The Unique Challenges of Pregnancy and Infant Loss Grief
All forms of loss suck. A lot. Like a lot lot. I’ll refrain from peppering in the four-letter words I’m thinking to emphasize how much loss sucks. But just know that I’m thinking them… loudly. And I would never want to compare different forms of loss in terms of the quality of the suckiness. That’s not healthy or productive.
That said, each form of loss brings its own unique challenges. For example, let’s consider the loss of a partner. The emotional distress regarding losing “your person” is horrendous. But think about the tangible impacts as well. The loss of a partner may directly impact a family's income. It may present extremely practical challenges like “What password did they use for XYZ account?” Or maybe they were the partner who knew just how to spice the taco meat to perfection. Here’s to a life of eating subpar tacos alone. The list goes on.
As for the loss of a child, particularly a child in utero or early infancy, there aren’t usually those same tangible impacts. The child wasn’t bringing in an income. In fact, they were suddenly responsible for spending most of the household income. They had no passwords. And they certainly weren’t entrusted with preparing taco Tuesday. And yet, the loss is profound. The grief? Overwhelming.
In theory, people understand this. As I’ve explored a few times in previous posts, there is an inherent human instinct to protect our young. Our continued existence as a species relies on us procreating healthy and happy offspring. There is thus a strong biological need to feel an immediate and intense connection to our children. This bond is widely recognized by most humans, even those who don’t yet have offspring. As a species, we know that the parent-child bond is unique. That’s why the loss of a child is often such an uncomfortable topic for people. The idea of losing a child is “unimaginable” as it directly opposes one of our deepest human instincts. That’s often why people try to avoid the subject; it’s just too painful to think about.
But when you experience the loss of a child, you don’t have the luxury of avoiding the topic. Instead, you are forced to face one of humanity’s greatest nightmares. And when you are living it, you begin to realize that some very unique challenges come with this type of loss. Challenges that don’t come with the loss of a partner, friend, or family member.
Here are a few of those challenges. This is not an exhaustive list, but it does capture some of the biggest themes that grieving parents face after the loss of a pregnancy or young infant. Again, the idea of not to compare losses, but simply to help people understand the uniqueness that is the loss of a pregnancy or infant.
Parents struggle with the loss of potential.
This is one of the biggest and hardest challenges that grieving parents grapple with. The loss of a pregnancy or infant brings the loss of the future the parent envisioned for their child. The life they dreamed of but will never have. Obviously other losses come with losing the future as well. But the loss of a pregnancy or very young child is particularly challenging because all of their future is lost. They never got to begin to live any of their future. Someone who dies later in life may have plans for the future, but they also have a life that represents the progress they have made towards those plans. A fetus or infant has none of that. Only clothes they will never wear and toys they will never play with. This leaves parents with very few memories but lots of plans that will never come to be.
People actively avoid talking about the loss.
As I already established, the loss of a child makes people so uncomfortable that they don’t even want to think about it. I dove into how people respond to other’s loss of a child in a previous post called What NOT to Say to a Grieving Parent. In that post, I spoke about how people tend to provide “logical” responses to grieving parents rather than emotional ones. It’s for their own self-protection so they don’t have to “feel” the pain. But it just doesn’t work for the grieving parents. Additionally, what I didn’t discuss in great length in that post is that people tend to think that not talking about it will somehow help the grieving parent forget. Or at least if they don’t bring up the loss then the parent won’t remember it. This is completely illogical as anyone who has lost a child knows that it’s pretty much impossible to forget. And talking about it is actually a really important part of the healing process. Again, other types of losses also make people uncomfortable, and people sometimes try to avoid the topic. But this type of loss seems to amplify avoidance more than others. I think it’s due to people’s discomfort, people's limited understanding of this type of loss, and the close association pregnancy has with taboo topics (which is the next unique challenge).
Loss of a pregnancy or infant can involve taboo topics.
Let’s just straight out acknowledge that this type of loss dances around taboo topics. Pregnancy and infants are a direct result of sex. (Sorry if you didn’t know that already.) And conversations about sex, or any part of human reproduction (including female menstruation, the delivery process, or the postpartum body) make people uncomfortable. So talking about these parts of the loss is usually considered inappropriate. Even the grieving parents themselves often avoid these topics. But the thing is, that these topics are intimately (pun totally intended) intertwined into the loss story. So parents literally censor themselves when talking about their loss. They don’t usually get to talk about what it was like to miscarry. Or having a postpartum body without the joy of having a baby in their arms. These experiences are painful but deemed crude to discuss. So they are experienced and remembered, in silence.
The loss of a pregnancy or infant is a physical experience.
While we are on the taboo topics, it is well-known that pregnancy and delivery cause physical distress to the gestational parent. Morning sickness, hormones, cramps, back pain, stretch marks, tears, surgical sites, swollen breasts… the list goes on. The physical side effects of pregnancy and delivery are painful and annoying to everyone who experiences them. However, they are usually tolerated and even ignored when there is a cute baby to take care of. They are often viewed as a necessary sacrifice for the ultimate reward. But when there is no baby, there is no reward. And no distractions. Only physical distress.
People falsely suggest that an earlier loss should be easier to “get over.”
This one is a bit paradoxical. On one hand, people recognize the intense and immediate parent-child bond. On the other hand, people often assume that time with the lost child should somehow correspond to the depth and length of the grieving period. That is, an early loss should be less painful than losing a child later in life, right? Less time together should mean less of a bond, right? Again, as I discussed in What NOT to Say to a Grieving Parent, this assertion is a result of people trying to find “logic” to help grieving parents feel better. While it obviously flies directly in the face of the understanding that we have a biological need to readily and deeply bond with our offspring, people suggest this to grieving parents to help them rationalize their grief away. It just doesn’t work that way, though. And statements like this just make the parents feel misunderstood and judged.
Parents have very few memories of their baby.
In fact, having such little time with a child is often a source of pain in itself. Many parents who have lost pregnancies or infants struggle immensely with the fact that they had such little time. Many parents say they would give anything for even a few more minutes, hours, or days. While this sentiment is common in other forms of loss as well, there is a unique quality in this type of loss given the limited time. As I mentioned earlier, parents have so few memories that every moment with their child represents more of the child’s existence. So even another hour could significantly increase the memories together. And it should be pointed out that for many, the limited memories that do exist may house extremely unpleasant events. In addition to having no future with their child, parents often feel robbed of their past with their baby as well. I cannot think of another relationship that parallels this complexity.
Parents struggle with feeling like a failure.
Again, we return to the idea that having healthy and happy children is driven by a deep biological need. So it is extremely common for grieving parents to feel as if they have failed as not only parents but as humans. There is often a lot of guilt, shame, and a sense of inadequacy associated with the loss of a pregnancy or infant. Additionally, many mothers who miscarry or have a stillborn feel that their body is deficient. This coupled with the physical distress discussed above can lead to deep feelings of anger and resentment.
Parents feel pressure to try again…quickly.
This challenge is very unique to the loss of a pregnancy or infant. This is the only loss I can think of where there is immediate pressure to replace the person who was lost. This pressure is driven by both the parents’ biological need to procreate and the societal pressures associated with having children.
Final thoughts
All forms of loss suck. Period. But grieving parents face unique emotional, physical, and social challenges. Each of them is deep, raw, and incredibly complex to navigate. Hopefully this blog post makes them a little less mysterious.
