Recurrent Pregnancy Loss Support
When loss happens again. And again.
One miscarriage is devastating. Two is cruel. Three or more feels like a verdict: your body is broken, and you'll never be a mother. Recurrent pregnancy loss, defined as two or more consecutive losses, brings cumulative trauma that most people can't understand. At Dancing Bee Counseling in Madison, Wisconsin, Abby Lemke, MS, LPC-IT provides specialized RPL counseling for the repeated grief, the impossible decisions, and the fear of trying again after multiple miscarriages.
When Loss Becomes a Pattern
The first loss was shocking. The second loss made you wonder. By the third, you stopped believing pregnancy meant baby. Recurrent miscarriage rewrites your understanding of your body, your future, and yourself. Each loss adds weight to the ones before, creating a burden that gets heavier with every pregnancy that ends too soon.
Maybe you've had two losses. Maybe five. Maybe more. The medical definition of recurrent pregnancy loss is two or more losses, though some doctors still use the older definition of three or more losses. But numbers don't capture what you're living: the repeated trauma, the serial miscarriage that keeps happening no matter what you do, the question that haunts you: why do I keep miscarrying?
People don't understand. "At least you can get pregnant," they say. "Just keep trying." They don't know that getting pregnant is the easy part, that the hard part is staying pregnant, that trying again means walking willingly into potential devastation. They don't understand that repeated pregnancy loss creates a different kind of grief than a single loss.
Recurrent pregnancy loss support provides space to process cumulative loss, navigate the medical maze, and make impossible decisions about whether to keep trying. You're carrying a weight that deserves specialized attention.
The Emotional Impact of Multiple Miscarriages
Coping with multiple miscarriages is different from coping with one. Each loss compounds the trauma.
Cumulative Grief
Multiple miscarriage grief isn't grief times the number of losses. It's grief that builds on itself, each loss reopening wounds that never fully healed. You're grieving all the babies you've lost, all the due dates that passed, all the announcements you never made.
Repeated Trauma
Multiple miscarriage trauma is reliving the worst experience of your life again and again. Your nervous system learns that pregnancy equals danger. Repeated trauma responses affect how you experience everything: pregnancy tests, ultrasounds, even hope itself.
Escalating Fear
Recurrent pregnancy loss anxiety intensifies with each loss. The innocence of pregnancy is gone forever. If you get pregnant again, terror replaces joy. Pregnancy after loss with RPL history brings extreme hypervigilance.
Deepening Despair
Hopelessness and despair grow with each loss. The statistics that comforted you after the first loss feel meaningless now. You've been on the wrong side of probability too many times. Recurrent miscarriage depression is real and deserves treatment.
Mounting Anger
Anger at your body, at doctors who can't fix you, at the universe for this cruelty. Anger at people who get pregnant easily, who have babies without trying. The why me question that has no satisfying answer.
Feeling Broken
After multiple losses, many people feel fundamentally broken. Your body keeps failing at its most basic biological function. Shame and guilt compound grief. You feel like a failure even though recurrent loss is not your fault.
Profound Isolation
People run out of things to say. Friends who supported you through the first loss don't know how to support you through the fourth. You stop telling people when you're pregnant. The isolation of RPL is profound.
Identity Crisis
Who are you if not a mother? Loss of innocence about your body, about pregnancy, about the future. The identity you expected to have keeps slipping away. Recurrent loss challenges your sense of self at the deepest level.
RPL Testing and the Medical Maze
After recurrent losses, most people undergo RPL testing, sometimes called an RPL workup. The search for answers is both hopeful and terrifying.
Chromosomal and Genetic Testing
Testing for chromosomal abnormalities in you, your partner, or the pregnancy tissue. Genetic causes are the most common reason for miscarriage, but knowing that doesn't always help. Age-related factors and egg quality concerns may be discussed.
Uterine Evaluation
Looking for uterine abnormalities: uterine septum, fibroids, Asherman's syndrome, or other structural issues. Saline sonograms, HSG tests, hysteroscopy. Hoping something fixable is found, dreading what might be discovered.
Blood Clotting Disorders
Testing for antiphospholipid syndrome (APS), thrombophilia, and other blood clotting disorders that can cause repeated loss. If positive, treatments like baby aspirin or blood thinners (Lovenox) may help.
