Customer Reviews

Pregnancy After a Loss: A Guide to Pregnancy After a Miscarriage, Stillbirth, or Infant Death

5 star:		(38)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This book truly is for anyone who has suffered a pregnancy loss and is about to go through a subsequent pregnancy or is contemplating one. This book is full of stories of women, including the author, who have suffered through different kinds of pregnancy loss and have then gone on to give birth to healthy babies. After recently suffering a stillbirth, I had so many questions running through my head. Some of them being, What caused my baby to die?, Will I ever give birth to a healthy baby?, How will I ever make it through another pregnancy, Am I the only woman who has ever suffered this much pain?, How can I keep the memory alive of the baby I lost?, these are just a few examples. This book helps to answer so many of these questions. It is a very informative book because there is also so much helpful information on choosing a new doctor or keeping your old one, Questions to ask your doctor, how to decide if you are ready for a subsequent pregnancy or not, and some possible causes of pregnancy loss that sometimes go undetected. A section is also written on what to expect emotionally and physically during the three trimesters of a subsequent pregnancy and what can be done to help make it a little easier. Suffering a pregnancy loss is an extremely devastating, painful and scary time. Carol Cirulli Lanham has given me the inspiration, hope and courage to want to try again. She truly understands and you will feel her compassion and determination as you read this book. I have read it three times already and will always have it on hand. I have read many books on pregnancy loss and none of them compare to this one. Thank you Carol!

I wish I'd had this outstanding book when I was going through my subsequent pregnancy. This book addresses many concerns specific to women experiencing a subsequent pregnancy. Many of the issues that came up in my Subsequent Pregnancy After A Loss Support Group were touched on, including the desire for a child of a particular sex (either the same or different than the child you lost) and the need for more frequent monitoring during pregnancy. This book is well-organized and follows the three-trimester framework of most other pregnancy guides. However, the discussion of each trimester focuses on how women experience their pregnancy when they have suffered a loss in the past. Most meaningful to me as a mother who lost twins, this book addresses the feelings of mothers who lost multiple pregnancies and are now pregnant with a single child. I would recommend this book to any woman who is pregnant following a miscarriage, stillbirth, or the death of a baby.

I had to write this review. If one grieving parent sees how it made me feel and decides to try this book, then I will feel like I've helped to pass it on. Ms. Lanham's conversation style was just what I needed. She covers each stage of pregnancy loss and the decision to try again by interviewing dozens of women who suffered miscarriages, preterm or term births. She presents differing opinions in an objective, yet compassionate manner. (For example: How and when to tell people that you're pregnant again after your loss). She is not preachy, but lets the interviews speak for themselves. Several times, I felt like exclaiming, "Yes! That's how I felt, too!" The book discusses both the practical and emotional implications of getting pregnant again after a loss, and doesn't overdramatize or underestimate the range of feelings we will have during this trying time. This practical, yet heartfelt treatise helped Ms. Lanham with her loss (and subsequent successful pregnancies), and it is helping me, too.

My husband and I just experienced having a stillborn baby and we decided we would like to try again soon. After reading many books about grieving after a loss, which only had, at most, a chapter on the subject of trying again, I got this book. It was helpful for me because it discusses the issues of the future, rather than the past.

I found it surprisingly thorough on the problems that had caused our baby to die. Giving both discriptions of the problems and what could be done about them next time around.

The book follows the timeline of pregnancy from the perspective of the reader who has had a loss, and gives information and suggestions for both medical and emotional issues. It starts out with dicussing the problems of the last pregnancy (with a warning not to read those sections that don't pertain to you!), and moves onto recommendations for second opinions and then into the trimesters of pregnancy.

It give specific descriptions of tests and therapies that the doctor might prescribe. It is most helpful when discussing options with your doctor that you know the meaning of all the jargon before you start.

Because of this book, I have been much more savvy in dealing with my health care. I have gotten second opinions that my doctor didn't think to recommend. It has also prepared me more fully for my next pregnancy, which, I now realize, will be a lot more difficult emotionally than the first.

I miscarried at 10wks and did not feel this book was helpful.
My feelings of loss were not validated by the author as the majority of her example were of 3rh trimester miscarriages, stillbirth, or infant deaths. I would recommend reading "Trying Again" to couples experiencing an early pregnancy loss.

