I try to make my blog a happy, but honest place, showing the reality of our family life. However, there is something I wanted to share with you, something very important, that deserves to be discussed. I am sorry if some readers find any of this information upsetting, but I wanted to add my blog to the Mumsnet campaign, which is lobbying for change to the current miscarriage provision.
Yesterday Mumsnet published the results of their Miscarriage Care Survey. The survey highlights seven main facts, which I find both sad and shocking.
Mumsnet want politicians to pledge to improve miscarriage care, especially in these key areas.
When I think about the women that are in my immediate circle, most of these ladies have experienced a miscarriage and have sad stories of the failings they experienced in their care.
In 2011, after quite some time of trying to get pregnant, we finally got a positive pregnancy test. I went to the Doctor that day and as it was still early days (it would have been 5-6 weeks), all I had to do was wait a couple more weeks until my midwife care would start. Two days later, I started to bleed and I knew it was over. I went straight to the Surgery and was seen by a newly qualified doctor, who looked like a rabbit in headlights. She had to keep going out of the room to check things with another Doctor. I was given a pregnancy test (which came back negative) and that was it. All our hopes and dreams were wiped out. I wasn’t offered any pain relief or support of any form. In fact the Doctor looked really uncomfortable throughout the whole consultation.
I thought I was going to be a mummy for only two days, but so many of my friends have had miscarriages further along and their stories are heartbreaking. I feel that the correct miscarriage support should be a basic right. I feel so strongly that woman experiencing miscarriages and also those going through fertility investigations, should not be treated in the same place as pregnant or labouring women. To allow this to happen is heartless.
What can you do? You can help too, check out this page on Mumsnet and join the fight to put an end to these awful stories of mismanagement.
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Comments 24
Thank you for this post. I’m in Canada but our level of care for those who’ve experienced miscarriage is also sadly lacking.
I’m so sorry to hear about your loss. Our first pregnancy ended within a couple of days of our positive pregnancy test too, so while I don’t know how you feel, I can relate. Our second and third pregnancies ended with an ectopic and a much later miscarriage and I wasn’t offered counselling for any of them. I also found it very difficult to wait for “confirmation ultrasounds” in a room filled with happily pregnant women.
So few people talk about miscarriage and the psychological scars that it leaves. Thank you for sharing. I really hope that our attitudes about miscarriage and the treatment that families experiencing it changes.
Author
Thank you for your comment and I am sorry that you experienced such poor care. I hope this campaign gets practices and attitudes changed for good x
thankyou for the great insightful post, i was reading this this morning and watching about it on this morning x
Author
Thanks for reading. I didn’t see it on This Morning, but I thought it is a very important campaign x
Yep yep and double yep to this I was when I had my first miscarriage was shocking they did not care , ohhh and my care for my second pregnancy was a big 00000000000s it still makes me sick till this day my daughter was born 10 weeks early and is disabled because of them .x
Author
That is so awful hun. x
I completely agree something more needs to be done. When I had my scan and found out I had miscarried I felt like I was just pushed out into the corridor so they could continue scanning. There was no after care, absolutely nothing offered. I was made to feel like I shouldn’t be mourning and that it was nothing…
Author
That is so awful, it really is inhumane who women are so often failed x
It’s a very important message to share x
Author
I hope people will get behind the campaign x
This is distressing. To have to deal with mismanaged care when you are suffering the loss of an unborn child is just not on.
Author
The statistics and stories are truly heartbreaking x
I totally agree and having had a miscarriage myself I know how lacking the care is. Waiting for that final scan surrounded by other women waiting for their ‘routine scan’ is a memory that I will carry with me forever. I was given a leaflet and sent on my way but the heartbreaking bit was being contacted a few weeks later by the midwife to arrange my ‘booking in appointment’ that was truly awful.
Author
That’s awful Helen, I got a call about the booking in appointment too x
Some of those facts are scary – how can women in that situation be failed so badly.
Author
It is awful isn’t it x
Scary how women can be failed in this modern age,
Author
It is horrible and should not be allowed to happen x
When I had mine the comment that sticks in my brain was “oh well, you can try again”
Author
Unfortunately that is all too typical a comment for people to make. It is really awful. I am sorry for your loss x
Thank you for such a powerful, personal , insightful post. I felt awful when I had a miscarriage, we were just dismissed by the staff. It was almost like Oh well you’ve had a miscarriage get on with it. I feel that the parents should be treated a lot better with more compassion x
Author
I am so sorry that you experienced such poor treatment x
Great post and thanks for sharing. In 2012 I miscarried a little boy at 15 weeks and was totally traumatised by the whole process and when I was told he had passed away I had to walk through a room full of pregnant mothers waiting for their scan pictures. I then miscarried again at 9 weeks in 2013, both times I felt the care I recieved was not adequate and was slightly insensitive to my situation. But many a time you’re this happens to one in three women. Great but actually this is happening to me! x
Author
Oh hun I am sorry for your losses. This should not happen to anyone. I think it is inhumane that it actually does. I hope you received support from friends and family x