I am 34 and have been living for three years with my fiance and his 11-year-old daughter. On the night we set our wedding date, I conceived what would have been my first child. Once I got used to the idea of being pregnant, I embraced it fully. I was so focused on making sure everything I did was right. Then in my 19th week, I had a miscarriage. I was totally devastated. I went into a very deep depression where I did not want to talk to anyone. It did not seem fair -- I was healthy, I've never done drugs or smoked, I don't drink. I was so very angry -- at my fiance, at his daughter, at myself for somehow screwing this up, even at God. It's been two months and I'm still having difficulties dealing with this. We've taken test after test to find out why this happened, with no answers. I have no real closure. The crying spells are just sporadic now, but I know I still have a long way to go. How long will it be before I can get back to normal? I have not been able to be intimate with my fiance since then. Is this normal?

A.

My condolences to you on your miscarriage. Women who miscarry have a variety of reactions to the loss of their anticipated children, with crying and anger common. Such feelings are often a part of the grieving process.

Sometimes the loss suffered through miscarriage is made more difficult by others who, perhaps well-meaningly, try to minimize the loss. Such people may assume a miscarriage must be easier for a woman to bear because she didn't carry the baby to term before she lost it. But a woman who loses an unborn child grieves for the future loss -- the baby she will never have -- as well as for the present.

The mourning following a miscarriage also can be complicated by confusion and fear. The woman -- and her physicians -- may not know why she miscarried, and she may fear going through a similar ordeal should she conceive again.

It's also common for people who have experienced loss or trauma of any kind to become angry at God and others, and sometimes even themselves. They may question why it happened to them -- what, if anything, did they do to deserve such pain? Such spiritual questions might best be processed with caring clergy or a therapist comfortable with existential anguish. A quick but not necessarily comforting answer is that bad things can and do happen to people who do not deserve them. We need only look around at the world with our eyes wide open to see that.

I can't say how long it will take for you to regain your footing both individually and with your fiance. Grief has its own course to run with each individual. Perhaps it would help to talk with your fiance about how you're feeling. Your physician may also be able to recommend a support group for people who have lost babies through miscarriage or infant death. There are also support resources available at the SHARE Atlanta website.