I HAD A MISCARRIAGE

A psychologist shares the intimate details of her miscarriage.

During her second trimester, Zucker, whose work focuses on reproductive and maternal mental health, suffered a miscarriage at home. Based on her experiences with the silence, shame, and stigma that often surround this emotionally charged experience, she created the #IHadaMiscarriage campaign and wrote this memoir/manifesto to enable a broader discussion of the subject. The author is candid about the personal, frightening details of her loss, and she smoothly interweaves her moving story with the narratives of some of her clients, all of which are complex and worthy of examination. “Miscarriage, pregnancy, and infant loss is not just a ‘woman’s experience.’ It does not discriminate. There is also no ‘one way’ to feel about these specific losses.” As the author shows, while some women experience relief after a miscarriage, most feel a profound sense of loss and grief. Throughout the book, Zucker is attuned to diversity and the unique circumstances facing marginalized groups (“I want to acknowledge that my experience represents just that—my experience”), and her inclusive approach allows women to embrace their feelings and express them rather than hide them or diminish their significance. She discusses how important it is to accept the loss and yet not feel like a failure because it happened, and she consistently emphasizes its unfortunate prevalence (“One in four pregnancies ends in miscarriage—and that’s just of the pregnancies that are known”). Zucker also writes about her need to name her child and chronicles her trip to Japan to discover “the unique ways Japanese culture acknowledges pregnancy loss.” Given that so many pregnancies end without a successful birth, this book should serve as both balm and guidebook for those suffering from such loss.

A contemplative, sensitive, and necessary work in the field of pregnancy and parenting.