Rainbow Pregnancy Preparation Guilt: When You Feel Like You’re Not Doing Enough

Have you ever found yourself lying awake at night, mentally scrolling through all the pregnancy preparation tasks you “should” be doing but can’t seem to bring yourself to tackle?

Or maybe you’ve caught yourself comparing your preparation approach to other pregnant people and feeling like you’re somehow failing at getting ready for your rainbow baby.

If you’re nodding along, you’re definitely not alone. Preparation guilt during rainbow pregnancy is incredibly common, and it can feel particularly heavy because it comes layered with all the complex emotions we carry after loss.

Maybe you’re feeling guilty because you can’t bring yourself to start a registry yet, or because you’ve been avoiding thinking about nursery plans. Perhaps you’re on the other end of the spectrum, feeling guilty about how much mental energy you’re spending researching every possible baby item, wondering if you’re being “too much.”

Or maybe your guilt shifts between these extremes depending on the day or week you’re having.

Whatever form your preparation guilt is taking, I want you to know that it makes complete sense. When you’ve experienced loss, the stakes of “getting it right” can feel impossibly high, and that pressure can manifest as guilt about almost every choice you make.

So let’s talk about why preparation guilt hits so differently after loss, and explore some ways to work with it rather than letting it overwhelm you.

Understanding Preparation Guilt After Loss

Preparation guilt during rainbow pregnancy operates on a completely different level than typical pregnancy preparation anxiety.

Don’t get me wrong, it is 100% possible to develop perinatal anxiety when you haven’t experienced a loss. But the likelihood that anxiety will develop is higher in parents who have suffered previous losses, and the way it hits you is different.

There are a lot of unknowns in pregnancy, especially a first one. But once you learn that pregnancy does not always equal baby, you can’t unlearn it, and the “knowns” can outpace the unknowns in a race for an anxiety-inducing spiral.

When you’re carrying a rainbow baby, every preparation decision can feel weighted with the impossible question: “What if this doesn’t work out again?”

This creates a unique kind of guilt that can pull you in multiple directions at once.

You might feel guilty for not being excited enough about preparation, while simultaneously feeling guilty for any moments when you do feel excited. You might feel guilty for avoiding certain tasks, while also feeling guilty for obsessing over others.

This is where those “shoulds” creep in and take over, telling us we’re doing it all wrong.

The Impossible Standards We Set

After loss, many of us develop impossible standards for ourselves. We tell ourselves that if we can just prepare perfectly this time, if we can just do everything exactly right, maybe we can prevent another loss.

This creates a preparation environment where “enough” becomes an impossible target. No amount of research feels sufficient. No level of preparation feels adequate. There’s always one more thing we could be doing, one more precaution we could be taking.

And when we inevitably fall short of these impossible standards (because they are impossible), the guilt rushes in to fill the space.

So why do we keep creating these overwhelming expectations for ourselves during an already difficult time?

Why Guilt Becomes Another Form of Protection

What I’ve come to understand about my own experience (because hindsight) is that guilt often became another way my brain tried to keep me safe. If I could just feel bad enough about not doing things “right,” maybe I could somehow control the outcome.

In some twisted way, the guilt felt productive. Like if I was properly worried about not doing enough, then I was taking this pregnancy seriously enough.

None of this was conscious thought; it was happening in the background while I hid behind my denial (also not a conscious decision).

But here’s what I wish I’d understood then: guilt doesn’t actually protect us or our babies. It just adds another layer of emotional burden to an already complex experience.

This idea is beautifully expanded in Permission Granted: Let Go of Guilt from Pregnancy After Loss Support, which gently reframes guilt as something we don’t have to carry alone.

Understanding this protective function of guilt can help us recognize it when it shows up in specific situations. Let’s look at some of the most common ways preparation guilt tends to hit us.

Common Guilt Triggers in Rainbow Pregnancy Preparation

Understanding the specific triggers that tend to spark preparation guilt can help us recognize when it’s happening and respond with more compassion for ourselves.

Reading about how others have experienced this can be incredibly validating. This post from Pregnancy After Loss Support shares 10 things one parent felt guilty about during her own rainbow pregnancy—and chances are, a few might feel familiar.

