calm-hearted
REMEMBERING FORWARD
FOR HR, LEADERS, AND COWORKERS
When an employee loses a baby, your workplace becomes part of what happens next.
A calm-hearted workplace does not need perfect words or previous experience with pregnancy or infant loss. It needs to understand that every response carries weight. The first message, the handling of personal information, the return-to-work plan, the way coworkers are guided, and the dates people remember can either preserve trust and connection or add harm at one of the most vulnerable times in an employee’s life.
A NOTE FROM NATHAN'S MOM
Why this matters
After family and friends, a workplace is often one of the first places entrusted with news of a pregnancy or infant loss. A bereaved parent may already be navigating medical recovery, funeral planning, paperwork, trauma, physical postpartum changes, financial logistics, and the impossible reality of returning to a world that keeps moving. The last thing they should also have to worry about is whether or not their workplace will handle their news, their absence, or their return with care.
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Most workplaces are not cruel; they are unprepared. Pregnancy and infant loss may be unfamiliar territory for many workplaces, but unfamiliarity does not remove your responsibility to seek guidance and respond thoughtfully. Care cannot be left to HR alone. It is shaped by leaders, managers, colleagues, and the culture around them. Policy and process still matter, but they need to be applied with empathy, judgment, and an understanding that every response carries weight. Handled with care, work can remain somewhere the employee feels safe returning to. Handled poorly, it can become another part of the experience they have to recover from.
EVERY LOSS DESERVES CARE
Pregnancy and infant loss can happen under many circumstances. Follow the employee’s lead, recognize what has happened, and offer care without requiring them to explain or justify why their loss matters.
ASK BEFORE YOU COMMUNICATE
A personal update is not automatically a workplace announcement. You have a responsibility to respect privacy and ask what may be shared, who may receive it, and which words the employee wants used.
SILENCE IS NOT NEUTRAL
Giving an employee space does not mean disappearing. A brief, imperfect message acknowledging their loss can communicate care without expecting a reply or leaving the employee to interpret everyone else’s silence.
Types of loss
There are different experiences of pregnancy and infant loss. Thoughtful support honours what happened without comparing it against someone else’s story.
Miscarriage & early pregnancy loss
Pregnancy loss before 20 weeks, including chemical, missed, early, or later miscarriage. The physical experience and grief can vary widely, and may be minimized because the loss happened early.
Ectopic pregnancy
A pregnancy that implants outside the uterus, most often in a fallopian tube, and cannot continue safely. It may require urgent medication or surgery and can bring both medical trauma and grief
Termination for medical reasons
Ending a wanted pregnancy because of a serious fetal diagnosis or risk to the pregnant person’s health. TFMR may carry the added weight of an agonizing medical decision, stigma, and misunderstanding from others.
Stillbirth
The death of a baby before or during birth at 20 weeks or later in most of Canada. Families may also navigate labour or birth, postpartum recovery, memory-making, and sudden absence.
Neonatal or infant loss
Neonatal loss occurs within the first 28 days after birth, while infant loss can occur anytime during the first year. It may involve illness, NICU care, medical trauma, or sudden death.
Infertility and recurrent loss
Infertility, unsuccessful fertility treatment, and repeated pregnancy loss can create grief that builds over time. Without one recognized loss event, these experiences may remain unseen or misunderstood.
Start with the situation in front of you.
Every loss, employee, and workplace is different. You may be deciding what to say, whether to share the news, how to handle leave, or how to prepare the people who work most closely with the employee.
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You do not need to have the whole plan before asking for guidance. Start with what has happened, what decisions need to be made now, and what the employee should not have to carry. Calm-hearted can help you identify the next careful step.
This affects your people and your business
15-25%
of pregnancies in Canada are estimated to end in miscarriage.
90%
of managers noticed some impact on a bereaved employee’s performance.
73%
of managers said they needed training on how to support a bereaved employee.
23%
of managers believed they had the skills needed to support a bereaved employee.
Sources: Canadian pregnancy-loss data; Center for Creative Leadership, The Humanity Gap: What Most Leaders Miss About Bereavement at Work (2026). U.S. research involving bereaved employees, managers, and coworkers.
Support for workplaces that want to get this right.
A NOTE FROM NATHAN'S MOM
Calm-hearted helps workplaces bring care and structure together. I bring more than a decade of professional experience designing learning, leading change, and helping teams communicate through complex situations. This experience turns lived insight into practical guidance for the people responsible for responding at work.
