Background
The silence around miscarriage and pregnancy loss can make couples feel like they are the only ones this has ever happened to. It's only when they start to ask the questions - why did this happen? - what does this mean? - will it happen again? - and look for answers that they find out that they are far from alone and that miscarriage is a relatively common experience.
In fact, up to a quarter of all pregnancies end in miscarriage but most women then go on to have successful pregnancies. When you start to talk about miscarriage its surprising how many friends, mothers and grandmothers have had miscarriages and came through to have successful pregnancies.
Finding the answers
But it's not just that our culture is so poor at understanding and dealing with the loss that surrounds miscarriage that makes it so hard to find the answers. It's the fact that miscarriage is still not well understood by the medical profession.
So when your doctor says they don't know why you had a miscarriage, they probably don't know. They know the statistics though so that's why when you expect them to investigate - to look, feel, prod, poke, test and scan - they will tell you that they will only do this after three or more miscarriages.
This can feel very uncaring and dismissive. It doesn't acknowledge the emotional impact of miscarriage. But what it does acknowledge is the fact that there is unlikely to be a real problem unless it happens several times.