Comparison Guilt

This might be the biggest guilt trigger of all. You see other pregnant people posting about their nursery progress or excitedly sharing registry items, and suddenly you’re drowning in shame about your own approach.

Maybe they seem so carefree and excited, while you’re struggling to even think about baby items without anxiety. Or maybe they seem more organized, more prepared, more ready than you feel.

These comparisons are particularly painful because they highlight the innocence you’ve lost. You can’t approach pregnancy with the same carefree excitement, and that loss deserves acknowledgment rather than guilt.

Here’s something that helps me remember: those social media posts and conversations you’re seeing are curated highlights, not the full story.

That beautifully staged nursery photo doesn’t show the anxiety that might have preceded the shopping trip, or the tears that might have been shed while assembling the crib.

Even people who haven’t experienced loss often struggle with pregnancy preparation in ways they don’t share publicly. And for those who genuinely are sailing through preparation with ease? That’s the innocence you once had too, and losing it wasn’t your choice.

Your cautious, protective approach to preparation shows wisdom earned through difficult experience.

If comparison guilt is hitting hard, consider taking breaks from social media or unfollowing accounts that consistently trigger these feelings. Your emotional peace matters more than staying connected to content that hurts.

To learn more about the why behind some of your feelings, take a look at these posts:

Understanding the Preparation Paradox in Rainbow Pregnancy
Emotional Response Patterns in Rainbow Pregnancy: Why You Feel The Way You Do
Understanding and Managing Emotional Disconnect in Rainbow Pregnancy

Timeline Guilt

Traditional pregnancy preparation timelines suggest you should have certain things done by certain weeks. Nursery ready by the second trimester. Registry created early enough for a baby shower. Hospital bag packed by 36 weeks.

When you’re navigating pregnancy after loss, these timelines can feel completely irrelevant to your emotional reality. You might not be ready to think about a nursery at 20 weeks, or you might need to avoid baby shopping until much later in pregnancy.

But that societal timeline pressure can create intense guilt about being “behind” or not doing things when you’re “supposed” to.

Here’s the truth about those timelines: they’re largely arbitrary and based on social expectations rather than actual necessity.

Your baby doesn’t need a nursery ready at any specific week or even before they’re born. Most hospital bag items can be brought later if needed (and a lot of them won’t be, I never even opened my hospital bag).

Many preparation tasks have far more flexibility than traditional advice suggests.

You have permission to create your own timeline based on your emotional readiness rather than a pregnancy book’s schedule. “Behind” assumes there’s a race you’re supposed to be winning, but there isn’t one. There’s just you, doing your best to prepare in a way that feels emotionally safe.

If timeline guilt is weighing on you, try asking yourself: “What does my baby actually need by this date?” versus “What do I think I should have done by now?” The gap between those two answers often reveals how much unnecessary pressure you’re carrying.

If you need some help identifying what you actually have to have and when, here are some good posts to check out:

Essential vs Optional: A Framework for Rainbow Pregnancy Preparation
When Time Won’t Wait: Handling Urgent Tasks in Rainbow Pregnancy
Your Terms, Your Time: Rainbow Pregnancy Preparations You Can Say No To

Avoidance Guilt

If you’re finding yourself unable to engage with certain preparation tasks, the guilt can be overwhelming. You might feel like you’re not loving your baby enough, not taking the pregnancy seriously enough, or somehow jinxing things by avoiding preparation.

This guilt can be especially heavy when well-meaning people ask about your preparations and you don’t have progress to report.

Let me be clear about something: avoiding preparation doesn’t mean you love your baby any less. Your avoidance is your heart’s way of protecting itself, and that protection serves an important purpose right now.

Emotional safety and regulation are much more important than a perfectly prepared nursery or a comprehensive registry completed by a certain date. Taking care of your emotional well-being IS taking care of your baby.

If avoidance guilt is hitting hard, remember that many preparation tasks can honestly wait until after your baby arrives.

When you’re ready to engage, you can start with tiny steps or ask support people to handle overwhelming tasks. There’s no preparation emergency that requires you to push through emotional discomfort.

