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SMNTY Classics: Understanding Miscarriage · Stuff Mom Never Told You

0:05
Speaker 1: Hey, this is Annie and Smith. Welcome to stuff one
0:08
Speaker 1: ever told your protection of I Heart Radio. So today
0:20
Speaker 1: we wanted to bring back a classic on infertility. So
0:24
Speaker 1: content warning if that's something that is painful for you
0:29
Speaker 1: to hear, just want to put that out there. We
0:31
Speaker 1: wanted to bring this one back because we recently talked
0:33
Speaker 1: about surrogacy and this is a big part of that conversation,
0:40
Speaker 1: or it can be. And also we really appreciate listeners
0:43
Speaker 1: who have written in about their experiences and hopefully you
0:47
Speaker 1: can share that and future listener Maile episodes and yeah,
0:53
Speaker 1: this is something that I think we'll be talking about
0:55
Speaker 1: a lot more if once when we get to one
0:58
Speaker 1: of the fictional stories that were infertility is a big
1:01
Speaker 1: role in it. Well, we know it's like a big
1:03
Speaker 1: horror like trope, but you and I talked about different levels,
1:07
Speaker 1: whether it's miscarriage, not being able to have a child,
1:11
Speaker 1: all of these things. Infertility like, there's a lot of
1:13
Speaker 1: things to it that make sure to play on your
1:16
Speaker 1: trauma and fears. Yes, and we absolutely, we absolutely should
1:21
Speaker 1: and will talk about that because you know, we love
1:23
Speaker 1: talking about our horror two and what baby. Yes, but
1:27
Speaker 1: I do find it interesting that this story in particular
1:30
Speaker 1: I wrote in high school. Yeah, I just think there's
1:34
Speaker 1: a lot to unpack there, and there's a lot to
1:35
Speaker 1: unpack in all of this, But before we get to that.
1:39
Speaker 1: In the meantime, please enjoy this classic episode Welcome to
1:47
Speaker 1: Stuff Mom Never Told You from how Stuff Works dot Com. Hello,
1:56
Speaker 1: and welcome to the podcast. I'm Caroline and I'm Kristen.
1:59
Speaker 1: Today's topic is one that has been refusted by a
2:02
Speaker 1: lot of you listeners out there. It's a rather sensitive
2:06
Speaker 1: topic for a lot of women and their partners. Um
2:09
Speaker 1: it's we're talking about miscarriages today. It's a it's a
2:11
Speaker 1: common health issue that a lot of people face, and
2:15
Speaker 1: we have never done anything just kind of giving you
2:18
Speaker 1: the one oh one on miscarriages before, so today we
2:21
Speaker 1: thought we would talk about the whole issue. Yeah, And
2:24
Speaker 1: I think it's also important for us to talk about miscarriage,
2:27
Speaker 1: not just because so many women experience it, but because
2:30
Speaker 1: it's something that we don't talk about very much, probably
2:35
Speaker 1: among ourselves, especially considering how common it is. Um So
2:39
Speaker 1: we're just gonna, yeah, walk through what it is and
2:43
Speaker 1: why it happens, more importantly, almost why it doesn't happen
2:46
Speaker 1: and the psychological repercussions. So, first off, what is a miscarriage.
2:52
Speaker 1: This is coming from the National Institutes of Health, and
2:56
Speaker 1: technically speaking, it's the spontaneous loss of a fetus before
3:01
Speaker 1: the twenty week of pregnancy, because pregnancy loss after the
3:05
Speaker 1: twenty week is actually called a pre term delivery, right.
3:09
Speaker 1: And another term for miscarriage is spontaneous abortion, and spontaneous
3:14
Speaker 1: being the key word, this refers to a naturally occurring event,
3:18
Speaker 1: not anything to do with medical abortions or surgical abortions.
3:22
Speaker 1: And there are other terms for early loss of pregnancy,
3:25
Speaker 1: including what's termed a complete abortion, wherein all of the
3:31
Speaker 1: tissue of conception leaves the body, and there's incomplete, inevitable, infected,
3:38
Speaker 1: and missed abortion. All of those different terms relate to
3:42
Speaker 1: how much of the tissue leaves the body, whether or not,
3:44
Speaker 1: as infected abortion implies whether or not there was some
3:47
Speaker 1: kind of infection in the womb. Um. Missed abortion, for instance,
3:51
Speaker 1: is when the pregnancy is lost but the products of
3:55
Speaker 1: conception as they're called, remain inside of the body. Right.
