Meghan’s hidden fears: Harry’s sadness, her grief & the ticking clock…
As Meghan Markle opens up about her ‘unbearable grief’ - has she helped lift the taboo surrounding this often silent heartbreak?
Last week, Meghan Markle opened up about an incredibly personal and painful loss – breaking the news that she had a miscarriage in Summer.
Describing how, on an ordinary morning looking after her one-year-old son, Archie, she realised that something was wrong.
‘After changing his diaper, I felt a sharp cramp. I dropped to the floor with him in my arms, humming a lullaby to keep us both calm, the cheerful tune a stark contrast to my sense that something was not right.
‘I knew, as I clutched my firstborn child, that I was losing my second.’
The Duchess, 39, goes on to describe how she was admitted to hospital.
‘Hours later, I lay in a hospital bed, holding my husband’s hand. I felt the clamminess of his palm and kissed his knuckles, wet from both our tears. Staring at the cold, white walls, my eyes glazed over. I tried to imagine how we’d heal.
‘ Watching my husband’s heart break as he tried to hold the shattered pieces of mine, I realised that the only way to begin to heal is to first ask, “Are you OK?”’
Writing for the New York Times in a piece she called ‘The losses we share’, Meghan did not reveal how far along in the pregnancy she was, but described how the miscarriage came out of the blue on a July morning. She had fed the couples’ dogs, tidied up Archie’s clothes and toys – and then… the pain that signalled the onset of losing her baby.
The Duchess went on to speak about the impact the Coronavirus crisis has had on global communities – saying ‘loss and pain have plagued every one of us in 2020’ – and emphasised that the way to recover is to come together.
And sadly, Meghan, who will be 40 in August, will be all too aware of the ticking of her biological clock. Not only are miscarriage and medical complication rates higher for older mothers, but fertility declines sharply after 35, and by 40 an average healthy woman has only a five per cent chance of getting pregnant per cycle, according to the ASRM.
The loss of his unborn child will no doubt have come as a painful blow to Harry. After Archie was born in May 2019, a beaming Harry said he was ‘over the moon’ and that the baby, was ‘to die for’.
But maybe sharing her story will bring comfort to many women who have suffered the same fate, but never opened up about the loss.
‘I knew, as I clutched my firstborn child, that I was losing my second’