As a follow-up to my posts on miscarriage, infertility, and infant loss, I wanted to call attention to an important point. I posted a link to the article “What you Should and Shouldn’t Say to Someone who has Lost a Baby.” As I was scrolling through the comments on that post, one in particular jumped out at me.
Adam says:The other thing people should not do is focus just on the mother. The father is going through the lose of a child as well. Saying something like “You were not pregnant” does not some how magically remove the Father from the pain of losing his child. With each of my wife’s pregnancies I have bonded very quickly with our new little addition. When we lost our second child six weeks along I felt the lose just as much as my wife did.
The difference between the father and the mother is that the father needs to grieve and deal with his emotions while having no time off of work and taking care of a physically and emotionally recovering wife. The husband also has the add responsibility of dealing many times with hospitals and doctor’s office to arrange for payments and dealing with any other day to day operations which need to be attended to while the mother is recovering.
It comes down to the truth that Fathers lose a child along with mothers and should not be over looked when dealing with this issue. Father’s need time to grieve as well. Father’s need time to heal emotionally. Father’s need time to heal physically as well.
The physical part for father’s is not the injury to the body but it is the stress of having the woman they love go through emergency surgery. The stress of picking up the extra duties at home. The stress of caring for his wife. Finally the emotional stress of just dealing with losing a child.
Everything said above applies to fathers as well. Donielle in a couple places notes the fact this impacts couples and not just women. It is important to help Fathers because they need it.
Read more: What You Should (and Shouldn’t) Say to Someone Who is Experiencing a Miscarriage, Stillbirth, or Infant Loss | Naturally Knocked Uphttp://www.naturallyknockedup.com/what-you-should-and-shouldnt-say-to-someone-who-has-lost-a-baby/#ixzz1nABQK9tY
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This is a very very important point. Fathers grieve over the loss of a child…it’s not just a mother’s grief. If you know a couple who is going through miscarriage, infant loss, or infertility, make sure that you minister to the father, not just the mother!
-Bonnie
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