One of those things? Not for me or all the women like me
Julie Ford, 28, was six weeks pregnant when she lost her baby. Here, in an excerpt from her powerful account, that can be read in full at sundaypost.com, she details her grief and why Scots must start talking about miscarriage.
I didn’t tell anyone this had happened, because I was in denial. I was in denial that my pregnancy had ended, and I was in denial my baby was gone. I needed to have confirmation from a scan.
However, my experience at the hospital was far from positive. There was an attitude that I was “only six weeks pregnant” and I should have known that there was a chance my pregnancy would end in miscarriage. Like this is completely normal, and that women and parents must learn to deal with that fact.
Once I was home, I started to feel let down. Let down that my concerns, upset and distress hadn’t been taken seriously from the moment I called the hospital. Let down by our society, where collectively we suffer from a particularly cruel cognitive dissonance. On the one hand, we maintain a stigma around miscarriage
– it remains firmly a taboo subject, met with grimaces, quick changes of subject and palpable awkwardness. On the other, we are encouraged to think of miscarriage as just one of those things, a view that allows – in fact, encourages – us to fail to see, understand or empathise with the psychological impact that it can have on parents.
I went back to work after a week off trying to process what had happened, and I remember sitting crying at my desk weeks after my return. But, instead of being up front with what I was going through and admitting to the pain I was in, I hid it from colleagues. I did what is expected, not speaking about it.
We need to stop treating miscarriage as just “one of those things” and start investigating why it has happened to see if, medically, there is a way to try and prevent a miscarriage from progressing when bleeding begins.
I hope that when my daughter is older, and potentially having children of her own, that she never experiences miscarriage. But, if she does, I hope that this campaign, and others that will undoubtedly follow, help to improve the services and medical care that is offered to her and her generation.
Read Julie’s story at sundaypost.com