If you’d like to read about my own struggle with avoidance and denial, see
Why I Couldn’t Prepare for My Rainbow Baby.

Over-Preparation Guilt

On the other end of the spectrum, if you’re finding yourself intensely focused on preparation details, you might feel guilty about being “too much” or obsessive. You might worry that you’re bothering others with your need to research and/or talk about every option or plan for every scenario.

This type of guilt often comes with shame about your coping mechanisms, even when they’re helping you feel more in control.

But research and detailed planning can be incredibly soothing coping mechanisms after loss. There’s nothing wrong with needing to research thoroughly or plan extensively.

After experiencing loss, seeking control through preparation makes complete sense. Your brain is trying to create safety in whatever ways it can, and if detailed planning helps you feel more secure, that’s a valid coping strategy.

The guilt often comes from messages that you’re being “too anxious” or “overthinking things.” But your level of caution is earned wisdom, not excessive worry. You know what it’s like when things don’t go as planned, so of course you want to plan more thoroughly this time.

Your research isn’t bothering people who truly care about you. If someone is making you feel guilty about your preparation style, that says more about their discomfort with your experience than about your approach being wrong.

You have permission to prepare as thoroughly as feels right to you, without apologizing for your need to feel informed and ready.

Support Guilt

Maybe you feel guilty about needing more support with preparation than other pregnant people seem to need. Or perhaps you feel guilty about not being more grateful for the support that’s offered.

You might feel bad about asking your partner to handle certain tasks, or about needing someone else to come with you to baby stores because it feels too overwhelming alone.

Here’s something important to remember: pregnancy after loss requires different support than typical pregnancy. Your needs aren’t excessive; they’re appropriate for what you’ve been through.

Accepting help doesn’t make you weak or dependent. It makes you wise. You’re modeling healthy behavior by recognizing your limits and asking for what you need.

For a beautifully real example of what that can look like in practice, this story from Tommy’s offers gentle, doable ideas for navigating support through rainbow pregnancy.

Your support people genuinely want to help you through this. When you let them take on preparation tasks that feel overwhelming, you’re giving them a meaningful way to show their care for you and your baby.

If you’re not sure who or how to ask for some support, these posts can help walk you through it:

Asking for Rainbow Pregnancy Help When You’re Still in Denial
Finding Your Initial Support Person for Rainbow Pregnancy

Joy Guilt

Perhaps the most complex guilt of all: feeling guilty when preparation actually brings you moments of joy or excitement. If you find yourself getting excited about a baby item or enjoying the process of setting up a space, guilt can quickly follow.

This joy guilt often sounds like: “I shouldn’t be excited yet,” or “What if I’m getting too attached?” or “I should be more careful with my emotions.”

But here’s what I want you to know: feeling moments of joy or excitement doesn’t jinx anything. Your emotions don’t control pregnancy outcomes. Joy and caution can absolutely coexist in the same heart.

Hope can feel terrifying after loss, but it can also be healing. You don’t have to choose between being careful and allowing yourself moments of happiness about preparation.

If joy guilt is affecting you, try giving yourself explicit permission to feel excited when those moments arise naturally. You might even tell yourself: “I can enjoy this moment while still being appropriately cautious.” Both responses can be true at the same time.

The Perfectionism Trap

One of the ways preparation guilt maintains its hold on us is through perfectionism. After experiencing loss, many of us develop what I call “protective perfectionism” – the belief that if we can just do everything perfectly this time, we can somehow prevent another loss.

This perfectionism shows up in preparation as:

• Endless research that never feels sufficient
• Inability to make decisions because no option feels perfect
• Constantly second-guessing choices we’ve made
• Feeling like every preparation detail matters enormously
• Paralysis when faced with multiple “good enough” options

Any of these sounding familiar? The perfectionism trap is particularly sneaky because it disguises itself as being “thorough” or “responsible.”

Why “Enough” Feels Impossible to Define

The definition of “enough” preparation can be elusive. How much research is enough? How prepared is prepared enough? How can you know if you’ve done everything you possibly could?

The truth is, “enough” was always a moving target, but after loss, it can feel completely impossible to identify.

