m not sure if as a couple we grew closer in that time of wonderment, but looking back, it just fit into the plan. For me there was more ego and less of a sense of awe, which sounds really bad, but the truth is that there hadn’t been much to disrupt our neat little plan of action thus far. I was king of my castle! Add making babies to the list of my successes. Believe me, I don’t think like this now… not even close. I consider brushing my teeth twice a day a major accomplishment.
So, December 28th, 2007, we went in for a routine checkup, and BAM! Our baby no longer had a heartbeat. What follows is torture. There isn’t much worse than sympathy from strangers, especially when they do the same voice they would use for a 4 year old who dropped their ice cream cone in the sand. Stuff like, “aww, it must be hard,” as they rub your back. The next 24 hours were terrible. I wouldn’t wish it on anyone to have to flush a 1 inch fetus down your toilet, and I think I loved my wife more on that day than any day since.
I’ll pause here for a second to try to explain what I’ve learned as a husband trying to support my wife through a miscarriage:
- It is not like a failed 4th down or a strikeout. There are deep, lasting emotional scars for a woman that center on the question, “Am I broken?”
- Do not tell her it’s OK. It’s not OK.
- She needs you as her rock during this time — not to give her puppy dog eyes and rub her back, but to hold her as she cries and make her feel safe.
Ok, fast-forward a few months, and she’s pregnant again! You can read more of my feelings about this whole process in a different article, but about two and a half months later, another miscarriage, this one with her ending up in the hospital for an emergency surgery after passing out at home. Talk about kicking a girl when she’s down…
Exactly 365 days after that 2nd miscarriage, my rock star wife gave birth to twins. Brett & Ella are an answer to many earnest and repeated prayers. They’ve softened my heart, given me a vision for our family, and have cut my free time by about 95%.
But your story may not go like mine. So I’m not going to give you an atta-boy speech about the little engine that could. The truth is, the 3rd time might not be the charm for you. Your genetic testing might come back with some problems. You might turn to some scientific help, adoption, or give up. You’ll find most people are afraid to talk about fear and loss and defeat. Any stranger will tell you not to worry, that God has a healthy baby for you two someday. And that’s BS, because there might not be a healthy baby in your future. You might face years of tests and expensive procedures that leave you with nothing.
You’ll find statistics saying anywhere from 15-40% of pregnancies end in a miscarriage. So if multiple children are in your plans, the odds are against you, I’m afraid. As a guy, we’re not sure how to handle a loss like this. But believe me, your wife has attached herself so much more than you have to this unborn child. There is some serious ongoing grieving that she experiences, much more than we understand. There are some practical things you can do to really be what she needs. Some of these I’ve learned from my own experience; the rest are from psychologist Erik Fisher, Ph.D:
- Remember the day of the miscarriage, and the original due date that the baby would have been born. Leave her a note that acknowledges the day, and plan an outing to get out of the house, like going to the movies.
- Understand how your wife deals with grief. Sometimes people need time to process and then talk, and sometimes they process while they
talk. Check in with your wife to see what would help her to talk it through. - I’ve said it before, but don’t tell your wife that everything will be OK and expect to move on.
- Expect for both of you to cry, and be ready to hold her when she does… not matter how often or how long.
- Make time to talk or spend time together everyday for at least a few weeks.
- Recognize that the pain from this does not go away in a few weeks; it can last months and years, especially depending on the efforts that were taken to get pregnant in the first place.
- Don’t expect her to be ready for sex for enjoyment or procreation anytime soon. Everyone is different, but a conversation can save a lot of frustration. She will connect sex with the miscarriage, and there is a lot of pain there.
- This is important: don’t feel afraid to get counseling to work this through. It can really help to build a marriage, especially if it is worked through successfully.
Recovering from miscarriage is never easy — for either of you. But together, you can rebuild your lives and begin to move on. 
Special thanks to “Dr. E,” aka Erik Fisher, Ph.D, for his contributions to this article.
Joe Cassara is a husband, father and thinker from Webster, NY. Follow him at http://joecassara.blogspot.com.