4:00
Speaker 1: And there's also this term called threatened miscarriage. This is
4:03
Speaker 1: basically when the symptoms of miscarriage occur whether without vaginal bleeding,
4:08
Speaker 1: and half of threatened miscarriages do in fact in in
4:11
Speaker 1: pregnancy loss. And so the signs of miscarriage include things
4:15
Speaker 1: like cramping, bleeding, and lower back pain. And there was
4:20
Speaker 1: one column that I was reading in Slate by a
4:21
Speaker 1: woman named Sarah shem Kiss who was talking about how
4:25
Speaker 1: miscarriage is often portrayed on television as this one time event,
4:32
Speaker 1: like where a woman goes to the bathroom and she
4:33
Speaker 1: sees blood and then it's over. And one thing that
4:37
Speaker 1: a lot of people might not realize is that this
4:39
Speaker 1: can be a process that can take at least in
4:42
Speaker 1: shem Kisses case, as long as a week to happen. Um. So, yeah,
4:48
Speaker 1: then that just is just kind of putting it out
4:50
Speaker 1: there to clarify how the process can can vary for
4:54
Speaker 1: different women. Right, And so we should take a look
4:58
Speaker 1: at the causes of miscarriage because contrary to you know,
5:03
Speaker 1: there's a lot of misinformation I feel like around around
5:06
Speaker 1: things like this, having sex, exercise, mild falls, and most
5:10
Speaker 1: medications do not cause miscarriage. Again, sex exercise, mild falls,
5:16
Speaker 1: medications not a cause of miscarriage, and a lot of
5:19
Speaker 1: times when it happens, there might be some guilt on
5:22
Speaker 1: the part of the mother and her partner, thinking that
5:26
Speaker 1: there might be something wrong with their genes that caused
5:30
Speaker 1: this pregnancy loss, But in fact, most miscarriages are caused
5:34
Speaker 1: by chromosomal problems that essentially make it impossible for the
5:38
Speaker 1: baby to develop. But those problems are usually not related
5:43
Speaker 1: to mother's or father's genes, right, And a common chromosomal
5:47
Speaker 1: issue that comes up is that the embryo or fetus
5:50
Speaker 1: has a chromosome that causes it to develop abnormally. And
5:55
Speaker 1: this is not usually a sign of a condition that
5:57
Speaker 1: could cause problems in future pregnancies, because it usually happens
6:01
Speaker 1: by chance when the egg divides and grows. And this
6:04
Speaker 1: is actually a problem that causes at least half of miscarriages.
6:08
Speaker 1: And one thing that medical scholars have been looking more
6:10
Speaker 1: closely at too in recent years is a correlation between
6:15
Speaker 1: miscarriage and partners age, not the mother's age, um they're
6:20
Speaker 1: the frequency. For instance, of these kinds of chromosomal anomalies
6:24
Speaker 1: in spermatozoa appear to increase with male age, So, for instance,
6:31
Speaker 1: in two thousand four, there was a study published an
6:34
Speaker 1: American Journal of epidemiology, which found that pregnancies by fathers
6:38
Speaker 1: fifty years or older carried twice the risk of miscarriage
6:43
Speaker 1: compared with pregnancies with younger fathers and some other possible
6:47
Speaker 1: risk factors for miscarriage include things like drug and alcohol
6:50
Speaker 1: abuse during pregnancy, exposure to environmental toxins, hormone problems, infection, obesity,
6:57
Speaker 1: or on the flip side, being extremely underweight, um smoking,
7:02
Speaker 1: and problems with the body's immune response. Yeah. An age
7:05
Speaker 1: can also be a factor for risk of miscarriage as well,
7:08
Speaker 1: as we talked about in our episode on why it's
7:10
Speaker 1: harder to get pregnant after thirty five, because the risk
7:15
Speaker 1: of miscarriages hiring women who are older and at risk
7:20
Speaker 1: starts to elevate after age thirty, but it really escalates
7:25
Speaker 1: after forty. But no matter the age of the mother,
7:30
Speaker 1: miscarriage is most likely to happen early. In fact, most
7:33
Speaker 1: miscarriages occurred during the first seven weeks of pregnancy. Eight
7:37
Speaker 1: out of ten miscarriages happened during the first three months
7:40
Speaker 1: of pregnancy, and second trimemester miscarriages happened in just one
7:44
Speaker 1: to five of pregnancies. Yeah, I kind of put another
7:47
Speaker 1: way more than half of all pregnancies are spontaneously lost
7:52
Speaker 1: before a woman even knows she's pregnant, before she even
7:55
Speaker 1: misses a period. That's how common that's happened. So, in
8:00
Speaker 1: other words, women might have miscarriages and not even know
8:04
Speaker 1: it because they didn't even realize they were pregnant, right,
8:07
Speaker 1: And you know, as as horrifying as the experience of
8:10
Speaker 1: miscarriage is, typically, statistically it is usually a one time occurrence.
