Self Care After Miscarriage: How To Recover Physically & Emotionally

How To Take Care Of Myself After a Miscarriage? When a woman becomes preg­nant, she turns all her atten­tion to nur­tur­ing the new life with­in her. Eat­ing prop­er­ly, get­ting lots of sleep and exer­cis­ing in the cor­rect way all become even greater pri­or­i­ties. As the baby grows, so too does a wom­an’s deter­mi­na­tion to do all she can to ensure she has a healthy, strong and hap­py newborn. Mis­car­riage inter­rupts that joy­ous process. The sud­den end of a preg­nan­cy can be emo­tion­al­ly dev­as­tat­ing for a woman, par­tic­u­lar­ly if it is one she and her part­ner have hoped for. Los­ing the baby, no mat­ter how or why that loss hap­pened, can be deeply trau­mat­ic for a woman, who may feel like she has failed her unborn baby somehow. But from dev­as­tat­ing loss can come heal­ing and recovery. In this arti­cle, we offer some sug­ges­tions for self-care to women who are get­ting over a mis­car­riage. The sin­gle most impor­tant thing for any­one in this sit­u­a­tion to remem­ber is this: only time can lessen the grief a mis­car­riage brings. Tak­ing care of one­self, and tak­ing the time need­ed to deal with the loss, are both keys to recovery.

- Understand That Your Sadness & Depression Are Natural Reactions

Los­ing a baby trig­gers pro­found sad­ness, espe­cial­ly if you’ve been try­ing to get preg­nant for a while. Allow­ing your­self to mourn the baby, and feel the depres­sion and sad­ness that accom­pa­ny that loss, is essen­tial. It’s impor­tant that you do not min­i­mize what hap­pened, say­ing, for exam­ple, that you were “only” eight weeks preg­nant and it could have been worse had the mis­car­riage hap­pened lat­er. Women who lose their babies, no mat­ter what stage of the preg­nan­cy they are in, have lost some­thing that pro­found­ly changed their per­cep­tion of them­selves. Don’t bury or ignore those feelings.

- Try To Avoid Self-Blame

It’s only nat­ur­al to won­der why this has hap­pened. Accord­ing to one study pub­lished in June in the Unit­ed States, up to 30 per­cent of all preg­nan­cies end in mis­car­riage before 20 weeks. (And the risk increas­es to 40 per­cent dur­ing the sum­mer months, large­ly due to the effects of exces­sive heat.) While ask­ing why it hap­pened is under­stand­able, most doc­tors agree that, if a moth­er is healthy, most mis­car­riages can­not be pin­point­ed to one pre­cise cause. Talk to your doc­tor. Ask if there were risk fac­tors you had­n’t con­sid­ered. Talk to your moth­er, too; some research sug­gests that women whose moth­ers had one or more mis­car­riages are at risk of mis­car­ry­ing them­selves. Although every preg­nan­cy is dif­fer­ent, famil­ial fac­tors can impact your repro­duc­tive health.

- Talk With Your Partner Or Spouse

Shar­ing your grief with your spouse or part­ner is essen­tial, as is rec­og­niz­ing his pain and grief. You are both expe­ri­enc­ing the loss, albeit in dif­fer­ent ways, and going through that togeth­er lessens lone­li­ness and isolation.  Hav­ing some­one to grieve with, talk to and share your feel­ings with is an impor­tant and help­ful tool for deal­ing with this loss. Of course, your hus­band can­not expe­ri­ence the mis­car­riage in a phys­i­cal way, but he is suf­fer­ing emo­tion­al­ly. Open­ing up to him, telling him what you’re feel­ing and the deep sad­ness you’re expe­ri­enc­ing helps you bond as a cou­ple. Shar­ing grief can relieve its bur­den, and if you face this hur­dle togeth­er, you will come through the ordeal stronger as a unit.

- Decide Together Who To Tell

If it hap­pens ear­ly in your preg­nan­cy, before you’ve announced it to lots of folks, it may be less dif­fi­cult if you don’t men­tion the mis­car­riage to any­one out­side your clos­est cir­cle. After all, if peo­ple at work did­n’t know you were expect­ing, you are not oblig­ed to share this with them. But if they did know, con­sid­er talk­ing to your super­vi­sor only. You need not feel com­pelled to offer details to any­one who isn’t in your imme­di­ate sphere at work or who (for exam­ple) was going to fill in for you dur­ing your mater­ni­ty leave. In oth­er words – tell those who need to know, and don’t wor­ry about any­one who does­n’t. Even­tu­al­ly, you may con­fide in a wider array of peo­ple, but in the imme­di­ate after­math of the mis­car­riage, do only what feels right to you.