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wow. that brought back memories, and nearly brought back tears. it’s been over 9 years for us. we had a boy before that, and a girl after. didn’t realize I was still that good at walling off parts of my memory. it can be an extraordinarily rough time, but it can be used (as suggested in the article) to forge a closer bond between the two of you. take advantage of that time, sad as it might be, as you will need that strength when your beautiful little kids become …teenagers… >8}
Thanks for sharing your experience Joe. For those of us that have never experienced a miscarriage, it really helps us to not take the birth of our children for granted. And it will help me to understand how to support my wife if we were to ever experience that. Thank you for not sugar-coating your experience. I know it can’t be easy to experience those moments all over again and see them in writing. But I think it is important for others to understand how horrible an experience that having a miscarriage can be, especially since we rarely have heard about those experiences from our parents.
My husband and I have had two miscarraiges. For both he’s been a total basket case, but not in that sensitive-man-in-glasses kind of way. His is the more manly way: drown your sorrows, suppress your sadness, and occasionally lash out with icy comments laced with blame and bitterness.
I know what you’re thinking by now about him, but don’t. By thinking that way you are dissmissing and undermining the intensity of what he feels and goes through. He wants to be a father more deeply than even I, the mother of his unborn children, can understand. To me, the miscarraige was a matter of primarily physical pain with some lurking grief that can surprise you on any old Tuesday afternoon. I buried my lima bean alone in the garden, and that was that.
For him it’s more. It’s not a practical physical process to be endured, it’s an entire emotional fantasy being crushed. It’s a darkness sucking away the meaning and joy in his whole life, past, present and future. His is the kind of grief that likes to masquerade as callousness and anger. I can’t comfort him or support him because it’s too hard for him to even think about it. It’s crazy for me to dream of him comforting and supporting me like I hear about some men doing for their wives.
I do have to disagree with the statement of “don’t tell her it’s ok”. Maybe it’s not a good line to default to and hollowly repeat over and over, but as someone who hasn’t heard it once, I must say, those two words would mean everything to me. It’s ok that your body killed my baby. It’s ok I forgive you. It’s ok I don’t blame you. It’s ok I still love you. It’s ok we can keep trying.
I’m pregnant now for the third time, and accidentally, ie not-mentally-ready. When I told him we’d reached 9 weeks one morning he responded with a level of dryness bordering on sarcasm, “So, you think this one is going to stick”. I answered that I couldn’t make him any promises but that it’s farther than we’d made it before so I was hopeful, and so he just sneered, “well it’s about time.” in a tone that clearly said, he just expects me to let him down. Again.
I’m nearly at 14 weeks now. Early on, I’d been sure that the cramping would arrive any day. I didn’t want to go to the doctor and see a heart beating and then dig another pea-sized hole in the garden. So that’s how I will end up getting my very first ultrasound at 15 weeks, which is crazy and torturous, to be so “far along” but have no idea if your baby is a waterhead mutant or if it even exists at all.
I asked and he will not go with me to the appointment. In a very frank moment he told me that he wouldn’t be able to handle it [if the results are bad]. I don’t know how I will handle it if they are, knowing I have to go home to a man and absolutely break his heart. I’d rather crawl into a hole and die than have to tell him bad news again. I don’t know why I have to “be the strong one” but for some reason that’s just the way it is for us. All you can do is hope, and then feel something more appropriate when it’s time.
He will be the best, most devoted, loving father in the world and he deserves to have a child of his own, and I desperately want to give that to him. The first time I found out I was pregnant, before we ever had had any miscarraiges, he was so excited. He bought cigars and gave them all to his friends and bragged and joked about when kind of father he would be, and he treated me like a queen. Not this time.
We are so afraid. The fear doesn’t go away as the risk of miscarraige decreases… in fact it just seems to get worse. I’m so tired now from crying while I wrote all this out and I’m starving as usual. I feel like I’ll just fall asleep right on my key boaarrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr
T.B. – I must admit, I’ve never heard that perspective. It breaks my heart to read your story. I can understand how your husband (any husband, really) can grieve the loss of a child, but it sounds to me like he could really use someone safe to talk to – a counselor or pastor or even a brick wall! It’s not easy for most men (myself included) to admit they need to talk to someone, though, so I wouldn’t be surprised if he balked at the idea. The fact that you’ve put up with that anger and stuck with him speaks volumes about who you are as a woman. I hope this pregnancy does “stick” and he returns to treating you like a queen – you deserve at least that much, regardless of the outcome. And yes, I will say it to you: it’s ok. The miscarriages you experienced are not your fault. You are not a broken woman. You are no less a woman and no less human than any other. Regardless of the outcome of this pregnancy, you are valuable and worthy of being loved. I hope your husband can come to grips with this truth and express it to you soon himself… for your sake and your baby’s.
