In France, one in five pregnancies ends after a few days or weeks of gestation. These miscarriages can be traumatic. For couples engaged in a process of medically assisted procreation (MAP), this ordeal adds to a journey that is already long and strewn with pitfalls.
So why not be able to talk about it more freely? Why so much silence around the start of pregnancy? Human resources (HR) specialist, Judith Aquien is editorial director of HR decision-makers and wrote Three months in silence. The taboo of the condition of women at the start of pregnancy, released in 2021 by Payot editions. A plea for the rights of pregnant women to be more recognized in society, for their suffering to be better taken into account in the world of work. She was the guest of podcast from World “(In)fertile”a series of interviews around fertility.
Also listen Early pregnancy and miscarriage: why so much silence?
In your book, you write that getting pregnant is not just “a wonderful entry into the miracle of life.” What do you mean ?
I experienced an early pregnancy then a miscarriage and I was struck by the extent to which what women go through is disqualified by society. Health Insurance only truly recognizes pregnancy at the end of the first trimester.
Besides, pregnancy is not all wonderful. It’s suddenly a lot of existential questions, to which are added symptoms, which are also qualified by medicine as “small ailments of pregnancy”, which is scandalous! This vocabulary does not prepare us for what awaits us. The words used do not qualify what is experienced.
Where do these unsaid things come from?
I see several explanations there. First, the fear of miscarriage. But we could say that, in a fairly well-designed society, the risk induces protection, and women could therefore be better supported. Every year, in France, 200,000 women suffer a miscarriage.
Another explanation is the systematic discrediting of the words of women. A woman who suffers is not recognized with the same alacrity and to the same degree of suffering as a man. For example, a woman will be given a sedative, whereas a man will receive a painkiller.
Some doctors even consider that the ailments of pregnancy are the expression of rejection, of somatization. These are guilt-inducing words that can have psychological repercussions. Prenatal depression exists and then increases the risk of postpartum depression. This is a major public health issue, but it is not taken into account.
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