By Susan Brinkmann, OCDS
Staff Journalist

A new study has found that couples who experience miscarriage or stillbirths have as much as a 40 percent higher risk of breaking up than couples with live births.

The Washington Times is reporting that the study, conducted by the University of Michigan Medical School and published in the April 5 edition of the journal, Pediatrics, focused on couples who experienced miscarriage (defined as loss of a child at 20 weeks or less of gestation) and stillbirth (defined as loss of a child after 20 weeks gestation.)

The study found that over a 15 year period, couples who experienced miscarriage had a 22 percent higher risk of breakup compared with couples with live births. Couples who experienced a stillbirth had a 40 percent higher risk of breaking up.

In the case of miscarriage, most breakups occurred relatively quickly afterward – within three years – while the risk of breakup after a stillbirth could linger for as much as a decade.

“(M)any parents find that a [fetal] loss brings them closer together,” wrote lead author Dr. Katherine Gold, assistant professor of family medicine and obstetrics and gynecology at the University of Michigan. However, the data clearly showed that miscarriage and/or stillbirth amounts to a “huge stress for their relationship.”

For cohabiting couples, the risk of breakup was even higher.

Dr. Gold believes this could be because cohabiting couples have riskier relationships. “Couples with an unstable relationship before the pregnancy and those with other risk factors for breaking up may find themselves unable to sustain their relationship after a miscarriage or stillbirth.”

Fifteen percent of pregnancies are lost to miscarriage every year, with one percent lost to stillbirth, which means a substantial number of people experience this trauma.

However, there is help for those who grieve over the loss of a child to miscarriage or stillbirth.

Cathi Lammert, executive director of Share, a pregnancy-loss support organization offering more than 100 support groups for parents, advises couples to accept the fact that men and women grieve differently.

For instance, women may want to talk or be reassured frequently while men may prefer to be silent or to throw themselves into work.

“Many men have told me they grieve in the shower and in the car,” Ms. Lammert said.

While she has seen couples break up, she said couples “who truly work on their relationship do stick together.”

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