I registered my pregnancy at the ward office and then miscarried. Does anyone know if I have to go back and 'un-register'? Thanks

Hi Lisa, You have to go and report the miscarriage. Then you can get the 300,000 childbirth benefit. Patty

Can anyone confirm this? In 2001, I miscarried at 13 weeks and never reported the miscarriage to the ward, not knowing I had to. If I was entitled to any money I would sure like to know it.

Dear Caroline, I got a miscarriage in 2004, and I reported it right after I got out from the hospital, my baby was about 12 weeks old and the hospital gave me a death certificate as well to be submitted to the ward and yes, I was able to get some money too.

I am 11 week pregnant and I haven't registered yet! I don't know how to do it. Should I ask my dr to write me a letter or something or can I go there without any paper and simply register?
Thanks, Elisa

I think it's like this:
The miscarriage has to happen after 12 weeks of pregnancy. The pregnancy has to be registered (?). You have to have been a paying member of NHI (National Health Insurance) at the time that the miscarriage happened. And I don't think you can go back to 2001. I think you only have 2 years to collect. But it doesn't hurt to try!

Elisa,
You have to have a note from your doctor that you are pregnant. You registere at your ward office. You will receive a a "Boshi techo". Read more about it at: http://www.tokyowithkids.com/fyi/boshi_techo.html

Dear Cornelia, in my case I haven't registered my pregnancy and then got miscarriage but I got documents from the hospital to support and submitted the said documents to the ward office. I agree with you, it will less trouble if you register your pregnancy as early as 12 weeks or before that.

Thanks everyone for your comments. Marie, your message prompted me to call the ward office. Cornelia is right, you have two years to collect after the miscarriage. The problem is, I never knew I had to inform the ward, so I didn't. I think I may have a case against the city office for not providing me with information on how to deal with a miscarriage when I registered the pregancy. I will keep you posted.

Thanks everyone - this is really very helpful. I miscarried officially at 11 weeks so am probably ( and typically!!) not eligible..but I will attempt to check with the ward office just in case!!

Hi! I am Korina Hasegawa from Fukushima Japan. I just had a miscarriage just today. I was looking in google for the answers to my questions inside my head now. Some of you knows how i feel right now. I just want to ask you ladies how do they really count the age of the prenatal babies here. Like in my case the Japanese doctor said my baby was 4 weeks old but i know i was already pregnant 2 months old counting my last day of period. I heard from other women here they count ten month to give birth a child and others say 8 months. Its kinds weird for me since I am from Philippines and there we use western medical knowledge. I cant ask my doctor because he only knows few English and I only speak basic Nihon-go. Its really sad. When I saw my baby it was already big, like 12mm. I thought I wouldn't lose it beacause yesterday the baby was still okay. They injected me something. They said it will help to avoid miscarriage. But my spotting turn into bleeding that didn't stop and just this evening I lost it.

Hi Korina
I am sorry for your loss
I hope you have a good circle of friends to help you through this
In regard to your question
I found this clear explanation of this very confusing issue on babycenter.com
the last bit about 9 or ten months pregnant will explain where Japan is different perhaps to your own country's method of counting
All the Best
Janine

"How does BabyCenter count the weeks of pregnancy?
Does BabyCenter count the weeks of pregnancy starting from conception or from a woman's last menstrual period?

At BabyCenter, we count the weeks of pregnancy starting from the first day of your last menstrual period (also called your "LMP") because that's the way most medical practitioners do it these days. A few may count pregnancy from your estimated date of conception, which is the day that you were likely to be ovulating during the month you became pregnant. (This is usually about two weeks after your last period started.) While the estimated day of conception is literally the day you first became pregnant, most practitioners don't count pregnancy from that date because there's no way to know for sure when you really did ovulate and conceive. So they take the easier route and go back to the first day of your last menstrual period. Then they count 40 weeks from that day to find your due date. (On the other hand, if you're counting pregnancy from your estimated date of conception, your due date will be only 38 weeks from that day.) And by the way, your last menstrual period is also the date from which your practitioner will measure your baby's gestational age. That is, when you're 20 weeks pregnant (starting from your LMP), your baby's gestational age is also 20 weeks.
�EWhy are you telling me I'm 4 weeks pregnant when I'm in my 5th week?
Why are you telling me I'm 4 weeks pregnant when I'm in my 5th week, counting from the first day of my last period?

This is a pretty confusing issue for a lot of pregnant women. The fact is when you're in your 5th week of pregnancy, you are 4 weeks pregnant! During the week you start your period, you are in your first week of pregnancy, but you have not yet completed any weeks so you are zero weeks pregnant. Think about it this way �Eyou don't say that a baby is one year old during his first year of life do you? He is not considered to be one year old until he's actually in his second year.

A lot of pregnancy books and web sites don't make this distinction, which makes things even more confusing. To make things as simple as possible, we recently standardized our wording so that we only refer to you as being a certain number of weeks pregnant. We try not to say "you are in your 5th week" because that's when you are actually 4 weeks pregnant. We just say, "you are 4 weeks pregnant." You'll notice that the weeks on our Pregnancy Calendar (and everywhere else) say "5 weeks" for example, not "week 5." And that's how most practitioners express it, too. If you start thinking in terms of how many weeks pregnant you are instead of what week you're in, you'll be less confused.

�EIs pregnancy really ten months long?
Is pregnancy really nine or ten months long?

Well, it depends on how you count it. These days, most practitioners determine your due date by counting 40 weeks from the first day of your last menstrual period. Keep in mind that you're not actually pregnant for the first two weeks because you haven't even ovulated yet, and you don't usually find out you're pregnant until you're about 4 or 5 weeks along. But this is how most people count it. And forty weeks adds up to about nine calendar months (30 or 31 days each) or ten lunar months (28 days each). In order to make it easy to count the months, a lot of guidebooks and web sites, including this one, will count the months of pregnancy as lunar months, so that every four weeks, you're another month along. Counting this way, you will be ten lunar months pregnant by the time 40 weeks is up."

Thank You Ms. Janine for your post. I appreciate the information you shared. Now me and my husband understand our baby's age. My baby is in heaven right now and I know it will guide us every now and then. What I should do now is to stand up again and move on. Everything has a reason. Thank you everyone. Thank you also to Ms.Marie for you message. Have a nice day to everyone.