Miscarriage can be such an emotionally, physically and spiritually taxing event, and I feel aware of wanting to be sure to approach it with the compassion and recognition of complexity that it deserves.
While there are, of course, many physical actions you can take to support your body, which I will share, it feels important to focus on the emotional and spiritual first.
Many women express a desire to simply move forward and start “trying” again. While I understand this desire, I encourage you to allow yourself to sit with the loss and to let yourself feel it. This can be challenging and painful, but because we store unresolved grief in our bodies, not processing it could actually impede future pregnancies. It’s essential to allow the loss to move through your body, be experienced and processed, so that you are able to move forward both physically and emotionally.
While I will share more physical healing modalities and tips, encouraging complete clearing of the womb within the month following a miscarriage can be beneficial, so I created a Post Miscarriage Recovery Bundle to support this healing. If you’ve experienced multiple miscarriages, I’d follow the Post-Miscarriage Bundle with the Recurrent Miscarriage Bundle.
I also developed a Supporting Your Body after Miscarriage Workshop, to help you understand and heal the most common underlying imbalances that contribute to recurrent miscarriage, as well as prepare your body to carry your baby to full term.
The spiritual can be a bit more challenging for me to touch on as women have different beliefs and experiences of the spiritual. It’s important to honor what feels comfortable for you.
For some women, it feels healing to connect to the soul of the baby… to allow themselves to love and mother them, so that they can release their energy from their body, trusting that the connection is alive and well on the spiritual level. I believe that the energy of any being that passes through our wombs is energy that interacts with our own and should be related to. Whether you feel that you’re just relating to your own energy that has shifted, or to the energy of another soul, it’s important to acknowledge and relate to it as you feel comfortable.
It can be helpful to create a ritual around this healing. This may feel complete for you the first time you do it, or it may take several “rounds” of ritual.
I created guided meditations to support you and your body during this time, or you can choose to sit in silence or use relaxing music as you see fit.
Below is an example of a ritual I created together with one of my patients. Again, adjust and alter it so that it feels appropriate for where you are.
Begin by finding a comfortable area where you can lay down and be undisturbed for at least 30 minutes. Light some candles, make sure you can be warm and cozy. Begin by placing warm hands on your womb (the area right above your pubic bone, below your belly button) and take slow, deep breaths into that space. Be with yourself and your breath. You can focus on bringing your intention to letting your womb know that it is perfect, that nothing is wrong, that it is able to release whatever it is holding that it no longer needs, and that it is safe to be receptive and available to receive again.
You may want to start to envision the energy of the “other” that passed through your womb space. You don’t need to DO anything. Allow yourself to feel whatever comes up. You may want to speak to them, in your mind. Some women choose to thank that energy for coming to you. Some women choose to surround that energy with love, thank them for choosing her to be its mama even for a short time. Some women feel the desire to apologize for not being able to carry to full term at this time (although it feels important to share that I do not feel that there should be any guilt or shame or wrongness when it comes to miscarriage — this is just something that a few women have shared). Letting yourself feel full forgiveness to yourself for any feelings of guilt or shame is incredibly powerful.
This may be difficult and emotional. Just allow your body to feel it, as you feel ready. Be gentle with yourself and don’t force this if you don’t feel quite ready. It can take time.
Envision surrounding your baby with love. Remind your body that it is whole and that nothing is wrong. You may want to envision a beautiful bubble of golden light surrounding your body, and a separate bubble surrounding your baby, and envision a cord connecting the two. Trust that this cord connection will always be intact, and once you recognize and trust this connection will remain, you can gently release any physical holding on from your body.
At this time, you can blow out the candle. Or you may choose to let the candle burn down, allowing it to extinguish on its own.
You may want to repeat this ritual several times, adjusting as fits your needs. My sense is that you will know when you feel at peace, when you don’t feel gripped by loss or fear, when you feel trust in your body, and an awareness that you are able to move forward.
When you do feel ready to focus on the physical (and can honesty tell yourself that you’re not bypassing the emotional), it is important to give your body at least 3 months post-miscarriage to start “trying” again.
Here are my recommendations for supporting and nourishing your body during this time:
- Fertility Womb Massage
One of the most important things you can do to help clear out any residual tissue from the uterus, as well as to encourage the flow of blood and Qi to the womb and ovaries to support future pregnancies. I recommend 1-3 times a week, for at least 15 minutes a session.
- Progesterone & Womb Warming (Nourish the Yang)
I recommend a Day 21 progesterone test, to ensure that low progesterone wasn’t a factor in the miscarriage. If progesterone at day 21 or 7 days post-ovulation is not at least 21, I’d recommend asking your doctor for a progesterone supplement.
Progesterone is a warmer hormone than estrogen, which is one reason that temperatures are more elevated in the luteal phase. To ensure adequate warmth, it’s important to add warming activities and foods to your daily routine, as well as to cease activities that add cold into your body. Stop putting ice in your water, wear slippers when you walk on cold floors, cook your vegetables instead of relying on raw salads, etc.
My Recurrent Miscarriage Bundle contains warming products, and a heating pad on your low back and low abdomen is always a good idea.
I also recommend moxibustion, or mugwort, to nourish the Kidney yang, which is responsible for holding our babies in and up. I offer my patients a chart that shows where to use moxa, and recommend doing it for at least ten minutes at a session. This is included in the above bundle, or you can watch videos on how to use it on our store pages.
Eating and drinking warming foods can also be beneficial for this womb warming energy, so ingredients like your favorite chai tea — cinnamon, ginger, fennel. This can support a warm womb, which is essential for both implantation and carrying a baby to term. My Womb Warming tea contains warming ingredients such as the ones above to help invigorate the Kidney Yang and warm the uterus.
- Estrogen & Healthy Fats (Nourish the Yin)
Estrogen is also important, especially during the follicular phase as your follicles are developing. Note that it takes 3 months to improve the quality of your follicles, so I recommend doing activities that help nourish the yin. Adequate estrogen is essential both for egg quality as well as for thickness of the uterine lining. My Fertile Mama Tea was formulated with this in mind, so I recommend any woman who has had a miscarriage to drink it for at least 3 months, especially during the Yin phase (Days 5-12).
Healthy fats are essential for building cells, so in preparation for creating life, it’s important to ensure that we are nourishing ourselves with healthy fats. Avocado, Coconut oil and milk, olive oil, a small amount of nuts and seeds, oily fish, etc. You can also aim to remove more inflammatory foods like gluten and dairy from your diet. Check out my Fertility Foods Guide here.
- Nurture and Mother Your Body/ Yourself
Nourishing your body post miscarriage is incredibly important, both on an emotional and physical level, so I recommend healing modalities, ideally at least once a week. Acupuncture, Restorative or Yin yoga, massage. If financial constraints are an issue, even an epsom salt bath or a stroll in nature is healing to our Yin energy.
I know there aren’t really words that can take away the grief and pain that come with miscarriage, but hopefully these tips, exercises and rituals can help you feel a bit more empowered in accessing and relating to that loss. Mostly, I surround you with love and remind you that you are a divine being, a human woman, and that that is magical.
You are magical… and you are not alone in this.
Love you, Dear Sister.