A miscarriage occurs every three minutes in France. One in ten women will be affected at least once in her life. While some will not experience this event as a trauma, others will need time to recover, both physically and psychologically. Pain, loss of blood, sadness linked to perinatal bereavement, post-miscarriage can be difficult. In order to allow women who have suffered an involuntary termination of pregnancy to take sick leave while remaining paid, Elisabeth Borne will announce, this Wednesday, the end of the waiting days in this specific case.
Sandra Lorenzo, co-founder of the False Layer collective, true experience and author of the book A miscarriage like any other and the podcast of the same name, remembers like it was yesterday when she learned that her pregnancy had come to an end. “After five seconds of ultrasound, the radiologist told me ‘the pregnancy has stopped.’ I stood there, flabbergasted. » The appointment is dispatched in a few minutes. In shock, Sandra does not even think of a possible sick leave.
“I did not feel legitimate to ask for a stop”
The young woman tells herself that if we don’t offer her a break, it’s because she doesn’t need it. “I didn’t feel justified in asking. For me, a work stoppage, it does not ask. It is up to the doctor to prescribe it. After the aspiration of her fetus, she loses a lot of blood and is prone to many crying spells. She then decides to go to a general practitioner who stops her for four days and offers her to come back if ever she still feels bad. “After four days, it wasn’t better, but I didn’t have the strength to ask for a new stop. »
And Sandra is no exception. One month after their pregnancy termination, 29% of women suffer from post-traumatic stress, 24% from severe anxiety and 11% have developed moderate to severe depression, according to a study by Imperial College of London and the KU Leven University. And according to Judith Aquien, author of Three months in silencethe trauma can be, in some cases, reinforced by poor medical care.
More or less understanding doctors
Faced with the absence of an automatic leave, “one can come across an understanding doctor, who respects what a woman’s body is going through. But also quite the reverse”, sums up Judith Aquien. With her False Layer, Real Experienced collective, she wants caregivers to offer systematic stops.
This is why Paula Forteza, former MP (Ecology Democracy Solidarity Group), made a bill in March 2022 aimed at establishing a common care pathway for women victims of an involuntary end of pregnancy. It included in particular the introduction of a three-day special leave. “The end of the waiting days is already a first step, but we should go further,” she considers. We were offering leave which was a real right, something automatic, both for the mother who had the miscarriage, but also for the second parent. »
“There is a whole battery of measures to be taken”
In New Zealand, since March 24, 2021, three days of leave are automatically granted to parents in the event of miscarriage or stillbirth. “Symbolically, it’s great, but three days is really nothing”, nuance Sandra Lorenzo, who needed a long psychotherapeutic support to recover from the perinatal bereavement she was going through.
Some companies have taken the lead in granting leave in the event of an employee miscarriage. L’Oréal, for example, gives three days of 100% paid leave. Women in the Syntec branch, employing 950,000 employees in digital, consulting and events, will also soon be able to benefit from a two-day leave.
“It’s not a single measure that will solve the problem, nuance Paula Forteza. There is a whole battery of measures to be taken. “Beyond the systematic proposal of a leave for miscarriage, the members of the collective ask for the delivery of an information brochure as well as psychological support. The bill by MP Sandrine Josso (Modem) aimed at establishing such support will also be examined in the Assembly this Wednesday, on the occasion of International Women’s Rights Day.