Men need more support after miscarriage
Miscarriage is devastating but whilst there is support for women, men are often overlooked, and the effect a miscarriage can have on men is often underestimated, or even ignored. As a result, many men suffer with the loss, in silence.
This page contains affiliate links, which means we may earn a small amount of money if a reader clicks through and makes a purchase. All our articles and reviews are written independently by the Netmums editorial team.
Now one high profile dad-to-be has spoken out about the subject, and the impact it had on him.
Last week Facebook founder, Mark Zuckerberg, wrote about the joy of his wife's pregnancy and how it was tinged with sadness by three previous miscarriages.
He spoke of how lonely the miscarriages made him feel:
"You feel so hopeful when you learn you're going to have a child.
You start imagining who that baby will become and dreaming of their future. You start making plans, and then they're gone.
It's a lonely experience."
Zuckerberg's honesty and the fact that he has spoken out about how men feel after miscarriage will no doubt have struck a chord with many others.
Is it assumed that men will not be affected as much by the loss or is it just that we culturally expect men to be stronger and to not open up about their grief?
One dad, Al Ferguson's experience of miscarriage led him to create a webiste to support dads - the Dad Network. Speaking to The Telegraph, he said:
"I felt inadequate to help (my wife). I was devastated for her and our baby, but held it in. I wanted to be strong and look after my wife as I knew that she was already heart broken.
I felt that to have me crying too would just add to that pain for her. This was a mistake.
I didn’t feel there was any real support for the father. It’s that feeling of helplessness, of needing to do something to help with your partner’s suffering that has to be addressed."
You can read Al's blog Men have miscarriages too! here.
In our Coffeehouse, mums talk about how their partners often suffer in silence after miscarriage and find it hard to get support:
"(After a miscarriage) I think dads are forgotten" - Laura J
"It wasn't just my baby, its was ours and he needs support just as much as I do. How do other men cope?" - Katie H
"People used to ask me how I was feeling but they didn't ask my husband." - Gemma T