This is partly because we’re trying to use preparation to create certainty in an inherently uncertain situation. No amount of preparation can guarantee the outcome we want, but our hearts keep trying to find that magical level of readiness that will keep us safe.

How Perfectionism Actually Increases Anxiety

While perfectionism whispers promises in our ear about making us safer, it often does the opposite. The constant pressure to get everything exactly right creates a state of chronic anxiety and hypervigilance that can be exhausting.

Instead of helping us prepare effectively, perfectionism can actually interfere with our ability to make decisions, trust our instincts, and focus on what truly matters.

Working with Perfectionist Tendencies

If you recognize perfectionist patterns in your preparation approach, here are some gentle ways to work with them:

Practice “good enough” decisions: When researching baby items, set a limit for yourself. Maybe you’ll read three reviews instead of thirty, or spend one hour researching instead of an entire day. Then make a decision and trust it. Easier said than done, but just do your best.

Remember that most choices aren’t permanent: The car seat you choose doesn’t have to be perfect; it just needs to be safe.

Focus on the essentials: When perfectionism hits, return to the basics. Your baby needs to be safe, fed, and loved. Everything beyond those essentials is bonus, not requirement.

Challenge the “control through preparation” belief: Remind yourself that your previous loss wasn’t due to inadequate preparation, and perfect preparation can’t prevent all difficulties. You’re preparing to care for yourself and your baby, not to control all outcomes.

Give yourself permission to be imperfect: You can be a wonderful parent without being a perfect preparer. Your baby will benefit more from your emotional presence than from flawless preparation.

Guilt vs. Your Actual Needs

One of the most helpful things we can do with preparation guilt is learn to distinguish between what guilt tells us we should need and what we actually need for our emotional and practical well-being.

Guilt often speaks in absolutes. Here are just a few I dealt with on the regular during my rainbow pregnancy: “You should be more excited,” “You should have this done by now,” “You should be able to handle this better.”

But your actual needs are much more nuanced and personal. Maybe you need more time before engaging with certain preparations. Maybe you need different kinds of support. Maybe you need to approach things in a completely different order than traditional timelines suggest.

Learning to Listen Under the Guilt

Guilt is loud, but underneath it, there’s usually a quieter voice that knows what you actually need. This voice might be saying things like:

• “I need more emotional support before I can handle baby shopping”
• “I need to take preparation in smaller steps”
• “I need permission to do this differently than other people”
• “I need help with certain tasks that feel too overwhelming”
• “I need to honor my protective instincts right now”

Learning to hear this quieter voice requires practice, especially when guilt is shouting over it. The first step is listening for those “shoulds.” When you hear a “should” in your head, meet it with curiosity and try to discover its source. That is where you will find the underlying need.

Journal Prompts for Exploring Your Actual Needs

These prompts are offered as optional tools for exploring your own feelings and decisions about your rainbow pregnancy.

There’s no pressure to engage with them – they’re simply here if you find writing helpful for processing complex emotions.

Think of them as a quiet space to explore your thoughts at your own pace, with no right or wrong answers. Whether you prefer to write, reflect silently, or simply keep reading, the choice is yours.

Exploring Guilt Messages:

• What specific messages does my guilt tell me about preparation?
• When does preparation guilt feel strongest for me?
• What triggers my guilt most often?

Identifying Actual Needs:

• What would preparation look like if I removed all external expectations?
• What do I actually need to feel emotionally safe during preparation?
• What kind of support would help me feel less guilty about my approach?
• How would I prepare if guilt wasn’t influencing my decisions?

Finding Your Values:

• What matters most to me about preparing for this baby?
• How do I want to feel during the preparation process?
• What approach to preparation would honor both my emotional needs and practical necessities?

Working Through Preparation Guilt

Once we understand where preparation guilt comes from and how it operates, we can start developing strategies for working with it, through it rather than being overwhelmed by it.

While guilt, or any other “negative” emotion, might not be fun or comfortable to feel, it is serving us. If I’ve learned anything in therapy it is that all of our feelings serve us in some way.

So let’s look at some ways we can make guilt serve us rather than harm us.

Gentle Reality Checks

When guilt starts spiraling, it can help to ground yourself in what your baby actually needs versus what guilt says they need.