- Consider Joining a Support Group

In the weeks and months after­wards, you may want to talk with oth­er women who have expe­ri­enced mis­car­riages. This kind of sup­port can be incred­i­bly help­ful. Do a lit­tle research online, and learn whether there is a group in your vicin­i­ty. (There prob­a­bly is). If your com­mu­ni­ty is small and no such group exists close to home, join one online. The feed­back and con­so­la­tion that comes from women who’ve expe­ri­enced this will lessen your feel­ings of iso­la­tion. Because mis­car­riage is quite com­mon, par­tic­u­lar­ly in the ear­ly weeks of preg­nan­cy, know­ing that oth­ers have lived through this and come out the oth­er side is tru­ly healing.

- Talk To a Therapist

Many ther­a­pists spe­cial­ize in this spe­cif­ic kind of grief coun­selling. Again, do a lit­tle research online or ask your doc­tor for a refer­ral. Talk­ing with some­one one-on-one can help restore your emo­tion­al well-being. A ther­a­pist can also offer tools and strate­gies for han­dling events that may trig­ger your grief all over again in the future – like a friend’s baby shower.

- Keep Caring For Yourself

While it may be tempt­ing to crawl into bed and stay there indef­i­nite­ly, doing so sim­ply fore­stalls recov­ery. As soon as you feel able to (and your doc­tor okays it), get back to your self-care rou­tine. That means mak­ing healthy meals and snacks and exer­cis­ing reg­u­lar­ly. Try to remem­ber that most mis­car­riages do not impact your abil­i­ty to get preg­nant in the future. While you need time to grieve, you should also try to think about the next steps. If you’ve been try­ing to get preg­nant for a while, ask your doc­tor about when you can try again – even if doing so is the fur­thest thing from your mind right now.

- Don’t Put Away Reminders Of The Baby Unless & Until You Are Ready

Depend­ing on how far along you were, there may already be signs of the baby’s impend­ing arrival all around you. Per­haps you’ve paint­ed the nurs­ery or bought a crib or an adorable mobile to hang over that crib. All these things that once rep­re­sent­ed the com­ing change in your life will sud­den­ly become painful reminders. You need­n’t rush to put these things into stor­age. Only you and your part­ner can decide when it’s time to pack away these items, at least until you’re ready to try for a baby again. There is no set sched­ule, no right or wrong way to deal with these baby things. Every woman is dif­fer­ent, and so is their abil­i­ty to put away mate­r­i­al sym­bols of moth­er­hood. Do this at your own pace, and don’t let oth­ers influ­ence you. Con­sid­er keep­ing some­thing small just for your­self – like an image from an ultra­sound – as it can be very consoling.

- Don’t Get Pregnant Again Too Quickly

Experts agree that just because a woman can con­ceive again almost imme­di­ate­ly, that does­n’t nec­es­sar­i­ly mean she should. Ther­a­pists and grief coun­sel­lors say peo­ple need time to heal the emo­tion­al pain of los­ing a baby. Noth­ing can replace the baby you’ve lost – includ­ing anoth­er preg­nan­cy. Talk it over with your part­ner, and when you both feel unabashed­ly joy­ful at the notion of anoth­er preg­nan­cy, take that as a sign you’re ready. Rush­ing is under­stand­able but unwise.

- Consider Holding An Event To Memorialize The Baby

If you lost your baby at five months or before (after that, it is con­sid­ered a still­birth), hav­ing a memo­r­i­al ser­vice can be incred­i­bly help­ful. How you do this – in a reli­gious or sec­u­lar fash­ion, with oth­ers or just you and your spouse– is entire­ly your call. But acknowl­edg­ing your baby in this way is very heal­ing for many women. Talk this over with your part­ner, and your faith leader, if appropriate.

Final Thoughts

Los­ing a baby through mis­car­riage, no mat­ter how far along you were or whether the preg­nan­cy was planned or unex­pect­ed – is a life-alter­ing event. Though some women mis­car­ry before they even know they’re preg­nant, at six weeks or so, for many, it hap­pens at a much lat­er stage, and it is deeply upsetting. Tak­ing care of your­self, and let­ting oth­ers take care of you too, is how you will recov­er. And you will recov­er – but it will take time. Time for your body to stop pro­duc­ing the hor­mones nec­es­sary for giv­ing birth and feed­ing a baby. Time for your emo­tions to sta­bi­lize and stay on an even keel. And time to begin look­ing for­ward again to a brighter future. That future can include chil­dren, as most mis­car­riages do not jeop­ar­dize a wom­an’s abil­i­ty to procreate. What mat­ters most is that you will even­tu­al­ly return to feel­ing like your­self on a phys­i­cal and emo­tion­al lev­el. You will nev­er com­plete­ly for­get what hap­pened, and nor should you. But you can heal, move on, and find joy in moth­er­hood some­time in the days ahead when your body and soul have healed and you are ready to tack­le all those won­der­ful challenges.