Dannie-Lu Carr
For some women it’s miscarriage. For some it’s infertility. For some it’s social infertility (financial, not meeting the right partner, or something else). For some it’s stillbirth. For some it’s ectopic pregnancy. For many of us it can be a cruel combination of more than one.
A friend of mine referred to this as a forgotten demographic of society. Not only forgotten, but shamed and judged for our disenfranchised grief. Endlessly.
13 years ago I was coerced into an abortion I didn’t want to have. I went down fighting but ultimately I felt cornered and exhausted. It broke me but I kept going anyway. I needed to keep working and earning. I needed distraction. I needed to pretend I was okay. Because life goes on right?!
In a society that has very little space or compassion to even begin to look at such uncomfortable issues, keeping going takes its toll.
Think about it… if you have no safe space to express or grieve without shame, judgement and silencing, then how can we ‘get over’ or work through our grief? Most of us do our best in shamed isolation. It works a bit. But it’s like walking uphill through treacle and inevitably there are times where you can’t walk anymore because you’re tired and you feel so alone and the grief catches up with you yet again and knocks you to your knees.
The limited understanding gets thinner and the judgement gets stronger. What, still? Still grieving? Still in pain? Maybe you need to go and get fixed somewhere? It’s been X amount of years, you’re past childbearing age now anyway, surely you’re over it by now? And other such rationalisations about emotions. Fact: nobody can rationalise their emotions. It’s not how it works. Unfortunately.
But you see the ‘fix’ you so desperately want us to find is in your hands. It is your kindness. The fix is simply being cared for in moments like these. The fix is being seen without shame or judgement. The fix is saying, I’m sorry it hurts so badly, I see you, I’ve got you, you’re not alone. And actually mean it. Having one eye on the clock isn’t meaning it. Or saying the words and hoping it’s an acceleration to our grief going away isn’t meaning it either.
For women (I can only write for women because I’ve never experienced personally how it is for men), every hormonal shift, every abdominal cramp, every piece of news about someone else’s pregnancy can throw us back into that agonising cocktail of grief, shame, pain, judgement, isolation and loneliness. Every article or policy written ‘for families’ stabs like a screwdriver in the guts. Every advert for anything ‘baby’ or family reminds us of what we will never have or have never had.
It isn’t all bad. Of course not. We don’t live our whole lives in a hole of blackness. In fact most of us are the queens of getting on regardless, achieving great things, being there for others and having humour, wit, resourcefulness in abundance. Some of us still love our lives. It isn’t an either / or equation.
But when the blackness does come, I ask you, please see us. Please care. Don’t roll your eyes. Don’t walk on by. Don’t judge or close our voices down. Stop, make some space, a little time. Please listen, see us and care. It really is all we ask and it really is all we need. The shaming though? The judging? That stuff can intensify our grief in seconds. And it can last for a long time.
It’s an inconvenience though right?! Hell yes. We are absolutely in agreement with you on that one. Only we can’t walk away from the inconvenience like you. It’s a kicker but it is what it is. Walk with us. Just for a while.
Society needs this so very much. We need you. And one day, you will need someone too. Trust me, nobody understands grief like women childless not by choice. We are not your enemy.
Photo by Ante Gudelj on Unsplash