Coping With the Loss of a Newborn Child

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/01/opinion/childbirth-loss.html

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To the Editor:

Re “A Sorority No One Wants to Join,” by Jen Gunter (The Cycle, Sunday Styles, Dec. 24):

I am an 88-year-old retired obstetrician/gynecologist. A week doesn’t go by that I am not asked, “How many children do you have?,” and a day doesn’t pass that I don’t think of our daughter, whom we lost at 48. But there is no need to say anything other than “we have three wonderful sons.”

I recognize that a loss of pregnancy at any stage is an individual burden. Early in my practice, I learned how important it was to have the parents hold and bond with a stillborn or perinatal death child. Also to recognize that invariably the mother knew and mourned the anniversary of a pregnancy termination or a natural loss.

In my lifetime, I have experienced the grief of a miscarriage and the death of a daughter. It gave me added strength to counsel my patients. It never carried “shame and stigma.” Rather, it enhanced compassion.

WILLIAM F. BESSERPRINCETON, N.J.

To the Editor:

Claiming that a woman cannot get over the loss of a newborn is a bleak and destructive idea. And it is not true.

I lost a newborn daughter when I was 25. It was my first encounter with death and the first time I had ever failed so miserably, so publicly, so completely. It was a shattering experience. But as the weeks went by, I saw the raw grief and loss morph into self-pity.

Grief does not last. Self-pity can go on forever. Recognizing the difference between the two was a formative experience in my life.

I wish that Jen Gunter, who, unlike most grieving mothers, left the hospital with two other, healthy babies, had better advice for her patients.

ANNE SCHOTT, GUILDERLAND, N.Y.