Your baby needs to be safe, fed, and loved. They need a car seat for the ride home, a way to eat, and a safe place to sleep. Beyond that, almost everything else can be figured out as you go.

Your baby doesn’t need a perfectly decorated nursery, a comprehensive registry completed by a certain week, or a parent who felt excited about every aspect of preparation. They need a parent who does their best with what they have.

Reframing Preparation “Failures”

What if the things you feel guilty about aren’t actually failures but wisdom?

What if your inability to engage with certain preparations right now is your heart protecting itself in exactly the way it needs to? What if your need for more support is a sign of self-awareness rather than weakness?

What if your different timeline is exactly right for your unique situation?

Finding Your “Enough”

Since traditional definitions of “enough” preparation don’t work well after loss, we get to create our own definitions.

Your “enough” might look like:

• Having the absolute essentials ready and trusting that everything else can be handled later
• Focusing only on preparations that bring you peace rather than anxiety
• Preparing in small bursts when you have emotional capacity
• Letting others handle preparations that feel too overwhelming
• Taking breaks from preparation when you need them

Self-Compassion Practices for Difficult Days

Preparation guilt tends to be harshest on our most vulnerable days. Having some go-to self-compassion practices can help:

Acknowledge the difficulty: “This is a really hard moment. Preparation feels overwhelming right now, and that makes sense.”

Normalize your experience: “Other people who’ve experienced loss struggle with preparation, too. I’m not alone in finding this difficult.”

Offer yourself kindness: “I’m doing the best I can with the emotional resources I have right now. That’s enough.”

Remember your why: “I’m being careful with my heart because this pregnancy matters to me. My protective instincts make sense.”

And maybe try scheduling intentional pauses on baby prep around triggering times.

Know that you are going to cut yourself some slack and take a break from all things prep around milestones like a loss anniversary, a point of previous loss, anatomy scans, or anything else that ramps up your anxiety level.

Setting Boundaries Around Others’ Expectations

Part of working with preparation guilt involves setting boundaries around other people’s expectations and timelines.

This might sound like:

• “I’m taking preparation at my own pace”
• “I’m handling things differently this time around”
• “I’m not ready to discuss that yet”
• “I’m working with what feels manageable right now”

You don’t owe anyone explanations about your preparation approach, and you don’t need to justify taking things slower or differently than they might expect.

You have enough “shoulds” coming from your own self, you don’t need to pick up anyone else’s.

Sometimes other peope’s “shoulds” come from ignorance around pregnancy after loss. Sometimes they don’t. In either case, my Rainbow Pregnancy Support Building Workbooks can help.

The one created for the rainbow parent has guides for helping you set boundaries and the one created for support people has a lot of educational resources so you don’t have to figure out how to tell them everything that’s going on with you before they can lend a hand.

Moving Forward with Self-Compassion

Preparation guilt, while painful, doesn’t have to define your experience of getting ready for your rainbow baby.

You have permission to prepare imperfectly. You have permission to take things at your own pace. You have permission to need more support, more time, or a completely different approach than what you see others doing.

Your baby doesn’t need you to be perfect. Your well-being matters, and taking care of your emotional needs is paramount to that well-being.

How Self-Compassion Can Improve Preparation

When we approach preparation with self-compassion instead of guilt, we often find that things actually become more manageable. Self-compassion creates emotional safety, which allows us to think more clearly and make decisions from a place of wisdom rather than fear.

You might find that when you stop fighting against your natural responses and start working with them, preparation becomes less overwhelming.

You’re not alone in this complex journey of preparing for your rainbow baby while carrying the weight of previous loss. Your guilt makes sense, your protective instincts are valid, and you deserve to move through this experience with compassion for yourself.

However you’re preparing (or not preparing) right now is okay. You’re doing the best you can with the emotional resources you have, and that’s enough.

And if you want to be around people who understand what you’re going through, come find us in our free, private, supportive Facebook group.

Before you go, I want to reiterate VERY CLEARLY that I am neither a Medical Health Care Provider nor a Mental Health Care Provider. Nothing I have written here should be taken as medical advice. PLEASE seek help from a professional if you have any questions or concerns about your pregnancy or your emotional state.