The grief of miscarriage

This is for those beautiful people who are going through an early miscarriage.

The day after we buried our first baby, the grief set in. My friend had talked about the ache. Now I felt it.

The ache is in your chest, it is physical pain. I had never felt it before in my life.

It didn't take long for me to realise my body was in grief. My spirit was in grief at a deep level. My mind was separate from it.

I think this is why they say you can't understand what miscarriage feels like until it has happened to you. Because your body and spirit feels the loss of a pregnancy in a unique way.

I felt and thought many things.

I felt over-dramatic. Like I was making a big deal out of nothing. My baby was less than a centimetre long. It wasn't really a baby was it? It was a blob.

I felt different. I saw many sweet miscarriage quotes and pictures on Pinterest. They spoke of heart beats, they had little footprints. My baby didn't have a heartbeat or footprints. She was a little blob.

I felt shame. I certainly didn't blame myself for the miscarriage, but I was ashamed to have fallen into something negative and depressing that would make people feel bad and uncomfortable if they found out.

I felt empty. It felt so wrong to have the gestational sac buried out in the garden. I wanted to somehow put it back inside me. It was supposed to be inside me. I wanted Charlotte back.

I felt silly. Because I phoned and asked for a copy of the ultrasound scan that showed the little blob and some bleeding. I wanted to see it again. I wanted to keep it.

I felt alone. I knew no-one in my city who had been through a miscarriage. All my support was long distance.

I felt confused. Who should I tell about this? I am not a terribly private person but I didn't want to break the social norm and tell everyone. I didn't want people to think I had over-shared. I told a handful of friends. I told all my piano student families because I needed to justify time off. I tried to keep it a secret from our entire church.

I felt blank. There were things I knew I should feel but I couldn't feel them yet. Our feelings come as we are ready and capable of dealing with them.

I felt angry. I was at peace with having had the miscarriage and knowing God's plan, but I still would feel angry sometimes. I needed to yell and hit pillows even if I knew it was irrational. I needed to scream at God.

I felt like I was feeling the wrong things. I was supposed to be jealous of babies. But that would be like losing a one year old baby and being jealous of a ten year old. Being around babies felt fine. Hearing of people in early pregnancy felt awful.

I felt frustrated at my husband. I wanted him to be sad! He didn't feel the grief I felt. He didn't feel most of what I felt. He was sad in a different way.

I felt like I wanted to run away from the ache. Sometimes it was physically strong in my chest and I couldn't make it stop. Sometimes I would cry but then I would stop because tears made no difference. I would try to find something to distract myself from it but I didn't feel like doing anything.

I felt shaken. My faith was shaken. I visited my friend's stillborn baby's grave. She had peace and the joy of heaven in her eyes but I felt physically sick. I looked around the cluster of children's graves with their decorations; a whimsical Willy Wonka world amidst the name plaques and the stillness. How God? I asked. How can you let them die?

Amidst all of this, I was far from totally broken. I was back and forth and my heart would often be in contrast to my mind. I didn't feel totally devastated. I felt like my baby was deferred, not gone for good. I still believed I would have a baby soon. I was blessed to have never been through 'trying for a baby' and I had never fully expected this baby to survive. This was not a shock. This felt like the way it was always going to be and I had peace. My little girl Charlotte was happily in heaven. God was holding me.

I learnt not to expect grief to be sensible or to follow a pattern or to stay on one side of the fence or the other. I learnt even more to let myself feel what I felt. To express whatever came out. To embrace the process. God was very gentle and comforting.

We mustn't be afraid to vent at him and we mustn't be afraid of pain. The moment I let him right into my anger or grief and share it with him is the moment I find release.