A 37-year-old mother has revealed the profound personal impact of the climate crisis, leading her to terminate a much-wanted pregnancy and later suffer a miscarriage, both driven by intense fears for the planet's future.
The Conflict Between Motherhood and a Fearsome Future
Happily married with two children she adores, the woman described always caring about environmental issues. However, after becoming a parent, her concern transformed into a potent anxiety, knowing her children would bear the brunt of the climate emergency. The family adopted an extremely green lifestyle, but her longing for a third child collided with overwhelming dread about the world that child would inherit.
After counselling and discussions with her supportive husband, who was content with two but open to more, they decided to try for another baby. She successfully conceived, but within a week was consumed by an "intense fear for the future and the impact of the climate crisis." Following further conversations, she made the agonising decision to have a termination.
A Cycle of Grief and Further Loss
Initial relief was swiftly replaced by devastation. With the aid of antidepressants and further counselling, she stabilised but never found peace. A year later, still wrestling with sadness and regret, the couple tried once more. She became pregnant again, and the debilitating anxiety returned "as if a switch had been turned," obliterating any vision of a positive future. This pregnancy ended in miscarriage.
Now striving to find contentment with her "lovely family of four," she is left questioning how to make sense of her actions and achieve acceptance.
Expert Analysis: The Need to Slow Down and Grieve
Consultant medical psychotherapist and psychoanalyst Dr Jo Stubley responded to the case, noting a sense of "breathlessness" and loneliness in the woman's story. Dr Stubley questioned the underlying motivations for wanting a third child and highlighted the absence of space to process grief amidst rapid, successive events.
"What's got lost is space for grief, because it feels as if it's been one thing after another," Stubley observed. She pointed to the powerful intersection of ordinary parental anxieties and the specific terror of the climate crisis. "On some level we should all have climate anxiety. Yet we all walk around with disavowal, dissociation and denial to not see how terrifying it is," she stated.
Dr Stubley suggested the woman may have been living an "idea" of a third child until the reality of pregnancy triggered deep-seated fears. The path forward, according to the expert, involves returning to counselling and dedicating time to stillness. "Acceptance comes with time, and the ability to face up to what's happened. But to do this you need to be still long enough for the more difficult emotions to be seen, and felt," she advised.
The process requires examining the meaning of motherhood, family size, and ageing within the context of her personal history, and deliberately working through the grief associated with the termination, the miscarriage, and even her children growing up.