8:16
Speaker 1: Most women who miscarry go on to have a healthy
8:19
Speaker 1: pregnancy after the miscarriage. However, there is a recovery period,
8:23
Speaker 1: and people kind of debate how long this period should
8:26
Speaker 1: go on. You know, do you wait a long time,
8:29
Speaker 1: do you try again immediately? Should you take you know,
8:32
Speaker 1: basically mental health into consideration when you're doing that. And
8:36
Speaker 1: while it of course varies from person to person, the
8:40
Speaker 1: physical recovery from miscarriage in most cases takes only a
8:43
Speaker 1: few hours to a couple of days. Yeah, I mean,
8:46
Speaker 1: your periods will likely return within four to six weeks,
8:49
Speaker 1: and it is possible to become pregnant during the menstrual
8:52
Speaker 1: cycle immediately after a miscarriage. Now that said, the World
8:57
Speaker 1: Health Organization recommends waiting at least six months before trying
9:01
Speaker 1: to conceive. That six month waiting period seems to be
9:04
Speaker 1: standard advice, although more recent studies are starting to call
9:08
Speaker 1: that in a question because the w h O is
9:11
Speaker 1: recommending that six month wait time based largely on maternal
9:18
Speaker 1: health in developing countries where medical care is less reliable
9:22
Speaker 1: and where women tend to get pregnant at earlier ages. Correct. Yeah,
9:26
Speaker 1: and the British Medical Journal actually says that women who
9:29
Speaker 1: conceive within six months of a miscarriage instead of waiting
9:32
Speaker 1: up to a year, end up reducing their risk of
9:34
Speaker 1: another miscarriage by a third, and they also increase their
9:37
Speaker 1: chances of a healthy and successful pregnancy. But Julius Shelley,
9:41
Speaker 1: who's an associate professor at Deacon University in Burwood, Australia,
9:45
Speaker 1: wrote an editorial accompanying that British Medical Journal study offering
9:49
Speaker 1: a little bit of a qualification, saying, quote, we cannot
9:53
Speaker 1: really tell whether pregnancy is conceived very soon after a
9:56
Speaker 1: miscarriage really do have better outcomes, or whether women in
10:00
Speaker 1: poles too conceive quickly following a miscarriage have better outcomes
10:02
Speaker 1: in subsequent pregnancy than couples who take longer to conceive, right,
10:09
Speaker 1: And so I mean it kind of depends person to
10:11
Speaker 1: person really on your own personal health and all of
10:14
Speaker 1: that stuff. I mean, if you're healthy and feel ready,
10:17
Speaker 1: doctors say there might not be a need to wait. Uh,
10:20
Speaker 1: you know, if you're if you're taking your prenatal vitamins
10:23
Speaker 1: or your full like acid supplements, you know that that
10:25
Speaker 1: usually starts months before you even conceive, as long as
10:29
Speaker 1: you're maintaining a healthy weight, including physical activity, uh and
10:33
Speaker 1: eating a healthy diet and of course managing stress and
10:35
Speaker 1: avoiding alcohol, smoking out sort of stuff. Yeah, and I
10:38
Speaker 1: would imagine too that that weight time might also depend
10:41
Speaker 1: on the type of miscarriage that occurs, like we were
10:45
Speaker 1: referenced at the top of the podcast of the various
10:48
Speaker 1: kinds that can happen. Um. But one thing too that
10:51
Speaker 1: we wanted to mention is the question of whether or
10:54
Speaker 1: not having a medical abortion of voluntary abortion in any
10:58
Speaker 1: way predisposes you to miscarriage, because I think that is
11:03
Speaker 1: a fairly common assumption. When I was just poking around
11:06
Speaker 1: on Google looking for solid data on this, there were
11:09
Speaker 1: a lot of uh, sort of inflammatory types of blog
11:14
Speaker 1: posts that immediately pop up saying that if you have
11:17
Speaker 1: an abortion, then you are risking you know, a subsequent
11:20
Speaker 1: miscarriage or infertility. Um However, the Royal College of Obstetricians
11:25
Speaker 1: and Gynecologists says, quote, there are no proven associations between
11:29
Speaker 1: induced abortion and subsequent topic pregnancy, placenta, previa or infertility.