Workplace Liaison Support
With the employee’s consent, Calm-hearted becomes a consistent point of connection between the bereaved parent and their workplace after the loss. Support may include communicating what has happened, clarifying what can be shared, setting contact preferences and boundaries, navigating immediate decisions, and creating a return plan without leaving the employee to manage every conversation or identify every solution.
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Stages of support can include:
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Immediate support
Guidance through the first days and weeks, including the initial response, privacy, workplace communication, contact expectations, leave, coverage, and what should be taken off the employee’s plate.
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Return and reintegration
Preparation before the employee returns, including guidance for managers and coworkers, workload and communication planning, separate care check-ins, and support when the original plan needs to change.
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First-year continuity
Ongoing, light-touch support through the first year, including significant dates, changing needs, and moments when grief resurfaces at work.
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Workplace Readiness and Training
Prepare the people around the employee while they are away, so they do not return to a workplace that is still guessing. Calm-hearted provides practical, tailored guidance for managers, HR teams, coworkers, direct reports, and leaders responsible for workplace culture. The goal is for managers and coworkers to respond with greater care, confidence, and consistency without needing to become grief experts.
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Tailored offerings can include:
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Manager and HR consultation
Practical guidance on what to say, what decisions need to be made, how to protect the employee’s privacy, how to stay connected, and how to plan for an adjustable return.
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Coworker and team preparation
Tailored sessions on what grief may look like at work, what to say and avoid, how to acknowledge the loss, and how to offer support without centring personal discomfort or experiences.
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Policy and checklist review
Review existing bereavement, pregnancy loss, leave, communication, and return-to-work practices, then identify gaps and create guidance that can be used consistently when another workplace loss occurs.
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Workplace care in practice
The first response does not need to solve everything. It should recognize what has happened, protect the employee from carrying more, and create enough clarity for the next response to be handled with care.
Recognize first, organize second
Acknowledge what has happened before moving into leave, coverage, or timelines, so necessary practical decisions do not make the employee feel reduced to a workplace process.
Name one point of contact
Choose one person to stay connected, coordinate internally, and prevent the employee from repeatedly explaining who knows, what has been shared, or what is happening around them.
Take ownership during leave
Manage coverage, customer communication, handoffs, and changing priorities without relying on the employee to keep work moving, even if they instinctively offer to help or protect it.
Keep care separate from work
Keep condolences and message of care separate from updates and protect against requests to connect about work topics, so the employee does not feel expectation to solve anything or shift back to work.
Treat the return as a process
Prepare managers, coworkers, and direct reports rather than leaving the employee to manage discomfort. Provide dedicated check-ins, revisited workload, and permission to change the plan as needed.
A NOTE FROM NATHAN'S MOM
When work becomes part of the grief
This writing reflects on what happened after my workplace was entrusted with the news of my son’s birth and death, and how decisions about privacy, communication, and coverage before my return changed my relationship with my workplace. The series explores the gap between intention and impact and what employers can do differently when an employee is grieving.
LET ME HELP YOUR WORKPLACE HELP YOU
For bereaved parents
What you are going through is already enough. Telling your workplace what happened, deciding what information can be shared, and explaining what you need can feel like another responsibility placed on you at an impossible time.
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You do not have to navigate those conversations alone. Let me be your liaison.
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With your permission, I can contact your workplace, communicate only what you are comfortable sharing, help explain what support may be needed, and offer guidance to the people responsible for supporting you.
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You remain in control of what is shared, who is contacted, and how involved you would like Calm-hearted to be.
Scope of workplace support: Calm-hearted provides education, communication guidance, liaison support, return-to-work planning, and practical workplace tools related to pregnancy and infant loss.
This support complements, rather than replaces, an organization’s HR, legal, occupational health, disability management, or employee assistance responsibilities. Calm-hearted does not provide legal advice, medical guidance, clinical counselling, crisis intervention, formal workplace investigations, or representation in employment disputes. Liaison support involving a bereaved employee is consent-based, and information is shared only as they authorize. A complimentary 15-minute conversation is offered as an initial discussion to understand the situation and determine fit. Any recommended services, deliverables, timelines, and pricing will be confirmed afterward in writing based on the needs of the employee and workplace.