Your pregnancy ends on a Tuesday. By Thursday, you're back at work.
Your pregnancy ends on a Tuesday.
By Thursday, you're expected back at your desk.
There are emails waiting. A meeting at ten. A colleague asking if you had a nice weekend. And you sit there, still bleeding, still reeling, trying to work out how on earth you're meant to carry on as if nothing has happened.
Maybe nobody at work even knew you were pregnant.
So now you've got a second thing to deal with on top of the first. Do you tell your manager? Use a day's annual leave? Ring in sick? Or do you just turn up, put your face on, and pretend you're fine?
Right. Let's talk about this properly.
The UK Government has announced plans to give eligible employees up to two weeks of unpaid bereavement leave after pregnancy loss before 24 weeks, miscarriage, termination, and an unsuccessful IVF embryo transfer included.
And look, don't get me wrong. This matters. For years, loss before 24 weeks has been treated as something that doesn't quite count, too early, too private, not a "real" bereavement. Naming it in law says the opposite. It says this is grief, and grief deserves time.
But I'm not going to pretend it's the finished job.
Because unpaid is a problem.
If taking time to grieve means not being able to pay your bills, then for a lot of women it isn't really an option at all. You shouldn't have to choose between your mortgage and your mourning. That's not support, that's support with a price tag most people can't afford.
And there's something else.
Grief doesn't run to a timetable. Some women need those days straight away. Others hold it together through the whole thing and then fall apart three weeks later, when everyone else has moved on. Partners feel it too, and we far too often forget them entirely.
Then there's the bit that gets missed completely: support shouldn't stop at the Early Pregnancy Unit doors.
Because the days, weeks and months afterwards are when so many of my women start quietly asking the hardest question of all, what happens if I want to try again? And that's exactly where the right support can change everything.
Which brings me to something I want to invite you to.
My colleague Annika Palmer and I are running a free, two-day online masterclass: Recurrent Miscarriage, Looking at the Whole Picture.
27-28 October 2026, 7pm UK time, online, completely free.
On Day 1, Annika, an accredited grief coach, explores grief, hope, and the emotional weight of recurrent loss.
On Day 2, I'll be looking at pregnancy preparation, making sense of your previous investigations, and the questions genuinely worth raising with your healthcare team before you try again.
Recognising grief matters. But so does making sure you've got somewhere to turn when you're ready to think about what comes next.
If that's you, come and join us.
Register here to our 2 day masterclass here
Claire x
