Miscarriage: Our Hidden Loss. In her own words, by Andrea Byrne.
Over the last few years, I’ve found myself talking more and more about our experiences with infertility, as we tried so hard to start a family. It was a long - and often lonely - road for my husband Lee and I to have our daughter Jemima and at the start of it all, we didn’t tell anyone what was going on behind closed doors. But a short time after she was born, we felt a bit stronger and we started to share a little of what we went through, to try to help others feel less isolated. So many people got in touch with either me or Lee and many of them would say how lonely they felt because infertility is still such a taboo.
From then on, it felt like the right thing to do to keep the conversation going. For me, of all the things we went through, miscarriage is one of the most common experiences for people - yet it’s still the least talked about. It’s awkward because it entangles all sorts of emotions that many of us find hard to confront. Grief is not something as a society we find easy to address and when the grief is for a new life and the loss of a future, it becomes even more awkward. So, when I got the opportunity to make a documentary, I decided I wanted to try to remove some of that stigma.
But it’s a tough one, because we don’t generally talk about pregnancies until they reach the 12-week mark. Miscarriage can happen at any point up to 23 weeks of pregnancy, but it’s most common in the first 3 months, which so often means that if a couple loses their baby in the first trimester, very few people will have known they were pregnant and in turn very few people will know they are grieving . For so many, miscarriage is a hidden loss.
For me, it was very much that way. It’s strange to think after so many years trying to start a family and being unable to fall pregnant, I have now been pregnant six times. One of those - luckily for us - resulted in our daughter Jemima; two were miscarriages at around 12 weeks of pregnancy; and the others were what’s known as a chemical pregnancy - an earlier failure.
Whilst making this programme and talking to others about their experiences, I also realised it’s not just the loneliness and grief that takes its toll. It’s also the varying experiences of medical care and mental health support that’s on offer. I remember when I was being treated for one of my miscarriages at an early pregnancy unit, I could hear newborn babies crying just yards away in the maternity ward, which was really heartbreaking. It’s also unlikely you’ll get offered much in the way of further treatment unless it’s your third recurrent miscarriage. Treatment is inconsistent and aftercare is patchy, whether that’s mental or physical. And whilst some people may prefer to keep their loss private, one thing remains true - everyone needs a certain level of medical help to get them through.
On the other hand, I have found there are aspects to be hopeful about. Although it’s a slow process, science is progressing all the time to be able to determine what causes miscarriage and to be able to know that early enough in the process of trying to conceive so that couples do not have to go through multiple miscarriages before they get answers. There’s also a growing commitment in some parts of the UK, to provide a more graded level of treatment and support for couples, which means they don’t have to wait for a series of losses to get more medical help. Miscarriage has all too often been trivialised as ‘just one of those things’, however, now there do seem to be small steps to change this.
In the film we reflect on some of that progress which is helping with miscarriage care, but perhaps one of the hardest and bravest decisions a person or a couple can ever make is knowing when it’s the right thing to do to stop trying. I am incredibly conscious that many people reading this may not have had the happy ending they so desperately want and so we felt it was really important in the film to reflect that experience as well. Everyone deserves a miracle, but not everyone gets their miracle. Please know that you are by no means forgotten.
As a journalist, it’s my job to tell people’s stories, though it’s not very often I talk about my own, especially when it’s something so personal, but maybe changing the way miscarriage is viewed and changing the way support is thought about, starts simply by talking. So, thank you for listening.
And the biggest thanks of all to all the people who trusted me to share their experiences of baby loss and fertility - Natasha, Anna, Caroline, Geoff and Jude and all those at the Morgan’s Wings, who welcomed me to their group.