11:35
Speaker 1: And one reason that some people have thought that misca
11:39
Speaker 1: that abortion might lead to miscarriage is because it's based
11:45
Speaker 1: on old data. Basically, abortion technology has improved and it
11:50
Speaker 1: made it safer for the mother and left the uterus
11:54
Speaker 1: and the cervix more intact, So there should not be
11:59
Speaker 1: a great or risk of miscarriage right exactly. And one
12:03
Speaker 1: risk factor that we didn't really touch on fully is
12:07
Speaker 1: the idea that women who have had previous miscarriages are
12:10
Speaker 1: at a greater risk of having future miscarriages. And yes,
12:15
Speaker 1: this is a definite risk factor, but it is it
12:17
Speaker 1: is small. Less than five percent of women have two
12:20
Speaker 1: consecutive miscarriages and only one percent have three or more
12:23
Speaker 1: consecutive miscarriages. And this is coming from the Mayo Clinic.
12:27
Speaker 1: Uh they write that after two consecutive miscarriages, there's a
12:30
Speaker 1: seventy chance the next pregnancy will be maintained. Now somewhat counterintuitively,
12:35
Speaker 1: after three miscarriages, in fact, that risk drops to But
12:41
Speaker 1: when looking for the reasons why someone might be experiencing
12:47
Speaker 1: recurrent miscarriages, but in cases of recurrent miscarriage, the big
12:52
Speaker 1: question mark often is why it's happening, because I believe
12:56
Speaker 1: this was reported on in the New York Times that
13:00
Speaker 1: in fewer than half of couples experiencing that will doctors
13:05
Speaker 1: pinpoint a definite cause, and the causes of recurrent miscarriage
13:10
Speaker 1: really tie back to miscarriage overall, UH, the overwhelming majority
13:16
Speaker 1: of these recurrent miscarriages that happened because of chromosome or abnormalities, which,
13:21
Speaker 1: as we already discussed, increase with the mother's age and
13:24
Speaker 1: with the father's age. There could be genetic errors in
13:27
Speaker 1: the egg or sperm that results in embryos with too
13:30
Speaker 1: many or too few chromosomes, but environmental factors are rarely
13:35
Speaker 1: linked to pregnancy loss, and there have been no associations
13:39
Speaker 1: between environmental factors and recurrent pregnancy loss established. There could
13:43
Speaker 1: also be an inherited disorder that raises a woman's risk
13:47
Speaker 1: of blood clots um also called thrombosis, that can increase
13:51
Speaker 1: the risk of fetal death in the second half of
13:54
Speaker 1: pregnancy as well, and if you experience multiple miscarriages, there
14:00
Speaker 1: there are tests that you can have when you go
14:02
Speaker 1: to your doctor, things like blood tests. They can evaluate
14:05
Speaker 1: it to detect problems with hormones your immune system. There
14:09
Speaker 1: are chromosomal tests that you and your partner might both
14:13
Speaker 1: have your blood tested to determine if chromosomes can be
14:15
Speaker 1: a factor. If there is tissue from the miscarriage that's
14:18
Speaker 1: remaining that can be tested, and these chromosomal analyzes can
14:23
Speaker 1: basically see if there's some inherited genetic cause that happens.
