How the stigma of miscarriage contributes to a culture of abortion

A miscarriage is one of the most difficult things a woman can experience, but it’s also one of the most common. According to the American Pregnancy Association, as many as 1 in 4 pregnancies end in miscarriage — yet there is still a stigma that makes many couples feel they must remain silent.

Miscarriages were recently discussed on CBS This Morning, exploring the stigma, as well as the frequency of early pregnancy losses. 80% of miscarriages happen before the first trimester is over, which is exactly why so many women remain silent about their pregnancies until after 12 weeks. “We’re in a culture where you’re taught not to talk about your pregnancy until the three-month mark,” Jamie Stelter, a New York traffic anchor, told CBS. “So, if you never told them you were pregnant, you’re certainly not going to march around and tell them you had a miscarriage.”

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Stelter has spoken openly about her struggles with fertility, which included five miscarriages. In her interview with CBS, she said there is a “giant club” of women like her that no one knows about. And as Stelter had already successfully carried one child before struggling to conceive — a condition known as secondary infertility — she had to deal with guilt as well.

“[Y]ou see how beautiful having a child is and you see that it can work. So, when I had two miscarriages between Sunny and this healthy pregnancy, it’s, Why can’t my body do this again?” she explained. “I looked at everyone complaining or being sad about secondary infertility; I’m like, You have one. You’re being so greedy. Then, I felt guilty about that greed after I had Sunny. Like, should I just be happy with her and stop? But the truth is that we want her to have a sibling.”

Though many women feel pressured to remain silent about their pregnancy losses, more and more people are speaking up, including celebrities like Meghan McCain and Gordon Ramsay. And as McCain said, the grief people feel is because the babies lost are real. “They were conceived, and they lived, fully human and fully ours – and then they died,” she wrote in the New York Times. “We deserve the opportunity to speak openly of them, to share what they were and to mourn. More important, they deserve to be spoken of, shared and mourned. These children, shockingly small, shockingly helpless, entirely the work of our love and our humanity, are children. We who mourn are their mothers.”

And it is perhaps keeping silent about that very thing that helps to encourage the culture of abortion. It’s indisputable that preborn children are human beings… and yet, the abortion industry and its defenders continually try to deny this.

Preborn children are frequently dehumanized, referred to as clumps of cells, blobs of tissue, or products of conception. Women who have had abortions and regret it or struggle with feelings of guilt and loss often feel the need to keep silent as well, either feeling as if they have no right to mourn, or that there is nothing to mourn from the pro-abortion community. But keeping quiet about the lives that are lost helps no one. Whether it’s a child lost from miscarriage or a child lost from abortion, these are lives that matter. They should be honored and remembered.

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