The part of pregnancy and infant loss that gets overlooked the most:
The man who loses the baby.
My body endured the physical burden. The testing, the procedures, the physiological reminders that something had gone wrong—it was all me.
So naturally, people checked on me.
They sent me flowers.
They asked my husband how I was doing.
And I understand why.
But there was a man standing beside me who had lost someone, too.
He wasn’t just watching his wife lose a baby.
He was losing his baby while watching his wife go through indescribable pain.
That is a different kind of heartbreak.
Dads are given a job before they’re ever given room to grieve.
Drive her home.
Make sure she’s comfortable.
Be strong.
All while trying to grieve a life he had already started imagining.
Maybe he wondered whose eyes they would have.
Maybe he thought about teaching them how to drive or mow the lawn.
Maybe he started calling baby by the name they’d picked out.
And maybe he never said any of that out loud.
Because while everyone was asking him to hold her together, nobody gave him permission to fall apart.
Check on the mama.
Then check on the dad standing beside her.
Emily Lindquist