Pregnancy and infant loss mothers, stillbirthday wants your feedback.
May is Pregnancy Awareness Month here in the US, and so we here at stillbirthday would like to know, what have been the best – and worst – pregnancy resources that prepared you with loss information prior to your loss (so, while you were pregnant), and/or supported you during or after your loss. If the resources you utilized while pregnant ever broached the subject of loss, we want to know about it – and how well they measured up!
To clarify: this survey is about the pregnancy resources you’ve ever used – not pregnancy loss resources. How well did your pregnancy resources inform you about pregnancy loss?
To participate, please let us know about any resource within the following categories:
Pregnancy Books – BEST support
- gave accurate facts, linked to support resources
Pregnancy Books – WORST support
- gave poor statistics and very little information
Pregnancy Blogs – BEST support
- felt connected, author was compassionate, linked to support resources
Pregnancy Blogs – WORST support
- didn’t address loss at all or did so in a confusing and unsupportive way
Pregnancy Facebook Pages/Groups- BEST support
- felt connected, page owner was compassionate, linked to support resources
Pregnancy Facebook Pages/Groups – WORST support
- didn’t address loss at all or did so in a confusing and unsupportive way
Pregnancy Websites – BEST support
- gave accurate facts, linked to support resources
Pregnancy Websites – WORST support
- gave poor statistics and very little information
Pregnancy/Birth Methods – BEST support
- instructor/method gave accurate facts, linked to support resources – do NOT submit the name of your personal instructor, only the name of the birth method/class
Pregnancy/Birth Methods – WORST support
- instructor/method gave poor statistics and very little information – do NOT submit the name of your personal instructor, only the name of the birth method/class
You can submit as many votes as you’d like, for as many categories as you’d like. Just leave a comment below, making sure you articulate which catories your votes belong to. At the end of the month, I will fill in the categories so we can see which pregnancy resourses have the best- or the worst – pregnancy and infant loss support!
Above Rubies is a magazine, but they are also online as a website and on Facebook too I think. I read their magazine and get all sorts of helpful pregnancy counsel and information. They also include encouraging and informative articles about miscarriage and stillbirth. I would vote for them for BEST pregnancy (reading materials), but I’m sure it’s the same information/articles on their online programs, too (so I would vote for them for all three categories).
I once saw a bereaved mother share a link about her loss on a Facebook pregnancy page. I don’t know all of the details around the situation, but I guess it was a link that the page owner didn’t want to see or share (it was a “Justice for Violet” I think). I could not imagine my own loss getting overlooked or ignored, and I remember that is exactly what happened to this poor mother. The page owner simply kept right on posting over it, as if she never saw it. For that, Made to Birth Facebook pregnancy page should probably be in the “worst” category.
Parents.com did not cover pregnancy loss at all.
TheBump.com had no information on miscarriage, but they did have a little bit on infertility.
BabyCenter.com did cover pregnancy loss, but it’s probably only because of the community aspect.
Surprisingly, the What to Expect When Your Expecting website did provide information on “the unexpected” (miscarriage) and so of these four, I’d put What to Expect in the BEST category.
I read “The Mom of all Baby Books” during my pregnancy. I went back to check, and the information on loss is extrememy lacking. I also read “Birthing From Within” and it didn’t have anything on loss at all.
Honestly I think most pregnancy info lacks loss info. It’s terrible. I hope this survey will maybe uncover some good pregnancy resources that DO talk about loss. We shouldn’t have to go digging for help after the fact.
Before Jonathan went to Heaven I had very limited time on the computer and never looked at pregnancy sights. I guess the books I have read had very small chapters on loss, mostly miscarriage. It is something that I was totally unprepared for and felt no support in. I think all books and sights should strive to do a better job at preparing moms on what to expect.
“Birth Without Fear” on facebook—-BEST. It’s how I found you!