I would just like to thank you for this article. It is very well written, and a great help. My wonderful wife and me just learned that the embryo (week
is far too small and chances are dim that the pregnancy will proceed as it should. We have one little daugher – who is a bundle of joy, and that in itself is a reason for gratitude – how very grateful you can become when you understand that things are not to be taken for granted. A bitter lesson it is nonetheless.
What I will never forget is: When I saw the tears in the eyes of my wife when the doctor informed us. It nearly broke my heart. It hurts, it really hurts like little else. Now we are in a waiting position, which, in a way, seems to me worse than knowing: What will be? Will she be alright, physically and mentally?
It is like a shadow falling over your life. Not that everything breaks down – life goes on and ours is an especially nice one, we have little to worry about in general; we live under very blessed circumstances – but it is like a sad background music which accompanies even the nicer things we do. What I find remarkable is my wife’s warmth and beauty in all of this. It is hard to tell how to feel – sometimes we forget it, and then the thoughts come back and it hurts … and so on. I liked your article. In the end, all one can do is relishing how oneself, the loved ones, and others are coming to terms, are coping (or not). Life is indeed a mystery, and there is no way around that insight. It can give you so much pleasure, and it can give you pain. I know this sounds trivial, but once you are in there, it isn’t so trivial anymore.
To others who are reading this – you are not alone. All who’ve been there know how much it hurts.
that should not have been a smiley, but week 8, and then brackets. Stupid computers!
i just wanted to thank you for writing this. nobody talks about miscarriage, and that fact alone makes it difficult for women (and men) to get through it. it seems that people shy away from the subject, and if they do talk to you about it, they end up saying something insensitive, like “it’s ok, you can try again” or “well, maybe it was God’s will. maybe there was something wrong with the baby.” thank you for saying that a husband should just be a rock. my husband just being there, saying nothing, was exactly what i needed. he still remembers the day it happened, and he is sensitive to how i’m feeling at that time of year – that is incredibly important to me.
it’s been just over 4 yrs since i miscarried my first baby at 7 weeks, and even though i got pregnant again right away, and my husband i have 2 wonderful kids now, the pain just doesn’t go away. and i’m ok with that. it means that my baby is remembered.
again – thank you for taking a step in making miscarriage a little more out in the open so that women can feel that they don’t have to hide their pain.
Thank you for writing this. My Husband is not the biological father of my first 2 daughters and when we decided to try for a baby together we experienced 3 miscarriages together before we carried to term and added another beautiful girl to our family. The journey was terrible. Pregnancy, which in the past had been a wonderful time for me was a nine month anxiety attack. Glad for our baby, but definately the end of the baby road for us. I am so grateful that we have her. Still sad for the 3 that we lost.
I think you addressed this beautifully. Thanks for the perspective and the advice. Congratulations on your babies.
Thank you for writng such a beautiful article. Truly the gift of life is an an awesome gift! My spouse and I have two beautiful children (11 and 13). We suffered two misscarriages (2002 and 2004). Both rocked my world. I am still haunted by them and feel alot of emotional pain to this day. When I started bleeding we (my husband and I and two childern) were to to go on a trip to visit his mother and rent a car to take his mother on a trip to the south for a week). The doctor told us the baby was dead (I was 13 weeks) and that I would need a D and C. Against my wishes my spouse continued on the planned vacation with our children and left me with my twin sister who me took to the hospital for the D and C and post care. I have never recovered from this – I know for him the baby didn’t really exist – but for me it was real and my abandonment pain still hurts. WE have discussed this and has apoligized but my pain still haunts me. I applaud you for your sensitivity to the miscarriages.