It has often been suggested in the literature on pregnancy loss, that
parents run a high risk of complicated or pathological grief as a resu
lt of the specific characteristics of such loss. What confuses the iss
ue is that pathological grief has been defined in various ways. In the
interest of improving professional care, it is important to ascertain
how pathological grief manifests itself and which parents are most li
kely to have problems coping with pregnancy loss and therefore develop
pathological grief reactions. Given the lack of clarity regarding the
concept of pathological grief following pregnancy loss, this article
reviews empirical studies on pathological grief following pregnancy lo
ss according to four subtypes derived from general bereavement literat
ure: chronic grief, delayed grief, masked grief, and exaggerated grief
. It can be concluded that in the first six months following pregnancy
loss, psychological complaints, behavioral changes, and somatic compl
aints are fairly common responses. Approximately 10-to-15 percent of t
he women develop a psychiatric disorder during the first two years fol
lowing such loss, and less than 10 percent seek specific psychiatric c
are. Parents often mourn the loss of their baby for more than a year;
one in five women is unable to accept pregnancy loss after approximate
ly two years. A delayed grief reaction occurs in about 4 percent of pa
rents and seems to occur most often in men. It is suggested that devel
oping pathological grief following pregnancy loss may be more uncommon
than had previously been thought, and the long-held idea that parents
run a higher risk of pathological grief following pregnancy loss seem
s partly to result from flaws in the empirical studies in this field.
A large majority of women seem to be able to recover from pregnancy lo
ss in due time, drawing on their own strength.