In the op-ed, which was published in The New York Times, the Duchess of Sussex recounted how she was holding her son, Archie, in her hands as she felt a “sharp cramp” and dropped to the floor in July.
Meghan Markle, the Duchess of Sussex, has revealed in an emotional op-ed that she suffered a miscarriage in July. In the op-ed, which was published in The New York Times, Meghan recounted how she was holding her son, Archie, when she felt a “sharp cramp” and dropped to the floor.
“I knew, as I clutched my firstborn child, that I was losing my second,” she wrote. “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.”
Meghan then referenced a 2019 royal interview in South Africa that made headlines after a journalist asked “Are you OK?” and Meghan noticeably held back tears as she answered and thanked the journalist for asking.
“Sitting in a hospital bed, watching my husband’s heart break as he tried to hold the shattered pieces of mine, I realized that the only way to begin to heal is to first ask, 'Are you OK?'” the Duchess wrote.
She says despite a miscarriage being something that many women have experienced, it remains a subject many don’t speak about.
“Losing a child means carrying an almost unbearable grief, experienced by many but talked about by few. In the pain of our loss, my husband and I discovered that in a room of 100 women, 10 to 20 of them will have suffered from miscarriage,” Meghan wrote. “Yet despite the staggering commonality of this pain, the conversation remains taboo, riddled with (unwarranted) shame, and perpetuating a cycle of solitary mourning.”
Meghan goes on to talk about how people in general should be thinking about whether they are OK, considering the many things that brought people to their “breaking points” in 2020. The Duchess references COVID-19, police brutality and people’s polarizing opinions about politics.
“In places where there was once community, there is now division,” she wrote. “We are at odds over the value of compromise.”
“That polarization, coupled with the social isolation required to fight this pandemic, has left us feeling more alone than ever,” Meghan added.
As Thanksgiving approaches, the Duchess reminded people to ask themselves that question: “Are you OK?”
“Are we OK?" she wrote. "We will be."
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