Has anyone told you what this next birth might look like from a mental/emotional point of view? And the first few weeks? Are you already holding your rainbow baby and could you tell me some of the struggles you dealt with?

I know no one can tell me what I will be experiencing, but it would really help me to know what might be. Right now I have no clue what emotions, feelings, thoughts *might* come rushing over me when this baby arrives safely, and knowing will help make it less unexpected, and hopefully less overwhelming.

I have a great doctor helping me with this pregnancy and I have a medical psychologist at hand as well. However, the latter is not very experienced in stillbirth parents and I would really appreciate some insight in what might come my way. That way I'll recognize the emotion in the moment, and be less overwhelmed by it.

Thank you so much for the information. I hope others will be helped by it as well.

Lots of love and strength to you all 💕

I usually just brush it off and forget, but when my husband heard something like this last week for the first time, he was thrown off by it all day and it got me thinking... So much mental energy of mine is used up by not letting remarks like this affect my whole day. If it did I would hardly have any social life left. I did give some people specific instructions on what to say, and I correct people when I feel the need to, but it just happens so often that I just let it slide.

Disclaimer: some of these thoughts have crossed my own mind, maybe yours too. I'm not embarassed by any of these random thoughts or feelings I may have or have had. But when someone else says these things out loud, it's like my baby's existence is reduced to this one viewpoint. This loss is so immense, so big and so personal, that people are crossing a boundary by telling me how they view my loss and assuming I'm okay with that.

An anthology of some of the remarks said to me after losing our daughter, Amber, stillborn last year.

Chapter 1. People calling your baby "it" or not accepting your baby as an actual person

• oh, you gave it a name?
• and when there was no heartbeat, you still had to get it out
• wow, you had a funeral?
• (when showing pictures of the funeral:) no corpse pictures, right?
• blabla...try again...blabla

Chapter 2. Things aren't so bad/could be worse:

• it was even worse back in the day when you weren't allowed to see them, imagine that.
• it used to be very common and people would just find it normal and continue. (yes it used to be more common, but no it was not less tragic. It was still traumatic, there was just more support and more traditions involved around baby and infant death, people shared the load)
• life goes on
• maybe she was spared a life of misery
• the upside of it all is...
• you know who is going through a rough time? X has it rough.

Chapter 3. Trying to connect or relate but failing:

• (postpartum phase:) it must be so hard on you, because you have the hormones messing with your emotions
• I don't know what I'd do in your shoes.
• bad things happen in life, I once...
• (pregnant lady said:) I don't really feel connected to my baby until he is born, you know?
• (some woman whose name I know and that's it:) "My cousin just gave birth again, I'm so happy for her! You know, it was a rough pregnancy [insert story]"
• when my parents died...
• I had a miscarriage at 6 weeks recently and told my daughter her sibling is a rainbow now... (Just to note: I respond very kindly to these loss histories, but they also make it painfully clear at that point we are not talking of my loss anymore, instead this person just wants me to listen to their grief and I am not always in the right headspace for that and don't understand how they can expect me to be.)

Chapter 4. Not understanding we carry a load forever:

• I hope everything will be OK soon
• How are you? Oh, it's mentally still hard on you?
• [surprised response as I tell someone I just reserved the plot next to my daughter's, because... I might not always feel this desire to be buried close to her]
• You're not as connected to a stillborn baby as you are to a baby born alive. (said by hospital social worker. At the time I thought I needed to hear this, but in hindsight I just needed a good cry and she gave me one.)

Chapter 5. TW: LC

• >!how many children do you have? Huh? Oh, you count your stillborn daughter too. (said a therapist I did not end up going to)!<
• >!I wouldn't want my kids to be more than x years apart.!<
• >!at least you have LC (I recognize the experience is different, but it's not right telling a loss parent it doesn't really count cause they have kids, as if the one they lost did not matter 💔)!<

Chapter 6. TW: PAL

• >!her soul was not meant for you, but I feel this one is!<
• >!luckily your stillborn didn't have any genetic issue!<
• >!well, at least you have all the baby stuff ready!!<

Thank you for reading/skimming through!