Hormonal Causes
Checking for thyroid issues, progesterone deficiency, luteal phase defect, and other hormonal imbalances. Progesterone supplementation may be recommended for future pregnancies.
Immunological Factors
Some people pursue reproductive immunology testing for natural killer cells and other immune factors. This is controversial in mainstream medicine but desperate people seek answers wherever they might exist.
Sperm DNA Fragmentation
Testing the male partner for sperm DNA fragmentation, which can contribute to recurrent loss. RPL isn't always about the woman's body; male factors matter too.
When RPL Is Unexplained
For many people, RPL testing reveals no answers at all.
After all the tests, many people receive the diagnosis of unexplained RPL or idiopathic RPL. This means doctors cannot find a cause for your recurrent miscarriage. All the bloodwork, the imaging, the genetic testing: nothing abnormal found. And yet you keep losing pregnancies.
Unexplained recurrent miscarriage is maddening. You want a cause because a cause might mean a treatment. Without an answer, you're left wondering: is it something they haven't tested for? Something they don't understand yet? Is there something wrong that science just can't identify?
The lack of answers creates its own emotional burden. You can't fix what you can't name. You can't avoid what you can't identify. Trying again without knowing why you keep losing feels like gambling with your heart.
RPL counseling can help you process the frustration of unexplained loss and make decisions about next steps even without medical answers.
Therapy for Recurrent Miscarriage
Recurrent pregnancy loss emotional support addresses the specific challenges of repeated loss.
Processing Cumulative Loss
We work through the grief of each loss and the cumulative weight of multiple losses. This isn't about "moving on" but about carrying the grief in a way that doesn't crush you. How to cope with recurrent pregnancy loss when the losses keep coming.
Treating Trauma Responses
Repeated trauma creates PTSD symptoms, hypervigilance, and anxiety. RPL and mental health are closely linked. We address these trauma responses with evidence-based approaches so your nervous system can find some safety.
Addressing Depression
Recurrent miscarriage depression is common and treatable. The hopelessness, the low mood, the loss of interest in things you used to enjoy: these deserve attention. Depression therapy is part of comprehensive RPL support.
Navigating Decisions
What to do next is overwhelming. Keep trying? Move to IVF? Consider donors? Stop? Counseling for repeated pregnancy loss helps you explore these options without pressure, finding what's right for you and your family.
Processing Medical Information
RPL testing and emotions go together. Results that provide answers, results that provide nothing, the emotional weight of the medical process itself. We make sense of what you're learning and feeling.
Supporting Relationships
Recurrent loss strains relationships. You and your partner may grieve differently, disagree on next steps, struggle to communicate. Couples counseling can help you navigate this together.
Who Seeks RPL Support?
Just experienced another loss and can't face this grief alone again
Going through RPL testing and anxious about what will or won't be found
Diagnosed with unexplained RPL and struggling with the lack of answers
Deciding whether to try again after multiple losses
Pregnant again with RPL history and terrified throughout
Feeling broken and hopeless after so many losses
Considering stopping but unsure how to make that decision
Partner or family member wanting to support someone with RPL
Wherever you are in your RPL journey, you deserve support designed for repeated loss.
Schedule a ConsultationQuestions About Recurrent Pregnancy Loss
Why do I keep miscarrying?
Why do I keep miscarrying is the question that haunts everyone with recurrent loss. Recurrent pregnancy loss causes include chromosomal abnormalities (in the embryo or parents), uterine abnormalities like septum or fibroids, blood clotting disorders like antiphospholipid syndrome, hormonal issues like thyroid problems or progesterone deficiency, and immunological factors. Age and egg quality also play a role. In 50-75% of cases with unexplained RPL, no cause is identified despite testing. This is frustrating but doesn't mean nothing is wrong; it means current medicine hasn't found the cause. Some people continue to have losses while others go on to have successful pregnancies even without answers.
How do you cope with recurrent pregnancy loss?