After reading this book, I felt more fearful about a subsequent pregnancy than before reading it. It seemed as though quite a bit of time was spent on discovering the reason for a pregnancy loss. Having experienced a full-term stillbirth, I can with authority say that this topic is in the forefront of most parent's minds after a loss. However, up to 50% of women experiencing stillbirth will NEVER find a reason for the loss. Very little is then offered to those that fall into this group, of which I am a part. For those of us in this group, I would have appreciated some insight into resolution of feelings after the pregnancy loss when no cause is found.

For those that do have a cause, it seemed as though the author felt that we must then do more to try and prevent the same from occurring again. If there is anything that I've learned from my pregnancies, it's that most things are out of my control, regardless of whether I worry or not. And no amount of worrying, or testing, will be able to prevent most causes of pregnancy loss.

The book was well-based from a technological standpoint, but a little bit empty on a spiritual level. I feel that one must have some sort of spiritual ground to stand upon before embarking on another pregnancy. To ignore this is to ignore the miracle of life itself.

I do applaud the author for having the courage to deal with her loss, and her gifts, in a very public way. I am sure that this was essential to her grieving process.

I recently reread this book before recommending it to couples I had counseled following their pregnancy losses. Six years after its publication, Carol Cirulli Lanham's book still speaks with immediacy and compassion, guiding parents through the agonizing process of mourning their previous loss, contemplating a new baby and coping with an always anxiety provoking subsequent pregnancy. My only suggestion for improvement, in what I hope will be a new edition some day, is the inclusion of an index to help guide readers to specific topics. Otherwise, this book provides couples with support and hope as they face a difficult period in their lives, a situation which only people who have been there can truly understand.

First of all, let me say that I can understand why those who have had miscarriages might not find this book to be as useful as someone who had a stillbirth might. It does seem to be more geared towards women dealing with a stillbirth. As someone who has gone through the latter, I think this book is so helpful and inspirational. I bought it within a month of my second pregnancy ending in stillbirth, and then and even now it has given me so much reassurance. It is pretty common for women who have suffered even one loss (even if they have other living children) to feel as if they might never be able to have another living baby. This book is packed with real life accounts of women who have suffered pregnancy losses and gone on to have healthy babies. It is also filled with practical information on how to decide when to try to conceive again, how to decide if you should stay with the same doctor and advice for seeking out a new one if you decide to go that route, advice for how to answer delicate questions (such as when you are pregnant again and a stranger asks you if this will be your first child), and has sections divided up for each trimester and deals with the issues in each - for example, in the first trimester section there is the issue of when and how to tell people that you are expecting again. There is also a section for high-risk pregnancies as well. Everything in this book is balanced with realism, the pros and cons of either side of any issue, and most importantly, personal accounts by women who have been through a loss and gone through another pregnancy. For someone who has had a pregnancy loss, sometimes the most helpful thing is someone who really "gets it". This book is filled with advice by lots of women who do.

After delivering stillborn twin boys at 21 weeks, I needed a guide to bring me through my next pregnancy. This book was a lifesaver. The author has suffered a fullterm stillbirth, so she truly relates the feelings that we go through during our subsequent pregnancies. There is detailed info on when to get pregnant again, high risk pregnancies and each trimester. Best of all, everyone interviewed for the book has gone on to deliver a healthy baby after suffering some sort of loss, which brought great hope to me. This is a must read for everyone in my subsequent pregnancy support group!

I agree with most of the other people who have reviewed this book. I lost a daughter at 38 weeks and we are hoping to try again. (I am 42 so we have age-related fertility issues to deal with as well.) I did think this book was extremely well-written, in a very easy-to-read and personal style, covered basically every issue I needed covered, and is an excellent book which I would recommend to anyone who has lost a child and is thinking of trying again. The only thing I would like to have seen (and if this book were to be published again it would be nice if it were included) would be an index in the back of the book with page numbers, sorted by subjects. This book was chock-full of so much information and many times I wanted to find something again and had trouble doing so. That is really my only complaint, otherwise I found this a great book.