Yesterday, in a personal essay for The New York Times, the Duchess of Sussex detailed the immense grief and suffering she and Prince Harry were feeling after Markle suffered a miscarriage with her second child in July.
In an attempt to encourage more of a conversation around pregnancy loss, Markle wrote, “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. Yet despite the staggering commonality of this pain, the conversation remains taboo, riddled with (unwarranted) shame, and perpetuating a cycle of solitary mourning.”
Markle’s bravery in speaking about her loss comes less than two months after model Chrissy Teigen did the same. Teigen and her husband John Legend lost their third child, a boy they had named Jack, after pregnancy complications on October 1st. Teigen shared heartbreaking photos from the hospital to share the devastating news, before later penning an essay of her own on Medium.
At the time, Teigen’s post was met with a barrage of criticism from those who couldn’t understand why she wanted to share her loss publicly (despite her sharing every other part of her pregnancy, including her baby’s gender). Now, naturally, Markle is experiencing the same thing, with people trolling the 39-year-old royal online almost immediately after the essay was released.
But Teigen is having none of it.
When one user defended trolls of Markle’s by questioning her decision to write an essay, Teigen quickly responded in defense of the duchess. “Is anyone really questioning the pain and sheer awfulness of suffering a miscarriage, or are they perhaps criticizing Meghan’s decision to write a 1,000 word op-ed about herself?” the person wrote. “What does it add to the resources already available for those who go through a tragedy like this?”
In a now-deleted response, Teigen hit back with: “Award for today’s absolute piece of sh*t goes to [name of user]. Congratulations piece of sh*it.” She then removed the reply and posted in its place, “Sorry forgot I’m trying to be nicer lol.”
Sorry forgot I’m trying to be nicer lol
— chrissy teigen (@chrissyteigen) November 25, 2020
On Wednesday, Teigen addressed her lack of presence on Twitter and Instagram, writing that she’s offline because she’s “in a bit of a grief depression hole.”
She assured her followers that she’ll be fine, writing, “Do not worry as I have so much help around me to get better and I’ll be fixed soon.” She joked, “they’ll call when I’m better and ready for pickup and u can swing by and grab me ok? thank u and love you!”
Earlier this week, Teigen and Legend spoke about their loss while appearing on Good Morning America. “I definitely give myself permission to feel complete and utter grief,” Teigen said. “Every day is so different. So when people ask me how I’m doing I always say I’m OK—today.”
“It’s so painful to go through something like this as a woman—something that was inside your body that you were nurturing and taking care of. Obviously there’s a father involved, and the support for the both of us has just been so beautiful, so incredible,” she continued.
“I didn’t know that we could experience this grief and also share it, but when we did it really meant so much to so many people,” Legend said. “And it was such a powerful experience for me to learn that. I’m just grateful that my wife was courageous enough to do it.”
