Does grief trump discomfort?
It’s a question that gets asked a lot when people talk about their dead babies–does a parent’s need to share their grief over a child that never was trump the uncomfortable collar tugging it incites from the general public?
That’s the question asked in this article from Maclean’s magazine that I’m sure many of you have seen already. I can’t express how disappointed I am that a publication I once respected has come up with such drivel.
When it comes to the loss of a spouse, sibling, parent, grandparent etc. the people who loved them are allowed to grieve openly and with the consent of everyone else (to a point). But when it comes to grieving miscarriages and stillbirths, there is an unspoken pact that we shall not talk about such unseemly things, lest it make someone uncomfortable.
What I want to know is at what point did a person’s need to feel comfortable become more important than someone who’s heart has been broken into a thousand pieces?
I’m not sure if the writer of this article has ever experienced a loss (but it does read as though she has no clue).
I’m sure if she had, she would understand that it’s not really about the physical body. Yes, people who lose late term babies will take photos and share them and yes, they can be hard to look at, but ultimately it’s not about the flesh and bone in the photo, it’s about the promise that was lost. It was about the memories and moments that will never happen–those first steps, that first word, the first day of school, a wedding, grandchildren etc.
It’s about the circle of life being broken and sometimes never repaired.
And this is precisely why there is no blurring of lines when it comes to deciding what is life and what isn’t in the abortion debate. I can be as pro-choice as I want, that doesn’t mean I didn’t feel a physical sense of loss when I had my miscarriage. I had no baby–the manifestation of my pregnancy was unceremoniously flushed down a toilet (something I was acutely aware of during and after it happened), but it was the promise that was lost and that’s what I grieved for.
This is about is judging how someone handles their grief and that’s just not fair. There are numerous comments on the article that state the writer has no idea what she’s talking about and just as many rebuttals asking “how do we know she’s never experienced a loss? Everyone grieves differently.”
And there’s the rub–everyone grieves differently.
If the writer and commenters who say they have experienced loss can stand up and say, “this is how I grieved, I got over, so should you, and the writer is entitled to her opinion because everyone grieves differently,” how can they marginalize anyone else for choosing to grieve the way they do?
The reason there are groups of people on the internet talking so much about miscarriage and stillbirth is precisely because the people in our real lives don’t want to hear it. It’s precisely because they don’t want to see pictures of dead babies that our blogs exist. Why was it so wrong for Jay-Z to talk about Beyonce’s miscarriage? She probably felt as alone when it happened as the rest of us do.
Ultimately, I think we just want to be heard. We just want people to look at us and acknowledge that we have lost something–and sometimes that’s why we can’t stop talking about it. I know when I had my miscarriage, the most hurtful thing someone could do was pretend like nothing had happened.
There is no “fetus fetishization” as the article claims and to suggest that is pretty insulting. It makes all of us seem like crazy people worshiping dead babies at the altar and we all know that’s not what it’s about. The final sentence in the article reads, “the evolving focus on perinatal death potentially affects far more than bereaved families,” as though this were some surprise revelation and a negative consequence of bringing pregnancy loss into the open.
I say it just states what we already all knew. When a couple loses a baby, it is about so much more than just those two people. Of course it bloody effects everyone around them–that’s what death does.
And it’s about time people started realizing that.
Yes. Yes. Thank you for writing this. I sent MacLean’s an email in response to this as well. The kind of attitude presented and perpetuated by this article is *precisely* why pregnancy loss is suffered in silence. I never needed a big deal made of it, but a sincere acknowledgment of our devastating grief (not to mention a few check-ins afterward) would have made a world of difference. Unfortunately, I was handed the exact opposite.
Something else I thought was hinted at in the article, and something that I have been blatantly told in real life, is basically “But you have a baby NOW, so just forget it (and/or) what’s your problem?” This applies to my IF as well. Now that I am lucky enough to have my son, my IF is magically cured and my miscarriages don’t matter in the slightest. Except, you know…
Like you said, everyone grieves differently. I guess I don’t talk about mine in public because i don’t want to deal with people who have stupid opinions like the author who wrote the article. I feel lucky to be a part of this community and have a blog so I have an outlet.
I haven’t read the article, and I don’t intend to. Reading your discussion of it is enough for me. I think reading the actual article will either depress or enrage me, and I need a break from major emotions right now.
But I have been talking about my miscarriage and infertility more in normal conversation. People get uncomfortable, and *usually* I don’t care. I just don’t anymore. And if I’m strong enough to do it today, maybe it will lead that person to think before they say something stupid or hurtful to an infertile tomorrow, or will lead them to check on a friend who has suffered a loss rather than ignore it.