I took HypnoBirthing classes when I was pregnant with my Jonathon. They never made any mention of utilizing their services in the event of a stillbirth. It is a shame, because obviously the stress level really increased when, at 38 weeks, we discovered that his perfect heart had stopped beating.
Yes, Birth Without Fear. For sure, BEST.
I had a horrific experience with the ‘Lamaze’ birth method of giving birth with my oldest son in 1985. Back in the mid-eighties, giving birth via ‘Lamaze’; the natural method (without any medication) was fairly new and ‘all the rage’. Since this was my first pregnancy and child, I had no idea what I needed or did not need in order to give birth. To be honest, I figured that childbirth couldn’t be all that bad because so many women give birth… I eventually bought into the idea that panting like a puppy and staring at a picture could make me forget the pain of childbirth; even though I was expecting a large baby.
In addition to my own ignorance about how to best go about giving birth, my gynecologist ‘insisted’ upon natural child birth. I really did not feel that I had a choice so I agreed to ‘natural childbirth’ and I attended the mandatory Lamaze classes. There was much the trainer did not go over. For example, she did not talk about the trauma to a woman’s body, and especially, vagina, if giving birth to a large baby. She did not go over things to look for after giving birth to help ensure your body is ‘okay’. (All she really talked about during my classes was how to breathe and I already knew how to breathe).
My son weighed nearly 9 ilbs so pushing him out naturally nearly killed me. I pushed until every blood vessel in my eyes burst. Additionally, I was so bruised after giving birth that even the nurses would wince when checking me. I was not prepared for my eyes to turn blood read after giving birth nor was I prepared for such tremendous bruising. Worse yet, unknown to me until days after giving birth, my doctor had performed an episiotomy on me due to the size of my son and he left a sponge inside of me. (He was running late for a golf game I heard him say).
Had I not been living with my parents. I would have needlessly died. I left the hospital with a terrible odor coming from me and slight fever. My mother knew something was wrong and she insisted that I call my doctor’s office and tell them about the odor and fever. To make a long story short, I was going into ‘Toxic Shock’ by the time I got to my doctor’s office; which was two hours away from where I lived. Another doctor at the office actually removed the sponge and I was placed on antibiotics.
The birth of my first child should have been a relatively easy birth as far as giving birth goes but, due to lack of information given to me by my doctor and Lamaze instructor, my first birth experience was very traumatic. My son cried non-stop for the first two years of his life and was labeled with ‘Difficult Child Syndrome’. I have often wondered if he would have cried so much if I had not experienced such a traumatic birth. I’ll never know…
As far as pregnancy books go, ‘What to Expect When You’re Expecting’ is a classic and I read it throughout all three of my pregnancies so I would say it’s a good source of basic information in regard to being pregnant and what you ‘need to know’. I don’t recall much, if any, information about pregnancy loss in the book though:(
I did not have a computer or even know how to use one back when I was pregnant so books and videos were my only source of finding information other than through my doctor. For women today, I think ‘Above Rubies’ is a great site regarding all issues for women. Their website is especially informative regarding pregnancy, pregnancy loss and the female body in general. The information they give out is given out in a caring and loving manner which is a plus; especially in the case of pregnancy loss.
I want to add a note to my previous post in regard to the ‘Lamaze’ method of giving birth. If you look this method up on-line or in books; you will likely see/read “This method also teaches the mother when a medical intervention is necessary for the health and safety of the baby and mother’. This is the part of my instruction that was missing… To this day, I can hear the nurse outside of my hospital room telling my doctor that I needed to be given something for pain. I can also hear my doctor reply ‘No, it will slow things down and I have somewhere to be’. The Lamaze method might work out for someone as long as the doctor and Lamaze instructor are honest about all information and as long as they are dedicated to doing what is truly best for mother and baby.
You always have the most informative and helpful responses! Thank you for taking the time to answer this so thoroughly!
Birth Without Fear (vote x 12)
Navelgazing Midwife has a couple of articles on her blog about miscarriage, and they are done very nicely and appropriately, with a lot of interaction and love.