Why We should be Sharing our Grief like Chrissy Teigen and John Legend about Miscarriage

BY KCY

Last week, Chrissy Teigen and John Legend shared with the world that they suffered a late miscarriage of their baby boy. Chrissy shared a raw and vulnerable picture of herself grieving while still in the hospital, hooked to machines, naked on top. Most comments were sympathetic and echoed something along the lines of “thinking of you” and “sorry for your loss.” Some, though, accused them of wanting attention and publicity, of sharing too much.

Chrissy bravely did what many of us women cannot do. She shined a light on the pain a woman experiences with miscarriage, or in her case, what the medical doctors call, a fetal demise.

About 10-15% of pregnancies end in miscarriage. Chances are, you know someone who has experienced a miscarriage.

And if you didn’t know someone already, now you do: me.

The first time it happened, I didn’t even know it was happening. My routine check up at 8 weeks, revealed an empty sac, what they call a blighted ovum. They call it a missed miscarriage, one where the baby just dies and you don’t even know it. Some people bleed later, others, like me,never bleed and need to have a procedure to empty the body of the pregnancy. I had that procedure, but they didn’t get everything, so I had another procedure. The procedures themselves were not painful. What was painful, was losing a baby and pretending everything was fine for six weeks when things were not fine. But I was too scared to tell people, too afraid to be vulnerable. So I buried it deep
down inside.

Just when I thought I was over it, I got pregnant again. But again, at 8 weeks, another missed miscarriage. The same process. Again, the first procedure did not get everything out completely, so, I had to have another procedure, this time in the operating room. I hid all of this from most people, and the people, I did tell, I told them factually, not revealing how crushed I actually was. I hid my pain from people when all I really wanted to do was scream and cry.

I wish I could’ve been brave like Chrissy. I’m in awe of her courage. I’m in awe of her bringing to light and talking about what many people don’t want to talk about, what many people want us women to hide. We need to let women know they shouldn’t be afraid to talk about infertility, miscarriages. They shouldn’t have to be allowed to share their grief, to share their stories, or to share a picture of themselves naked and vulnerable in a hospital room.