14:26
Speaker 1: And that's in less than five percent of couples. But
14:29
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, talking about the immune system problems
14:32
Speaker 1: and the hormonal problems, like you know we mentioned in
14:34
Speaker 1: our thyroid episode that you know that is both when
14:37
Speaker 1: you have something like graves or hashimotos, that's both a
14:39
Speaker 1: hormone and an immune disorder problem. So having those tests
14:44
Speaker 1: leading up to pregnancy, whether you've had miscarriages or not,
14:47
Speaker 1: is very important. Yeah, and and again we want to
14:49
Speaker 1: underscore that on the bright side, about sixty two of
14:54
Speaker 1: women with unexplained repeated miscarriages still go on to have
14:58
Speaker 1: healthy pregnancy. So even if you've had multiple miscarriages, it's
15:03
Speaker 1: certainly likely that you can still have a baby. So
15:07
Speaker 1: we've talked about the physical repercussions of miscarriage, what what
15:12
Speaker 1: might be going on inside the body, but we also
15:14
Speaker 1: need to talk about how miscarriage can impact the mind
15:19
Speaker 1: and your emotional well being, not just for mothers, but
15:22
Speaker 1: also for partners as well. So we're going to get
15:26
Speaker 1: into the psychology of pregnancy loss when we come right
15:29
Speaker 1: back from a quick break and now back to the podcast.
15:33
Speaker 1: So we were talking a lot about the physical causes
15:36
Speaker 1: and effects of miscarriages, but one thing we have not
15:40
Speaker 1: talked about yet is the psychological effect, the burden that
15:42
Speaker 1: the mother and her partner feel when this tragedy has happened,
15:46
Speaker 1: and calling it a tragedy is I mean, I feel
15:51
Speaker 1: like a lot of times when miscarriages are discussed, they're
15:54
Speaker 1: kind of brushed off anyone outside of the couple or
15:58
Speaker 1: the mother who is having the child. It's kind of
16:00
Speaker 1: the attitude is like, oh, well, you'll be okay, just
16:03
Speaker 1: try try again. Well, and especially if it's lost early
16:06
Speaker 1: and the pregnancy to right there seems to be kind
16:09
Speaker 1: of this general misunderstanding about the emotional toll that a
16:13
Speaker 1: miscarriage can take on a couple or a mother. However,
16:16
Speaker 1: early it happens, traditionally, it's kind of this private event,
16:20
Speaker 1: you know. I know a friend of mine had a
16:22
Speaker 1: miscarriage before she had her children, and I didn't even
16:25
Speaker 1: know about it. You know, it was once she was
16:26
Speaker 1: pregnant with her now two year old that you know,
16:30
Speaker 1: she said, oh, yeah, you know, early on, I had
16:33
Speaker 1: this thing. And and it's almost as if a lot
16:36
Speaker 1: of moms feel like they're not allowed to be sad,
16:38
Speaker 1: or they're not allowed to be sad in public. Yeah,
16:40
Speaker 1: but a new research suggests that some women might actually
16:44
Speaker 1: more in for a lot longer than expected, which is,
16:48
Speaker 1: you know, part of why we wanted to to talk
16:49
Speaker 1: about this issue, to kind of open up these conversational
16:53
Speaker 1: lines for women to feel more comfortable talking about these experiences,
16:57
Speaker 1: because it can last even after the birth of a
17:01
Speaker 1: healthy child, although of course, the range and severity of
17:05
Speaker 1: the symptoms are going to vary, right and uh. Janet Jaffee,
17:10
Speaker 1: who is a clinical psychologist at the Center for Reproductive
17:13
Speaker 1: Psychology in San Diego, says that it's kind of the
17:15
Speaker 1: medical commonality of miscarriages that lead us to kind of
17:19
Speaker 1: brushing them off, to underestimate the impact that they can
17:22
Speaker 1: have on a family. Um Jaffe says that it's a
17:26
Speaker 1: traumatic loss not only of the pregnancy, but of a
17:28
Speaker 1: woman's sense of self and her hopes and her dreams
17:30
Speaker 1: of the future. She has lost her reproductive story and
17:34
Speaker 1: it needs to be grieved. Yeah, and a woman who
17:37
Speaker 1: has a miscarriage is understandably at risk for symptoms of
17:41
Speaker 1: depression and anxiety, not just immediately following the miscarriage, but
17:46
Speaker 1: in in the years to come and even after having
17:50
Speaker 1: a healthy child. Women who miscarry also have a higher
17:53
Speaker 1: risk of postpartum depression. And there is a paper published
17:57
Speaker 1: in the British Journal of Psychiatry in two thousand eleven
18:00
Speaker 1: looking at this, and the researcher followed more than thirteen
18:03
Speaker 1: thousand women for three years post birth, and of those
18:08
Speaker 1: who had miscarriages, they were about hundred. Of those women
18:12
Speaker 1: who had had a miscarriage, fient experienced clinically significant depression
18:18
Speaker 1: and or exiety anxiety during and after the pregnancies for
18:21
Speaker 1: up to those three years. And this can really affect
18:25
Speaker 1: women as they become mothers, as they bear healthy children. UM.
