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Woman Lists 14 Awful Things No One Tells You About Having A Miscarriage
The phase is so lonely, and the recovery is longer than imagined.
Kristen Moore has a child who was conceived via IVF. She and her husband had tried for seven years before getting their first positive pregnancy test through IVF, after laparoscopy and rounds of insemination. Kristen’s latest miscarriage came after a shocking natural pregnancy.
Miscarriage and the complex feelings associated with it often create a silent atmosphere that leaves those experiencing it feeling alone.
She was 13weeks along by the time she had the D&C [ a procedure that clears the uterine lining after miscarriage]. She was almost 12weeks when she couldn’t find the heartbeat despite hearing it several times before and had even gotten the all-clear on genetic tests.
But thankfully, Kristen R. Moore has shared what she learned about miscarriage having gone through one.
As anyone would’ve reacted, Kristen kept telling people because the tests were all good. However, the New-York has launched a list of things no one tells you about having a miscarriage. Kristen has pointed out just how expensive it can be, claiming she paid over $1000 for her miscarriage and that they didn’t inform her it would cost much to lose a baby.
Kristen Revealed The Unknown To Her Hundreds Of Thousands Of Followers On Twitter, Sharing Her Experience Amid Grieving The Loss Of Her Pregnancy.
Today, I paid over $1000 out of pocket for my miscarriage. They didn’t tell me it would cost so much to lose a baby. Here are other things they don’t tell you about miscarriages. A thread based on my experience. CW: miscarriage & infertility.
— Kristen R. Moore (@kristen4moore) November 1, 2021
“We have good insurance. So, the $1200+ bill was a shock. And that amount doesn’t include the copays, the costs of all the meds, the cost of prenatal care, etc. It was paying the bill that prompted me to post about the experience on Twitter. We have enough money to incur a surprise bill like that now. But a few years ago, that would have sent us into a financial tailspin,” Kristen told BuzzFeed.
The New York-based Talked About How Healing After Having A Miscarriage Takes Quite Some Time.
1. It takes a long time. It’s not an event that’s suddenly over. It’s like a fucking marathon. A sad, dehydrated marathon with nothing on the end but empty.
— Kristen R. Moore (@kristen4moore) November 1, 2021
Kristen Said There’s A Complete Lack Of Support From Healthcare Professionals When It Comes To Miscarriages.
2. Practitioners who support birth don’t necessarily know how to support miscarriage—the joy of birth is so stark when compared to the grief and loss of miscarriage. Some of y’all need training.
— Kristen R. Moore (@kristen4moore) November 1, 2021
She added: “Here’s what I think; we need post-partum doulas to support miscarriages. I didn’t realize there are some folks (like Shyana Broughton with Our Mommie Village) who do that, who will come to sit with you while you grieve.”
She Also Revealed The Medical Professionals Often Provide Little To No Information About Post Miscarriage And Recovery.
3. There is medication to help the miscarriage along. It is used for abortion, too, and your pharmacist may treat you like you’re entering an abortion clinic when you want more information about how it works.
— Kristen R. Moore (@kristen4moore) November 1, 2021
Kristen Experienced A Situation Where A Pharmacist Refused To Give Her Information About How To Use A Medication Vaginally, Which She Needed To Do To Pass Her Miscarriage.
4. The most commonly used medication is officially prescribed for ulcers; all use for miscarriage management is “off books.” This gives your pharmacist permission (tacit or explicit) to deny you information about vaginal (rather than oral) use.
— Kristen R. Moore (@kristen4moore) November 1, 2021
And This Is Because Most Pharmacists Are Unaware You Have A Miscarriage When You Come In To Get The Medication.
5. The informational inserts for the medication—Misoprostol—warn you about how it can trigger miscarriage. If you have a decent pharmacist, they’ll give you supplemental information that they print off from the internet.
— Kristen R. Moore (@kristen4moore) November 1, 2021
“My pharmacists didn’t know what was going on to require the meds, and my midwife doesn’t have full access to the local hospital systems, which prevented her from being able to locate a range of D&C options for me.”
As Someone Who Had Infertility Issues, Kristen Experienced Lots Of Anxiety Around Having A Natural Pregnancy.
6. When you’ve been through infertility treatments, a natural pregnancy doesn’t always feel like a miracle. Sometimes it feels like a tightrope walk, a risk, a pain waiting to happen.
