Pregnancy happiness: implications of prior loss and pregnancy intendedness

ABSTRACT

Objective: This study aimed to examine the interaction between pregnancy loss and pregnancy intentions on women’s happiness about a subsequent pregnancy.

Background: Anxiety about prior loss persist for women, even during subsequent pregnancies. It is unclear from prior research, whether a prior pregnancy loss shapes attitudes towards and feelings about a subsequent birth.

Methods: Using data from the 2002–2013 National Survey of Family Growth (NSFG), we used logistic regression analyses to explore the implications of a prior pregnancy loss for happiness about a subsequent pregnancy that ends in a live birth. We compared births classified as on-time, mistimed, unwanted, and ambivalent.

Results: Births were more likely to be characterised as on-time if they occurred following a pregnancy loss, and women were less likely to report being happy about a conception if they were ambivalent about the conception and experienced a previous loss. Overall, pregnancy loss alone was not associated with lower levels of happiness about a subsequent birth.

Conclusions: Pregnancy loss can be a highly distressing experience, women’s happiness about a subsequent pregnancy is not reduced due to prior pregnancy loss. Future research should explore why women who were ambivalent about pregnancy reported lower levels of happiness following a loss.

KEYWORDS:

• Attitudes
• miscarriage
• mother/s
• pregnancy
• psychosocial factors

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This research was supported by grant P20GM109097 funded by the National Institute of General Medical Sciences (Jennifer Hays-Grudo, PI) of the National Institutes of Health. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institutes of Health. An earlier version of this paper was presented at the Population Association of America annual meeting in 2016 (Washington DC).