Laura Whitmore has opened up on going through a miscarriage.
The TV presenter revealed that she went through a miscarriage last year after an unplanned pregnancy with her boyfriend, Love Island presenter Iain Stirling.
Opening up in a candid personal essay for website Hot Press, the former I’m A Celebrity Extra Camp presenter reflected on the difficult time, writing, ‘I wasn’t sure how I was supposed to react. Should I cry? Was I allowed be emotional for something unplanned?
‘The things that go through your mind: actually, I had just spent two hours planning with the midwife earlier that day.
‘Then the strangest thing happened,’ she continued. ‘The doctor went out to the reception and brought in a puppy. She offered it to me. It was a new puppy that happened to be in the clinic that day – not a usual circumstance. But she hoped it would make me feel better. When in doubt, get the puppies out.’
Laura had found out that she was expecting a baby just weeks before receiving the devastating miscarriage news, being given the blow at her 12-week scan.
‘I went to the doctor to confirm the pregnancy,’ she explained, ‘was handed a pile of faded pamphlets and told it’s a good time to get pregnant, as the older you get, the harder it can be.’
However, after being delivered the heartbreaking news when she was only 12 weeks along, the TV star struggled to come to terms with the loss.
‘Miscarriages happen to 1 in 3 women,’ continued Laura. ‘I didn’t know this, because most people just don’t talk about it. Now I’m part of that statistic.
‘I hadn’t planned the pregnancy in the first place, so should I be sad? I was. That feeling was heightened because I felt I had to be sad alone: apart from a handful of people, no one knew. I had to deal with high intensity work situations without anyone around me knowing what was really going on inside my head.
‘Although maybe that made it easier to deal with – because I wasn’t actually dealing with it.
‘I poured myself a large glass of wine that didn’t taste as good as I thought it would and I kept on moving forward,’ added Laura. ‘Realising now that I do want children and knowing that so many women battle things in silence.’
