Jessica’s story: miscarriage and cultural taboo
Jessica shares her experience of miscarriage, her thoughts on how her culture sees pregnancy loss as a taboo and ways that helped her to grieve and feel less alone.
I am Indian and, honestly, I hadn’t heard anyone sharing their miscarriage story or talk about their grief, until I had to go through it myself.
In the culture that I come from, miscarriage is something that no one wants to speak about, it’s a taboo. I am Indian and, honestly, I hadn’t heard anyone sharing their miscarriage story or talk about their grief, until I had to go through it myself.
My mom miscarried twice, but she never seemed to show that she had been affected by it, she said she felt it was normal. But I have also seen women being blamed for causing their miscarriage by not taking care of themselves.
I called it a taboo because I was not allowed to grieve. I was asked to move on from the very next day after it happened. My husband was more focused on trying to figure out what went wrong with my health, rather than being my emotional support.
The most painful statement made by people around me who came to know about my miscarriage was, “I am sorry for your loss. It’s common these days, so don’t worry. I too had one miscarriage but see, now I have 2 healthy children.”
My mother had the chance to see my baby and all that I remember is what she described about my son. I could see the baby’s face in everything around me, it haunted me for a month.
When I started searching on Instagram for miscarriage, that’s where I found so much positivity and love. I read many stories of grief, which made me feel less alone. I finally knew that I wasn’t the only one feeling so miserable.
Slowly I started to share my own story on Instagram. My husband didn’t encourage it though, he felt such things shouldn’t be shared and that it would make people think that we were weak. He also felt I was doing it for attention and wouldn’t be able to help others. But I didn’t believe this. I had struggled enough and I just wanted to help women who were struggling silently.
Doing something good brings both appreciation and rejection. Many women opened up about their grief to me, and they felt good reading my post. The ones who didn’t like it, messaged my husband to fill his mind with nonsense. Anyway, these experiences have made me feel that miscarriage is something lots of people don’t want to talk about or don’t consider grief a part of it.
I also dedicated a beautiful song, ‘Heaven Someday’, in memory of my son. Originally it was written and sung by another mother who had a miscarriage, to express the emotions of going through this loss. Singing the words of this song myself helped me to express my own feelings, and to feel like I was getting my life back.
“I never got to kiss your cheeks, Or watch what you’d grow up to be… Before I got to say hello, I had to let you go.”
Jessica
You can find Jessica’s cover of ‘Heaven Someday’ here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7_KNqO0Ir0k