Or maybe it’s all a waste and none of it will do any good. But I tried.
I can’t read this article because the summaries I have read just enrage me. This kind of thinking seems to set humanity back 50 years rather than forward- especially in terms of understanding a healthy grieving process. Losing a parent, spouse or loved one just simply does not compare to the loss of a child in my mind…
Thank you for writing about this when people like myself cannot because of the emotions it brings forth…
I feel that anytime someone (you, me, Jay Z, anyone) speaks out with honesty and clarity about a difficult issue, it’s good for everyone. I have no idea what it feels like to have breast cancer, an eating disorder, suffer a divorce, etc. But I appreciate when people share their stories and I can learn a bit about it. We can only benefit from learning more about others’ paths and by having compassion for their troubles.
This article sickened me. I haven’t experienced the loss of a pregnancy (well, not a confirmed pregnancy, but that’s a story for another day), but I know of far too many women who have and I know that the pain stays with them forever. How dare anyone say that they shouldn’t express their feelings, lest it make someone else uncomfortable? What is a third party’s discomfort compared to a parent’s heartbreak over the loss of their child?
All I can say is HEAR HEAR!!
Nadav’s loss affected everyone around me as much as any death. We are all grieving and grief needs to be acknowledged.
Beautifully written, as usual.
Yes! I do understand that grief makes people uncomfortable. The loss of a baby/child tends to be even more difficult for people to digest. This is what makes it even MORE important to learn to talk about it.
It was only after my loss that I came to understand that “the most hurtful thing someone could do was pretend like nothing had happened”. Shortly afterwards, a friend of mine lost her mother. Most of our friends made appropriate gestures and then quickly stopped mentioning it. I knew to keep checking in. Sometimes she felt like talking about it and sometimes she didn’t but she appreciated this immensely. Sadly, in my case, it took going through it to understand better how to be supportive.
completely agree with you. stunned that anyone would think their comfort is more important than someone’s life being shattered.
I can’t even go and read that article. I think I’d hit someone with my car.
Well said!
I would like to know what prompted the author to write the article. What possesses a person to write something so insensitive, so stupid, and so ill-informed?
I was especially horrified by her use of “fetus fetishization.” I had to read that line twice because I couldn’t believe she actually wrote that. Just the use of the word, “fetus” instead of “baby” is so insulting and shows the world the insensitive angle she’s coming from. No one says, “I lost my fetus.” No – they say, “I lost my baby.” No one is obsessed with dead fetuses – but we are all very compassionate for passed on babies.
Infuriating.
My goodness, of course some people who lose their pregnancies are going to want to share it. Let’s talk a little bit about how they got there.
1. They fucked (or if unlucky, used ART).
2. They got pregnant.
3. There happened to not be a baby in the end.
Contrast to people with kids:
1. They fucked (or if unlucky, used ART).
2. They got pregnant.
3. There happened to be a baby in the end.
The same effort is made by both. The same excitement, the same fear, the same dreams, the same work, the same deservingness, the same desire for sweet domesticity, everything the same. Except one thing.
In the end of these concurrent stories, the one with the baby in the end is unbelievably showered in glory, love, and attention. The one without has to sit by…and people want her to shut up, too, because of her bad luck. Imagine how that feels! Pretty fucking terrible, I have to say. The one who lost the child needs that love and attention, being showered on the wonderful perfect mother who did NOTHING different than she did….just happened to luck out – she needs it more than anything. And to see it all go to someone else is just another kick while she’s down. Of course some people who lost children are going to turn public as part of the process – just like the people who didn’t lose their did! They get to show what their efforts got them – why not those who lose?
This article was astonishingly tone deaf, so much so that it was almost bizarre. Calling talking about a miscarriage or a stillbirth “fetishization” or “militancy” is just nasty. Yes, sometimes talking about miscarriage and stillbirth is uncomfortable for people. So is talking about death in general. I have experienced both miscarriage and the death of a teenage sibling. I talk about both, but when I bring it up, I’m extremely tentative and never leave a silence after dropping it into the conversation because I never know how people will react. I’ve found that there is usually more awkwardness when I say that my brother died, perhaps because most people simply can’t even begin to relate. In contrast, many people have either experienced a miscarriage or know someone who has. That creates it’s own problems because (a) it reminds people that it could happen to them and (b) some people who feel that they did “get over it” (usually people who had no fertility issues and experienced the miscarriage in between pregnancies that resulted in living children–though I know people for whom that was true and who still found the miscarriage devastating) expect everyone else to feel the same as them.