— Kristen R. Moore (@kristen4moore) November 1, 2021
Miscarriage Can Be So, So Lonely!
7. Miscarriage is so, so lonely. Y’all. The emptying of your body like that…bless it. You really DON’T want to talk about it, but you sometimes want to scream about it. Where can we go to scream?
— Kristen R. Moore (@kristen4moore) November 1, 2021
And The Recovery Is Longer Than Most People Imagined.
8. You want it to speed up and slow down all at once. Hurry, hurry, hurry up, and then no, don’t go–please don’t go.
— Kristen R. Moore (@kristen4moore) November 1, 2021
“All the literature says that you’ll be back to work or able to return to normal life within 24 hours. That’s crap.”
The Spouse Of Those Who Experience Miscarriage Also Feel The Pain Yet It’s Often Unacknowledged.
9. Non-birthing parents are ignored in the miscarriage experience: their grief and pain and suffering is real, too.
— Kristen R. Moore (@kristen4moore) November 1, 2021
“My husband adds that the miscarriage experience was traumatic and long for him too. And unexpectedly so. He needs/needed those conversations as much as I did and do.”
Having A Miscarriage In Your Second Trimester Doesn’t Mean The Body Will Immediately Goes Back To Not Looking And Feeling Pregnant.
10. When the miscarriage happens at 13 weeks, the weight stays on; you still have to pull out the pregnancy pants, as a reminder of your previous maternity state.
— Kristen R. Moore (@kristen4moore) November 1, 2021
After A Miscarriage, People Might Say The Wrong Thing To You.
11. No one talks about it, so you don’t know how to talk about. People say the wrong thing, but you’re so sad that you don’t want to say, “don’t ever say that to a person miscarrying.”
— Kristen R. Moore (@kristen4moore) November 1, 2021
“We need to be having more conversations about the experiences of miscarriage and fertility. The responses were heartbreaking evidence that we are mostly alone as we wade through this.”
Hurtful Remarks Will Come From Those Who Think They Are Assisting.
12. Related, do not recommend: “But you can try again soon, right?” upon hearing the news. Also, do not recommend: “Everything happens for a reason.” Or “This is all part of God’s plan.”
— Kristen R. Moore (@kristen4moore) November 1, 2021
But There Will Be Special Healthcare Professionals And People Who Will Make You Feel At Ease.
13. There are humans who feel like little angels, the tech who asks if you want to hear the lack of heartbeat, the friend you can scream with, the partner who’ll hold you in your grief. Mostly they feel like blips on a terrible painful road.
— Kristen R. Moore (@kristen4moore) November 1, 2021
“My doctors and nurses modeled an ethic of care that I think is useful. The surgeon started by asking me, ‘How are you? And acknowledge this must be hard. That sounds very simple, but the difference between beginning there and just jumping into protocol/procedure was marked for me.”
When It’s Over, You’ll Be Left To Navigate Emotions And Trauma; Unlike Anything, You’ve Ever Suffered.
14. It’s expensive and painful (like birth) and at the end you don’t get anything except a bill and a new playlist called, “S**t to help you get through the baby that never was.”
— Kristen R. Moore (@kristen4moore) November 1, 2021
“I believe we should implement comprehensive healthcare reform, especially for women. Healthcare reform should include post-miscarriage support, including time off after birth and miscarriage, therapists/doula support, and a more holistic approach to training medical professionals dealing with this kind of loss. This might include an articulation of the complexities [ physical and emotional] of recovering from miscarriage and birth.
“But importantly, you shouldn’t have to have a ton of money in order to receive this support. The way that class inequities shape patient care is indisputable, and those inequities intersect with other forms of inequity, like race and gender. So Black and trans patients are likely to struggle to get the care they deserve in miscarriage situations (among others). We can and should do better.”
After reading through Kristen’s experience, Dr. Erica Montes hopes medics treat their patients with empathy.
BuzzFeed reached out to OB-GYN Erica Montes for more details hinged on miscarriages. She revealed it was sad to hear the negative feedback Kristen experienced with healthcare professionals and hopes medics treat their patients with empathy.
She urged doctors to let patients know all expectations, possibilities, and provide resources for support.
As an OB-GYN, Dr. Montes thinks it’s also essential to think about the patient as a whole, physically and mentally, while letting patients know all expectations and possibilities and providing resources for support to feel more prepared.
