Crossings

Abstract

Creative non-fiction about a personal experience of early miscarriage, which is a largely hidden loss. Reflecting on experiences in the early 1990s, a background of Northern Irish Catholicism, where women’s fertility is rigorously controlled, both informs attitudes and gives way to an earlier memory in the late seventies, where I felt I was in control of my fertility. However, the present reflection now considers reproductive control as something further than contraception; including those difficult times, when a body edges beyond our wills. Despite all our gains for autonomy and reproductive rights, involuntary miscarriage is a devastating loss, which we do not control.