"I’ve had four miscarriages over four years. Each time it happens, a piece of you dies. The most traumatic was the first one. That was the very first time I got pregnant. We were so excited about our new baby. But when we went in for the 12-week scan in our local hospital in the South-East of England, I was told I had a missed miscarriage, also called a silent miscarriage, which meant the baby died a long time ago but my body hadn't showed any signs. I was told that even though they knew the baby wasn’t alive, hospital policy was that I had to wait a week and return for a scan to confirm. I was devastated. I also couldn’t believe that they were going to just send me home with my dead baby inside me, and no advice about what to do. 

I kept asking what I should do now and how I should cope, and the healthcare staff just said there was nothing to be done, and miscarriage was really common in early pregnancy. They didn’t even give me the number of a helpline to call. 

I was rushed into the emergency room a few days later as my body had started contractions and ended up in surgery. I was in enormous pain, but the hospital behaved so coldly and clinically that I was shocked. I had just lost my first baby. But they just left me on my own to grieve without any empathy. Months later I was still upset and wanted counselling, so I went to my GP but he just told me to go home and look on the internet. Luckily I found the Miscarriage Association helpline, which did help. But you’re so numb after losing a baby that you might not be able to find help by yourself.

I then had a baby boy – Rufus, who is now 4 years old – and we wanted to try for another baby. I had another miscarriage at around 7 weeks, then a third miscarriage. This time it was a potential partial molar pregnancy, which is when the embryo doesn’t develop properly, but the doctor we had was terrible in her attitude. She didn’t make eye contact and couldn’t even take my blood sample properly. They were going to surgically remove the baby for tests and the doctor was speaking to me as if from a script, casually mentioning that the surgery has a rare risk of hysterectomy, without seeming to know anything about my history or how this may upset me.

Finally, I found a GP who got me 10 weeks of counselling. But I still have really bad anxiety around my kids and constantly frightened something might happen to them. If I’d had help and support initially, I think that would have made me much less anxious. 

I have an incredibly supportive husband, but with the first miscarriage, he didn’t know what to do and we really struggled for a long time. It’s hard for partners, but they sometimes seem to get over it more quickly. There’s a feeling that we can just try again. That was the response from a lot of friends and families too. They told me I’d be fine. I thought, will I? I felt stupid for feeling so devastated as everyone else seemed to have forgotten about it after a few weeks. I don’t entirely blame them – I might have responded the same way if I hadn’t had my experiences, but we respond this way because doctors and society tell us that losing a baby early in pregnancy is so common that it’s not a major issue. And society seems to make us feel like it’s not a big deal either. But every time I miscarried it got harder to try again, I felt emotionally and physically broken. I wanted to grieve but I felt I couldn't allow myself the time. My anxiety hit an all-time high, and I even began to blame myself, wondering if I was causing the miscarriages by being so anxious. 

By now, I had had three miscarriages. In the UK, if you have had three miscarriages in a row, doctors will refer you for tests at that point to see what the cause might be. But because I already had a baby I wasn’t deemed eligible for any tests through the National Health Service (NHS), even though I'd had recurrent miscarriages – I think there’s a feeling that if you’ve already got a child you can’t complain. 

The fourth time I miscarried was over New Years Eve. By this time I was really struggling, and so was my relationship with my husband. For four years, we had either been trying to get pregnant, were pregnant, or had just miscarried. I felt guilty for continuing to want a baby – since I already had a child, why did I so badly want another one?  

We found a private doctor who runs one of the few clinics in the UK focused on helping women with recurrent miscarriage to get pregnant. It was expensive and our last chance really. Till my baby girl Margot was in my arms the fear that I would lose her never left me. 

Even though I now have two healthy children, and Margot is nearly a year old, I am still recovering from postnatal depression that was undiagnosed for a long time. Most people assume that you only get postnatal depression straight after birth, and my doctor told me that many women go undiagnosed. I started group therapy, which is helping. 

I feel that now, after everything that has happened I'm finally starting to grieve my four lost babies. I join ‘Wave of Light’ and light candles. I feel I can talk about my experiences more, especially with my husband, and it helps that we acknowledge each of them as individuals. Some people create memorials to remember their lost babies, but I found it too hard at the time. 

I know that public healthcare even in rich countries like the UK is underfunded. I appreciate how stretched the doctors and nurses are. But empathy and emotional support does not cost money. I found that you sometimes don’t get treated as a human who lost a baby - they treat it like a medical problem. Rather than downplaying my loss on the basis that lots of women lose babies in early pregnancy and there’s nothing you can do about it, they could have acknowledged our loss and grief. They might have even spoken to us separately in a bereavement room and offered more emotional support. 

People feel like they can’t talk about it because the hospital gives the impression that you don’t need to – you’re made to feel quite ridiculous. The attitude that early pregnancy loss doesn't matter is pushing women into darkness. That doesn't help anyone. We need to talk about our grief – it’s the only way to heal".