The Paradox of Time Post-Pregnancy Loss: Three Things Not to Say When Communicating Social Support

ABSTRACT

In this essay, I interrogate the role time plays in the three most common social support messages I received post-pregnancy loss. In doing so, I illustrate how our most common “social support” responses to pregnancy loss, while uttered from caring, intentional places of support, can actually serve to marginalize and invalidate experiences of pregnancy loss.