Ouch

[songinmind]

So I was talking to a friend who I used to work with yesterday and somehow when we got on the topic of her kids, she confided in me that she had gone through ~3 years of infertility trying meds and IUI.  I thought she would understand, so I confided that I've gone through 2 miscarriages really recently.  She said something like 'Oh my gosh, that's awful.  It's probably because you're so stressed at your job, you need to relax or it'll never work' [we both found our job(s) pretty frustrating and used to vent a bit to each other]

I was so taken aback to such a blatant causality that she attributed to me :(  I mean, we all look at our miscarriages (usually with no good reason) and try to find the cause.  And yes, stress is probably not good and I try to manage it as best as possible (and leave work stress at work and not take it home).  But I was just blown away to hear such a 'It's your fault' response from a friend.  :(  I didn't even know how to respond to her.

[cocacolapanda]

Thanks for the words usuk, very well said!

[usuk]

A very blunt person told me this. If stress, or anything else - sushi, goat cheese, hair dye, any other thing we are told to avoid - could cause a miscarriage so easily, every woman with an unwanted pregnancy could just go out and do a few of those things at once and it would all be over without a procedure. It is very hard to harm a healthy baby. Women on drugs, or malnourished/impoverished have babies. Women whose husbands dies on 9/11 did not miscarry. Battered women have healthy babies. Truth is every time the cells divide is a chance for a chromosomal mistake. And your body "scans" the embryo for mistakes constantly. I think stress plays a role in TTC but not once you get prego. Sorry she said that to you. How is that supposed to help you??? Ugh.

[songinmind]

Thanks- I wish I could have that moment back with her to be a little more calm about it as I do really hope you are right.  

I know my mother was losing her mom to cancer right when she conceived me.  She didn't even know she was pregnant for the first 4 months as she thought the tiredness and nausea were just stress and grieving.  I figure if she made it through that stress and I came out ok...  

I had the exact same situation related to the H1N1 vaccine (my husband asked me if that had caused anything).  In my case it was a blighted ovum weeks before that, so I knew that didn't cause it.  It is really scary to read that there may be some correlation with that, though.

[cocacolapanda]

Stress can't cause a miscarriage unless it brings forth a different medical issue that could cause a miscarriage!  I'm so sorry she said that to you, it's hard enough dealing with a miscarriage but to have someone gracefully say it could be your fault??  Wow.

The weekend I found out I was miscarrying, my husband brought up the fact that I got the H1N1 vaccine and basically said that's what caused it, (I know for sure it didn't because it was a full week after the baby stopped developing.  I totally went off on him, and trust me, I looked into it myself.  I know that I didn't do anything that caused me to miscarry, and I highly doubt you did either.  

Basically just calmly explain that you can't do anything to cause a miscarriage, maybe if you were in a horrible car accident, or something tragic, but in general you can't make yourself miscarry.