All the Kardashians are pregnant. All of them. Probably even Kris and she’s 60. Probably even North and she’s, like five. That’s how this week feels to all the women who are struggling with infertility, who want to be pregnant but aren’t due to biology or circumstance or who are in the aftermath of miscarriage or stillbirth.
Your Facebook feed can be brutal at a time like this. All that happy news. All those Kardashian tummies full of babies. And yours……not.
Whenever there’s a big pregnancy or birth moment – a royal baby born, a royal pregnancy announced or yet another celebrity posting photos of their pregnant tummy or scrumptious newborn – my heart always goes to those women. The ones who feel like a knife is being twisted into them. If you’ve never experienced it, you will find that description melodramatic and maybe even absurd. What does Kylie Jenner’s pregnancy have to do with anyone else? How can someone’s baby news be anything other than joyful?
If you don’t understand, you’re lucky. I hope you never do. Because the grief and pain of not being pregnant or not being a mother when you desperately want to be is something that’s hard to explain. And whether it’s fair or logical or not, someone else’s happy news can feel like your heart is being squeezed. It can make you feel jealous and shattered and you can’t tell anyone because you are deeply ashamed that you are not able to compartmentalise your own feelings and your own situation from another woman’s joy. But you can’t. You simply can’t. Grief cannot always be compartmentalised and women are plagued by comparison syndrome in almost every area of our lives including our fertility. And so it goes.
Mamamia columnist, author and friend Rebecca Sparrow wrote this a few years ago:
We wanted to share all of our Pregnancy Loss Awareness Week posts in one place, and that’s here.You can download Never Forgotten: Stories of love, loss and healing after miscarriage, stillbirth, and neonatal death for free here.
Join Mia, Rebecca and others who have lost a child in our private Facebook group.
The award-winning podcast Mamamia Out Loud is doing their first live show. There will be laughs, disagreements and you can meet the hosts afterwards! We’re also donating $5 of every ticket price to Share The Dignity so grab your friends and come along to share the love and laughs, get your tickets here.
Top Comments
I found the closer I was to the woman, the harder it was. Celebs or women on tne street gave me a twinge for a second, but my best friend annnouncing she was pregnant (in an 'isn't this an awesome surprise' kind of way) 6 weeks after I lost our first pregnancy at 19 weeks nearly broke me. Six years (and another miscarriage) later, I was surprised how upset I was when my SIL announced her pregnancy - we're older, we're supposed to be first. I remember being at the family Christmas do, when she was 8 months pregnant, I had to go and hide around the corner and have a smoke. I was finding it so hard to cope with everyone being so excited for them and talking about all the baby stuff. It's easier now, I was over the moon when my brother's baby was announced. I found it easier if I expected it - if I knew they were trying to get pregnant, I was mentally prepared.
I feel sad for those ladies. The fact is though, the more you relax about it, the easier to get pregnant if you're trying to. Unless there are medical reasons why not, of course.
Spoken like somebody who has never struggled to fall pregnant....
Cath, I know you mean well, but even without 'medical reasons', it's really not as simple as that. Please think twice before you say that to someone you know in that situation. It's an incredibly frustrating thing to hear, especially as they've probably heard it more than once.