ABSTRACT
In addition to the primary loss of a wished-for child, the experience of miscarriage, stillbirth, or infant death often entails other significant losses. Many bereaved parents report, and rue, a loss of innocence as well. For example, Kristen Ingle, a facilitator for UNITE…s subsequent pregnancysupport group, writes of her pregnancy following the stillbirth of her daughter, “Gone is one…s innocence. Gone is the thought that pregnancy means you will have a baby” and Mary Cushing Doherty observes, “Never again will I capture the innocent joy.”Another UNITE contributor, Susan Erling (1988), writes following a stillbirth, “My spiritual, trusting innocence or naivete is gone now, never to be recaptured” 1 and Mary Davis writes after a miscarriage, “I…ll never hear those words again […You are pregnant…] with the same naive joy, the same innocence of spirit. I know that in future pregnancies, there will be a cloud over the news and I…ll wonder if it is going to happen again”(Davis 1988:25).
