HEALING THROUGH STORYTELLING: NICOLE CORRADO'S STORY

I always wanted more children and at 38, I decided to make that dream a reality.  Unfortunately, I had a miscarriage. It was early on. A couple of weeks after finding out I was pregnant, I started cramping.  I had no idea what was happening, but I knew something was wrong. I had been pregnant before and have two healthy grown boys.  I just figured this would be a healthy pregnancy also. But after the cramping, I started bleeding, so I called my doctor. The doctor said I was probably having a miscarriage.  I was in horrible pain both physically and mentally. Just waiting for it to all be over.

TOP TAKE-AWAYS: SELF-BLAME FOLLOWING PREGNANCY LOSS

We’ve had the pleasure of working with Taylor Thomas, an undergraduate student who has been analyzing some of our survey data for her Honors Symposium project.

Taylor’s project particularly focused on the relationship between self-blame and grief.

TOP TAKE-AWAYS: GRIEF AND COPING AMONG COUPLES FOLLOWING PREGNANCY LOSS

The IPL Collaborative presented our most recent research findings at the Eastern Psychological Association conference on March 2nd.

In the morning, we presented our talk, “Perceived Incongruent Grief Following Pregnancy Loss.” We presented some of the results from our recent survey study that examined how incongruent grief (as perceived by mothers), influenced relationship satisfaction and commitment.

TOP TAKE-AWAYS: WHY SOCIETY DISMISSES MISCARRIAGE

How women are treated by society after a miscarriage can dramatically impact their grieving process.  Dr. Rayna Markin, a maternal mental health clinician and researcher, gathered information from a number of research articles and her own experiences with patients on the impact family, friends, and even healthcare professionals can have on women who suffer from miscarriage (Markin, 2016).  Our main take-away from her article mirrors the feelings we have heard from many women about their pregnancy loss experience(s).  

As a whole, society is not effective at recognizing miscarriage as real loss and often does not support grieving parents in a constructive, sympathetic manner.