18:30
Speaker 1: A study looked at women who had delivered a child
18:33
Speaker 1: within nineteen months after a miscarriage and found that of
18:37
Speaker 1: the infants had disorganized attachments to their mothers, that it
18:42
Speaker 1: was still affecting them in the way that they viewed
18:44
Speaker 1: their healthy children. And not only can it take a
18:47
Speaker 1: toll on mother's relationship with her children, but understandably it
18:51
Speaker 1: can take a toll on her relationship with her partner. Um.
18:55
Speaker 1: There have been there's been research into how miscarriage can
18:59
Speaker 1: impact act uh sex life for instance, and a lot
19:03
Speaker 1: of times you'll see in heterosexual relationships men might be
19:08
Speaker 1: ready to move on and wanted reignite that flame, whereas
19:12
Speaker 1: women might not be ready to have sex for a while. Yeah, exactly.
19:17
Speaker 1: And we should look at at at partners, both both
19:20
Speaker 1: male and female partners when it comes to having a
19:23
Speaker 1: miscarriage because traditionally, the feelings experienced by the partner tend
19:30
Speaker 1: to be dismissed, both within the family and without, and
19:34
Speaker 1: studies have shown that men are not satisfied with the
19:36
Speaker 1: support they get from others. Nonetheless, research also has shown
19:40
Speaker 1: that that men absolutely grieve these losses as well, but
19:45
Speaker 1: it might not be as intense or as enduring as
19:49
Speaker 1: their partners, which is understandable because it's not as much
19:52
Speaker 1: of a physical experience perhaps for them. Right In. The
19:57
Speaker 1: study in the Journal of Psychosomatic Research found on that um,
20:01
Speaker 1: for both men and women in these situations, giving up
20:04
Speaker 1: their personal expectations, hopes for, and fantasies about the unborn
20:09
Speaker 1: child is a major source of grieving. Some men, on
20:12
Speaker 1: the other hand, feel burdened, particularly by their wives grief
20:15
Speaker 1: or depressive reactions. I'm sure, feeling helpless, not knowing what
20:19
Speaker 1: to do or say. They can't say anything right exactly.
20:22
Speaker 1: I mean, there's no way to to magically fix that situation.
20:26
Speaker 1: Um And So you see sort of gender stereotypical differences
20:30
Speaker 1: emerging in these studies of how men tend to manage
20:35
Speaker 1: their grief compared to women. For instance, one study publish
20:39
Speaker 1: in n a Journal of Reproductive and Infant Psychology found
20:42
Speaker 1: that men might display less what they call immediate active grief,
20:48
Speaker 1: but they might also be more vulnerable to feelings of
20:50
Speaker 1: despair and difficulty coping, probably because of a sense of helplessness.
20:56
Speaker 1: Right And, While studies have shown that no matter how
20:58
Speaker 1: advanced the pregnancy is, the woman and will likely feel
21:01
Speaker 1: the same sense of loss. For men, the more advanced
21:05
Speaker 1: it is, the greater their sense of loss, the more
21:07
Speaker 1: it's almost like they're getting to know this little person
21:10
Speaker 1: from the ultrasound on, whereas the woman's sense of grief
21:14
Speaker 1: is heightened either way. Yeah, and there have been similar
21:17
Speaker 1: studies on this conducted among lesbian couples as well, and
21:20
Speaker 1: it finds for the non pregnant lesbian partner similar feelings
21:25
Speaker 1: that that husbands or boyfriends might experience in heterosexual relationships.
