Holding space for all of it

Joy, loss, grief, relief, regret—fertility is more than one experience. Let’s talk about all of it

TW: Abortion and Miscarriage

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This post may feel a little different from my usual fashion and design-focused content, but with International Women’s Day just behind us, the timing felt right.

Still, I hesitated for a long time before sharing this. It’s a deeply personal, sensitive, and complex topic. But given the state of the world—and how much (female) empowerment means to me—I believe opening up is an important first step. And likely, not the last time I’ll speak about it.

Years ago, I had an abortion. My IUD failed, and I got pregnant. I wasn’t ready to become a (most likely) single mom, so I decided to end the pregnancy. Though the decision wasn’t easy, I made it out of love and I’ve never regretted it. However that doesn’t mean it didn’t come with grief.

One thing I remember so clearly from that time was how alone I felt in the process. Not because I didn’t have support from my friends, but because abortion—despite being so common (WHO reports 29% of pregnancies end in abortion)—is still something we don’t openly talk about. Even amongst women, we keep it quiet. The few I knew who had been through it, I felt like I couldn’t ask or talk about it, out of fear of perhaps steering up unwanted emotions. And years later, I still feel like it’s something I “should” keep to myself (even now posting this, I feel scared to get ostracised by society).

But it’s not just abortion—we rarely talk about the complexities of fertility at all. Take pregnancy test commercials for example. They always show a glowing woman, tearing up with joy at a positive result. But doesn’t reality have so many more sides to it? When taking a test, we can feel relief or devastation if it’s negative, and equally, we can feel anxious, overwhelmed, happy, or even sad when it’s positive.

I have been surrounded by women who struggled to get pregnant and carry that grief in silence. I know women who have had miscarriages, and after, people acted to them as if it never happened, though they carried that grief on for quite some time. And then there was me, making the right decision but carrying grief that I felt/feel I wasn’t allowed to express—because I had made the choice myself.

So I guess this post is a first aim at opening up the space to talk about the complexities of fertility. Luckily there are already some people bravely talking about this subject. For example

Camille Charriere

’ in her beautiful article for Vogue UK, where she talks about her fertility challenges.

This quote from that article stood out for me:
"Why does no one talk about the mental shift required to transition from spending all your young adult life trying NOT to get pregnant to wanting a viable pregnancy so badly it’s all you think about?"

Though my experience is very different from Camille’s, it shows me how we rarely talk about the full picture of fertility. Both the fears of getting pregnant, the responsibility we carry for many years to avoid getting pregnant, but also once we want to get pregnant. And why is it that we don’t talk about this? Why do we cary these burdens alone? Why do those of us with a uterus feel like the full responsibility for not getting pregnant falls on our shoulders? And why do we feel the same when we do want to get pregnant? In general why don’t we talk more about the challenges that come with fertility—beyond just the happy moments?

It’s not that I want us to stop celebrating joy—I love seeing people happy sharing their pregnancies with excitement. I just wish that we would have a more open conversation about some of the other sides and struggles as well. Maybe to create space for the fears, the grief, and the challenges that come with fertility?

As this Substack is about giving space to people and their stories, I wanted to share a few reads, podcasts, and documentaries that have helped me or I found interesting to read in my quest for these answers. Would love to hear about other sources you have read and heard about.

• (Article)Vogue UK – Camille Charrière’s article “We Need To Be Having More Honest Conversations About Fertility – And Not Just With Our Girlfriends” - Beautiful article by Camille Charrière related to her own journey of IVF

• (Book) You're the Only One I've Told: The Stories Behind Abortion – Meera Shah - Beautiful book that explores the different reasons why people have abortions, and also goes into the socio-economic factors that are influenced by abortion-bans.

• Joy: The Birth of IVF (Netflix) – A beautiful film about why choice matters

• (Article) WHO – “Why we need to talk about losing a baby” (stories about miscarriages and stillborns)

• “A love note to tender times” by Camille Charriere (follow up and beautiful post in relation to her IVF treatments).

• (website) Shout Your Abortion – A non-profit normalising abortion stories

• Substack ‘Talking about abortion - specifically my own’ by

  Aisha Joshi
  on
  Close Friends

Some AI art I created a while back that reflected my feelings about the grief we sometimes carry alone.