Isabella Marcinski-Michel

Institute of History of Medicine and Medical Ethics, Charité – Universitätsmedizin Berlin

Pregnancy losses occur in 10 to 20 per cent of all pregnancies and are nevertheless regarded as deviations from a normal course of pregnancy. Most pregnancy losses occur very early on and sometimes go unnoticed. They are experiences of loss that receive little social recognition; they are often kept private or shared only with the closest circle of friends and family.

Philosophical, medical-ethical and everyday conceptions of pregnancy are based on a teleological narrative of procreation, which usually remains implicit and is not reflected upon. Consequently, experiences of loss that point to the contingency and potential discontinuity of pregnancy have, to date, been scarcely addressed. Pregnancy losses thus mark a break with this assumed teleological temporal structure of pregnancy and signify the loss of an anticipated future.

A pregnancy loss is often experienced as a disruption in the course of one’s life. Like other experiences of loss and grief, it has an impact on the experience of time: it is described as a standstill of time, and as an awareness of time that is both heightened and diminished. Finally, part of the potential ambivalence of pregnancy loss is that it can also be experienced as a relief, for example when the pregnancy was unwanted.

The lecture will draw on existing philosophical and ethical reflections on time and (pregnancy) loss, literary narratives on pregnancy loss, and the experiences of time described here. The lecture will examine the significance of medical treatments and institutionally embedded temporal structures, as well as their impact on individual narratives. Texts to be drawn upon include ‘Die Antwort’ by Anna Hogeland (2022), ‘Für immer seh ich dich wieder’ by Yannic Han Biao Federer (2025) and the graphic novel ‘Good Eggs’ by Phoebe Potts. With their focus on narratives, narrative approaches in bioethics are ideally suited to exploring temporal dimensions. They are sensitive to models of temporal progression and are thus able to give voice to disruptions and unplanned courses of events. The lecture will explore the experiences of time specific to pregnancy loss, as well as the ethical significance of these experiences of time for healthcare provision.