21:31
Speaker 1: Um for instance, in one study talked about how often
21:35
Speaker 1: the response is, you know, a sense of having not
21:38
Speaker 1: only lost the baby, but also kind of having lost
21:42
Speaker 1: emotionally speaking, the partner not knowing how to sort of
21:46
Speaker 1: rebuild that connection. How do you move forward from that?
21:50
Speaker 1: Right and researcher Denuda M. Washner said that lesbian couples
21:56
Speaker 1: do face kind of a unique situation psychologically and emotionally
22:00
Speaker 1: in that they're going to be a lot of people
22:03
Speaker 1: who didn't approve of this union and this pregnancy in
22:06
Speaker 1: the first place, So there might even be a greater
22:08
Speaker 1: lack of support for them in this time. Well, they
22:11
Speaker 1: might have to go to greater links as well. To
22:15
Speaker 1: go about getting pregnant in the first place, right, And
22:18
Speaker 1: and that even ties in with other studies that have
22:20
Speaker 1: shown that women who go through like fertility treatments or
22:24
Speaker 1: IVF or something like that, their grief tends to be
22:27
Speaker 1: extended past the point of where other women are starting
22:31
Speaker 1: to move on. Yeah, and and I don't want to
22:33
Speaker 1: leave gay fathers out of the equation as well, because
22:37
Speaker 1: I'm sure there can be a similar process. For instance,
22:40
Speaker 1: if you're, you know, hoping to adopt and that falls through.
22:44
Speaker 1: I mean, any time you're going to experience some kind
22:46
Speaker 1: of of loss of unexpected child, we need to be
22:51
Speaker 1: able to to talk about it into to grieve with
22:55
Speaker 1: them and for them, and and allow that process to happen.
22:59
Speaker 1: So so the question would be, then, you know, if
23:02
Speaker 1: you are the friend, what can you do if you
23:05
Speaker 1: find out that that someone you know has experienced a miscarriage.
23:09
Speaker 1: Well grief expert Robbie Miller Kaplan stresses that a miscarriage
23:13
Speaker 1: is a death in the family, and just like any death,
23:17
Speaker 1: the bereaved must grieve for the loved ones they have lost.
23:20
Speaker 1: And so she says, first it's really important to acknowledge
23:23
Speaker 1: the loss that your friend is experienced. Yeah, she says,
23:25
Speaker 1: you should treat your friend just like you would treat
23:27
Speaker 1: a loved one who had who has had a family
23:29
Speaker 1: member die, send flowers, write a note, bring a meal,
23:33
Speaker 1: or just offered to visit and listen, you know, right,
23:36
Speaker 1: And she stresses that when you're talking with your friend
23:40
Speaker 1: and listening to your friend, kind of repeat things back
23:43
Speaker 1: to him or her so that she or he knows
23:46
Speaker 1: you're listening, you're actually taking it all in and that
23:48
Speaker 1: they're being heard. Yeah, and this is this also echoes
23:52
Speaker 1: what we've heard from stuff I've never told you listeners
23:55
Speaker 1: who have written and requesting this topic sort of not
23:59
Speaker 1: only the knee to be able to talk about it
24:03
Speaker 1: and sort of isolation that they felt, but also how
24:06
Speaker 1: helpful it was in instances when they did have friends
24:10
Speaker 1: who acknowledge the loss and took it seriously and didn't
24:14
Speaker 1: just pat them on the head and say, oh, well,
24:16
Speaker 1: you'll get pregnant down the road, which statistically, yeah, the
24:20
Speaker 1: odds are definitely in your favor that that will happen,
24:23
Speaker 1: but that doesn't discount the immediate grief that you're experiencing, right,
24:29
Speaker 1: And I mean, researching for this episode was educational for
24:32
Speaker 1: for me, definitely, because I mean, how many of us
24:36
Speaker 1: really know what to say or how to act or
24:38
Speaker 1: how to treat this, And so I think it's so
24:40
Speaker 1: important that we show through all of these studies that
24:43
Speaker 1: we cited that this, this is a huge ordeal that
24:48
Speaker 1: families and women go through, and it is isolating. It
24:51
Speaker 1: is isolating because you have kind of a general attitude
24:54
Speaker 1: in the culture of like myth, you'll you'll be fine,
24:57
Speaker 1: You'll you'll totally be fine. You're not you know, your health,
25:00
Speaker 1: it's fine, whereas a lot of these women feel, you know, no,
25:03
Speaker 1: it's not fine. I lost someone important to me. Yeah. So, UM,
25:07
Speaker 1: I know, like you said at the beginning of the podcast, Caroline,
25:10
Speaker 1: this was a sensitive topic to talk about, and I
25:12
Speaker 1: can imagine that for some people listening it might have
25:14
Speaker 1: been a difficult one an emotional one to listen to.
