Yes, there probably was some biological reason, though most of us will never actually find out the exact biological cause for our losses. But no, there is not necessarily some cosmic, greater purpose kind of "reason" why things like this happen, and feel free to roll your eyes as hard as you want in response anyone who tries to cheer you up (ha!) by telling you that "everything happens for a reason."

Sure, you can and probably will survive this experience, and you may even feel like a stronger, better person for it. If that happens for you, that's fantastic. But that doesn't mean that you needed to have this particular crappy experience in order to grow, nor does that growth diminish the crappiness of your experience in any way. Sometimes, things just suck, and they're allowed to just suck, and you're allowed to acknowledge that it just sucks without having to assign it any meaning.

You may feel weird about grieving, or even like you're not entitled to feel grief, because your child was never born. (This may feel especially bewildering to those of us who are pro-choice, and don't necessarily believe that life, in the full sense we know it, begins at conception.) But once you're pregnant, and you feel those changes, and if you get attached to the new life forming inside you, it's completely normal and OK to feel however much grief you feel if that pregnancy ends.

You don't need to meet a certain milestone in your pregnancy to feel sad about losing it, nor do you need to feel any responsibility to alter or downplay your feelings because it's not "as bad" as losing a child after birth, or "as bad" as any other losses we might experience in life. We don't need to rank or compare or justify our feelings.

In addition to grieving your lost pregnancy, you may also experience postpartum depression, anxiety, or rage. Since those mood disorders are thought to be partially related to hormonal changes during and after pregnancy, you can end up dealing with them even if you don't actually give birth to a baby. Just one of many ways that pregnancy loss is totally unfair.

If life was fair, everyone who wanted to have a baby would get to have one, and everyone who didn't want to have a baby wouldn't have to worry about it. Unfortunately, that's not how it works.

If you really wanted to carry your baby to term and lost it instead, that's totally unfair. If you weren't sure you wanted to continue with the pregnancy and that choice was taken from you, that feels unfair, too. Having to deal with all of the physical and emotional fallout from pregnancy loss is just unfair, no matter how you slice it.

Pregnancy can be really scary in general, but it's often especially scary when you've already experienced pregnancy loss, and you're so intimately aware of how many things can go wrong.

Even though you may feel grief and sadness and all sorts of other difficult feelings, you may also feel a bit relieved after a pregnancy loss. This common reaction is hardly talked about in any public capacity, which is why it may feel surprising, strange and even shameful if you really wanted to continue your pregnancy.

You totally shouldn't, because pregnancy loss isn't a referendum on you, or your worthiness to be a mom, or even what your body is or isn't capable of.

Still, it can be really hard not to feel some measure of shame when your body doesn't work the way you expected it to, or if you're having all these feelings that you don't understand, especially if you find yourself having to explain to other people that you're no longer pregnant.

All of them, all at once, and for some unknown amount of time. It's just really hard.

I knew that pregnancy loss is actually fairly common, even if the particular loss (and the timing of that loss) was less so. Still, that knowledge didn't keep me from feeling completely alone, even though my partner was grieving with me and even though many other people have gone through the same thing. Grief just makes it hard to feel connected to and understood by other people.

The week after I got out of the hospital, I saw a mom walking down my street feeding a very young toddler M&Ms, and I was outraged. Not surprised or sad or defeated, but outraged.

That in itself surprised me, because normally I don't really care about what other people feed their kids. I quickly realized that my outrage had little to do with them, and everything to do with my feeling cheated out of the pregnancy and child I felt I deserved. My newfound (and thankfully, short-lived) judgment was one of many surprising reactions to grief. That's absolutely a thing, and I wish I knew to be on the lookout for it beforehand.

If you feel weird about the place where you first became aware that your pregnancy was ending, avoid it if you can. If it feels like all of your friends are pregnant and that's just too hard to deal with, it's OK to decline invites to their baby showers and send a gift card, or to unfollow their updates on Facebook. You don't necessarily need to guilt trip them over your grief, because it's not their fault and they're allowed to be happy, but you don't have to subject yourself to anything that hurts you, either.

Loss is loss, and grief is grief. There's no definitive ranking of which ones are more and less legitimate, and you're not required to make yourself feel differently than you do just because you think other people have it worse, or because other people may not understand it. (Oh, and if anyone actually tells you to get over it, consider cutting that person out of your life. Or, at the very least, tell them off, 'cause that's a supremely awful thing to say to someone who's having a hard time.)

If it's easy for you to let it go and move on, that's totally legitimate and great. You certainly don't need to feel worse about your loss than you do. But if it's hard for you to "get over it," don't feel obligated to try. You're allowed to feel however you feel.