How to cope with recurrent pregnancy loss involves recognizing that this isn't regular grief; it's cumulative loss that requires specific strategies. Allow yourself to grieve each loss fully rather than minimizing because "you should be used to it by now." Find support from people who understand RPL, whether that's a support group recurrent pregnancy loss focused, online communities, or individual therapy. Set boundaries with people who say unhelpful things. Take breaks from trying when you need them. Make decisions at your own pace. Consider therapy for recurrent miscarriage specifically, as general grief counseling may not address the unique challenges of repeated loss. Most importantly, know that struggling is normal and seeking help is strength.
What is the emotional impact of multiple miscarriages?
The emotional impact of multiple miscarriages goes beyond simple grief. Support after multiple miscarriages addresses: cumulative trauma that builds with each loss, recurrent pregnancy loss anxiety that makes subsequent pregnancies terrifying, depression and hopelessness about the future, profound isolation as friends run out of supportive things to say, identity crisis and feeling fundamentally broken, relationship strain with partners who may grieve differently, and the exhaustion of repeated hope and loss cycles. Many people develop PTSD symptoms from the repeated trauma. Infertility grief with RPL is particularly complex because you're grieving multiple babies, multiple futures, and your assumed path to parenthood.
Should I keep trying after recurrent miscarriage?
Whether to keep trying after recurrent miscarriage is deeply personal and there's no right answer. Factors to consider: your emotional capacity for another potential loss, your physical health and age, what medical options you haven't tried, your relationship's resilience, your financial situation if considering IVF or other treatments, and whether you have the support you'd need. Many people with RPL eventually have successful pregnancies, but that statistic doesn't tell you whether you will. Trying again after recurrent loss requires weighing hope against self-protection. Some people feel they must try everything before stopping. Others reach a point where they cannot face another loss. Therapy can help you explore this decision without pressure.
Is there therapy specifically for recurrent pregnancy loss?
Yes, RPL counseling is available through fertility-specialized therapists like Dancing Bee Counseling. Therapy for recurrent miscarriage addresses the unique challenges of repeated loss: the cumulative grief, the trauma responses, the decision-making about whether to continue, the medical journey, and the isolation. A therapist who understands RPL knows why your third loss is different from your first, why unexplained results are devastating, and why "just try again" isn't helpful advice. Recurrent pregnancy loss emotional support can include individual therapy, couples therapy, or support groups. You don't need to wait until you're in crisis; RPL support helps at any stage of the journey.
Why See an RPL-Specialized Therapist?
Understanding Cumulative Loss
I understand that your fourth loss is different from your first, that the grief builds and compounds, that each loss reopens every wound that came before. Repeated loss requires specialized support.
Knowing the Medical Context
I understand RPL testing, what the various diagnoses mean, and the emotional weight of both finding and not finding answers. You don't have to explain antiphospholipid syndrome or idiopathic RPL to me.
Navigating Complex Decisions
Whether to try again, move to IVF, consider donors, or stop: I can help you explore these options without pushing you toward any particular choice. RPL specialists and fertility clinics offer medical advice; I offer emotional support for the decision-making process.
ASRM Training
My training through the American Society for Reproductive Medicine prepared me specifically for the mental health challenges of recurrent pregnancy loss and other fertility struggles.
Recurrent Pregnancy Loss Support in Madison, Wisconsin
Dancing Bee Counseling provides specialized RPL counseling from our Waunakee office. Telehealth sessions are available throughout Wisconsin.
🐝 Dancing Bee Counseling
Serving Dane County and Beyond:
Convenient for patients at UW Health Fertility and area reproductive endocrinologists.
Abby Lemke, MS, LPC-IT
Reproductive Mental Health Specialist
I founded Dancing Bee Counseling because I saw how many people were suffering through fertility struggles without adequate support. Recurrent pregnancy loss is among the most painful: the repeated hope and devastation, the medical uncertainty, the isolation of a grief others can't understand.
I provide support after multiple miscarriages that acknowledges the cumulative weight of repeated loss. You're not starting from scratch each time; you're carrying the grief of every baby you've lost. That deserves recognition and specialized care, not generic grief counseling that doesn't understand why your situation is different.
Your Grief Deserves More Than "Just Try Again"
Recurrent pregnancy loss is devastating, and you deserve support that understands the cumulative weight of repeated loss. A consultation is simply a conversation about what you're going through.
In-person in Waunakee · Telehealth throughout Wisconsin