Quando l’attesa si interrompe

When you lose a child you cannot forget the bewilderment, loneliness and anguish that a woman feels. A miscarriage is a great pain, is a promise of joy without end that is suddenly broken, leaving in the heart bitterness, disappointment, disbelief. The clinical data are alarming: about 15-25% of pregnancies are spontaneously terminated in the first trimester, and every year in Italy about 2 pregnancies out of 100 end with a perinatal death. Why did this happen? Will it happen again? Will I be able to become a mother? Should I do further checks and investigations? Why don’t others understand this pain? What about the future father? What does a man feel when he loses a child? Many questions, few answers. There are hundreds of titles on pregnancy, birth, childcare, but there was no book that talked about miscarriage, an experience that, unfortunately, affects many women.Because talking about it is a way of recognizing its importance. Telling one\’s story, reliving certain moments for some women is difficult and painful, while for others it is an opportunity to better understand their emotions and reconcile with the past. When the wait is interrupted aims to offer an answer to the most common questions when you lose a baby while waiting or immediately after birth. It is difficult to talk about this pain, because in addition to the sorrow there is also the devastating awareness of not being understood. Coming out of the silence that very often surrounds these issues, making them almost taboo, can be of great help not only for the woman, but also for those who are close to her (partners, family, friends, health workers) and would like to offer her their emotional support. Thanks to the contributions of numerous experts (obstetricians, psychologists, gynecologists, neonatologists) the author Giorgia Cozza offers a key to understanding the physical and emotional reactions of women (and couples), reflecting on the stages and timing of processing of grief. The intense and moving testimonies of many parents who have lost their child are meant to be a hand extended to every woman who is suffering and needs to know that she is not alone.