How I hid IVF heartache at 46, by Tatler editor
MILLIONS were charmed by her cheerful personality as editor of Tatler in a BBC documentary about life at the society magazine.
But behind the scenes, Kate Reardon was hiding her heartache as she battled to have IVF babies in her mid-40s.
Miss Reardon, 47, said none of her close-knit staff nor the TV crew knew what she was going through as she injected herself with fertility drugs in the toilets.
To avoid suspicion, she had to hide her sadness and remain ‘cheery and fun’ as she failed to become pregnant for months.
She said acting happy while privately yearning for a baby was the ‘toughest thing’ she had ever done – and sometimes left her in a ‘black hole of misery’.
But she claimed positive thinking carried her through, and she eventually gave to birth to twins at the age of 46 after several failed attempts.
The journalist revealed her struggle in a speech at her former school, £30,000-a-year Stowe in Buckinghamshire.
Miss Reardon told pupils: ‘Every single morning I had to walk into that office and be a glossy magazine editor. I had to come up with fun ideas. I had to be cheery, see the funny side and have a laugh.
‘And believe me it helped. Try it. When life is hard, fake it till you make it.’
During her treatment, she was being filmed for the BBC2 documentary Posh People: Inside Tatler, which was shown last year.
Miss Reardon, who married bloodstock agent Charles Gordon-Watson in 2013, began her career on the US edition of Vogue as its youngest ever fashion assistant. She was made fashion director of Tatler at 21 – also its youngest – and was appointed editor in 2010.
‘Fake it till you make it’