As much as you may feel like it is your fault, it is NOT. There is nothing that could have been done to change the will of God for your life and for the life of your child. This miscarriage is not a fault of you, it is a fact of the world and a fault of sin. The world is a place full of sin and the death of your child is a result of sin, not a direct result of anything in your life. So how do we process this pain? I can only speak from the point of a mother but the pain of a miscarriage runs deep and often feels lonely. Even when we are in our most lonely moments, and our feelings drive us to despair, God’s promises still are true, and God’s goodness is still real.
*Trigger Warning This post Talks about Miscarriage
There is something about being a mom that I never fully grasped until I was well, a mom. That was the idea of having joy and pain at the same time. I had often heard of this concept but never truly experienced it. The first time I experienced joy and pain was the moment after our first daughter was born. There was such joy in holding our slippery bundle of joy that we had prayed and waited for so long. And yet, among the joy was the physical pain from giving birth. I think this is a feeling that all mothers can understand—the feeling of joy and physical pain. The combination of joy and physical pain happens often throughout motherhood. Joy may come from seeing your child shaking a toy, and the pain comes when you get smacked in the face by said toy. Joy may come from hearing your child speaking, and the pain then comes when your child screams in your ear. I could go on and on with stories of experiencing one or the other of joy and physical pain as a mother. But what about experiencing the feelings of joy and the feeling of pain at the same time?
The Unspoken Pain Mothers Carry
This pain is carried by many mothers and is carried silently. There are many reasons why mothers feel this dichotomy of joy and pain at the same time. It could be the joy created from the laughter of a toddler, while in pain from their new diagnosis. It could be the joy of seeing your child creating community while bearing the silent pain of knowing you will be moving and those friendships being made today won’t last long beyond tomorrow. There are seasons of difficulty that augment the joy and pain we carry as mothers. The times when you are grieving the loss of a loved one while still experiencing the joy that comes with motherhood. Or the even more silent pain, the pain of a miscarriage. A miscarriage that might have been acknowledged by others, or a miscarriage that might only be known by yourself. No matter the stage of the pregnancy or the amount of people who know, the pain of miscarriage is difficult and different from other pains that we experience as mothers.
Processing a Miscarriage
First, I need to start this section by stating that your baby no matter how small is a baby. Your pregnancy changed you. You became a mother even before the moment you saw the positive on that pregnancy test. The hopes, the dreams, the pregnancy sickness, the sadness, it was all real and all valid. You are allowed to say you lost a child. We have lost 2. When you read our bio you will see that we say we have 6 children and only 4 living children. This is how we open the conversation and share with others that we have lost babies in the womb.
Second, as much as you may feel like it is your fault, it is NOT.