I Had a Miscarriage and Didn’t Stay Silent. Here’s Why You Shouldn’t Either (Exclusive)

I was 16 weeks along and in the so-called “safe zone” of my pregnancy when I felt the sharp pains and unfortunate signs of pregnancy loss. Already the mother of a 3-year-old, I had just wrapped my head around the idea of having another child when I miscarried, so to lose my very wanted pregnancy felt like some kind of cruel joke.

As a clinical psychologist who specializes in reproductive and maternal mental health, I knew that this could happen. I knew how this could happen. After all, I had listened to hours upon hours of heartbreaking stories of pregnancy loss, including ectopic pregnancies, chemical pregnancies, twin loss, infant loss, stillbirths and terminations for medical reasons.

I knew, intimately, the heart-wrenching reality of miscarrying as well as any one person could without having lived it themselves — yet all I could ask myself in that profoundly devastating moment when it was me standing there in disbelief, bright red blood pooling underneath me, was, “How?” How. 

As a clinician, I’ve seen the way women are often socially conditioned to blame ourselves for our various reproductive outcomes. From the ability to conceive to how our pregnancies end to every potential complication in between, it’s common to think: This is my fault. I must have done something wrong. This was me. I am to blame. There is an undeniable amount of shame hidden among those thoughts — a shame so powerful that it often pushes us into silence. 

I knew if I was to combat that shame, not as a mental health professional but as a mom in mourning, I had to share my story the same way so many of my patients did before me — honestly, vulnerably and untethered to the stigma and judgment that society still attaches to something as common as pregnancy loss. I had an innate impulse to tell my family and close friends: I had a miscarriage. 

I was open about the emotional and physiological pain of enduring full-blown labor alone at home, having to cut the umbilical cord myself, hemorrhaging and undergoing an unmedicated dilation and curettage (D&C). 

I was candid about my milk coming in with no baby to feed. I didn’t sugarcoat the unique pain of looking pregnant days after my traumatic loss. I didn’t try to hide that I was struggling with bone-chilling all-day anxiety, convinced that another trauma was right around the corner — waiting for me to let my guard down like I did on that otherwise unremarkable autumn afternoon.

My story became one of many that helped slowly but surely change the way we speak about and understand pregnancy and infant loss. 

And yet, much more needs to be done. Because while we are arguably sharing our stories more freely, we are not untethered to society’s expectations of what constitutes a “good” story – one “worthy” of our collective understanding, sympathy and support. The same stigma, shame and judgment that kept so many of us suffering in silence are still present and trying to convince us that our stories are now not necessarily “good enough” to share. 

It’s why the woman who loses a pregnancy at 6 weeks of gestation convinces herself it’s “too early” for her to justifiably be upset. It’s why the mom who loses a pregnancy and doesn’t feel overwhelming grief or anger, but rather relief, feels as if she’s somehow broken. It’s why we’re still asking ourselves “why?” when our stories don’t fit into some prescribed, outdated box of “should haves” and “must look likes.” 

It’s also why I wrote Normalize It: Upending the Silence, Stigma, and Shame That Shape Women’s Lives. Through the process of exploring my own multilayered grief — a sacred process in which my therapist bore witness to the ebb and flow of my pain — I learned firsthand that the antidote to the shame and stigma that shapes our lives is to replace silence with our stories. When we do not allow ourselves the chance to truly feel what we’re feeling — and then articulate those feelings by speaking them into a tangible existence that we can then poke, prod, explore, integrate and accept — we suffer more. 

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My hope is that Normalize It is the mirror, the motivator, and the manifesto we’ve all been craving, especially at a time when empathy is arguably in short supply. Perhaps this book can act as a guide in helping us, once and for all, replace the antiquated cultural silence with the powerful, life-changing and culture-shaping act of storytelling. 

“I had a miscarriage.” I’ve said those words many times over — in hushed whispers, out loud over cups of much-needed coffee, in tears on the phone, via social media and to a room of total strangers. If you have said those words, too — even if it was only to yourself — please know you’re not alone. 

And while your story is yours to tell, it is worth sharing. If and when you’re ready to tell it, there are so many of us who are ready to listen.

Jessica Zucker is a Los Angeles-based psychologist specializing in reproductive health and the author of the award-winning book I Had a Miscarriage: A Memoir, a Movement. Jessica is the creator of the viral #IHadaMiscarriage campaign. Her second book, Normalize It: Upending the Silence, Stigma, and Shame That Shape Women’s Lives, is out now and available everywhere books are sold.

Follow her at @ihadamiscarriage