25:18
Speaker 1: But we just want to invite you to share with us. UM.
25:22
Speaker 1: You can email us mom Stuff at Discovery dot com.
25:25
Speaker 1: You can tweet us at mom Stuff podcast, or share
25:29
Speaker 1: with the whole community of Stuff Mom Never Told You
25:32
Speaker 1: listeners and viewers over on Facebook as well. UM, and
25:36
Speaker 1: we have a couple of messages to share with you
25:38
Speaker 1: in fact right now. So We've got a couple of
25:45
Speaker 1: letters here from listeners about our episode on cursing, swearing,
25:51
Speaker 1: F bombs, and women, And this one comes from Jill,
25:54
Speaker 1: who writes, Hi, guys, I was so excited when I
25:57
Speaker 1: saw you did a podcast on swearing because it's honestly
26:00
Speaker 1: one of my favorite things to do. I know that
26:03
Speaker 1: sounds lame, but I feel such a release of stress
26:05
Speaker 1: whenever I throw F bombs around. It just feels so free,
26:09
Speaker 1: and it's one of the best things about being an adult,
26:11
Speaker 1: not having to limit myself to vocabulary someone else's deemed fit.
26:15
Speaker 1: With that said, I always make sure I'm not in
26:17
Speaker 1: public when I do it in case it upsets someone.
26:20
Speaker 1: It really shouldn't. They are just words, she writes in
26:23
Speaker 1: all caps. Thanks for the enlightening podcast. I eff ing
26:27
Speaker 1: love it. Um. Well, I have a message here from
26:31
Speaker 1: Crystal Um. She says, being a professional, or as professionals,
26:37
Speaker 1: one can be in a line of work where you
26:39
Speaker 1: sometimes feel the need to scream out loud. Insurance claims,
26:42
Speaker 1: I do feel that urge to curse out loud in
26:45
Speaker 1: the workplace every so often, sometimes more than once a day.
26:48
Speaker 1: But I digress. I've heard people say that cursing as
26:51
Speaker 1: a lady makes you seem less educated, I e. She
26:55
Speaker 1: couldn't find a better word in her vocabulary to express
26:57
Speaker 1: that point. I hold a bachelor's degree and would consider
27:00
Speaker 1: myself highly educated, But sometimes my old standby is such
27:03
Speaker 1: as fiddle d d or goodness simply won't cut it.
27:06
Speaker 1: I find myself letting an F bomb slip out at times,
27:09
Speaker 1: and although I may not be the most pleased with it, later,
27:12
Speaker 1: it just feels better. Thank you for offering an escape
27:15
Speaker 1: from my day to day stresses. You're welcome, Crystal, and
27:19
Speaker 1: I hope that us relieving you from some of your
27:21
Speaker 1: stresses means you dropped a couple of fewer f bond
27:25
Speaker 1: at the office. So thank you for writing in, and
27:27
Speaker 1: thanks to everybody who's written into us. Mom Stuff at
27:30
Speaker 1: Discovery dot com is where you can email us, and
27:32
Speaker 1: you can also find all of our social media links,
27:35
Speaker 1: every single podcast, blog post, and video. It's stuff Mom
27:39
Speaker 1: Never told You dot com for more on this and
27:45
Speaker 1: thousands of other topics. Does it how stuff works dot
27:48
Speaker 1: com