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Episode Four: Our losses stay with us forever with Debra Lawrance and Liz Ellis
840 Plays1 year ago
On today's episode we are honoured to be joined by two strong and successful women. Debra Lawrance, Australian Actress, known best for her time on the well-loved, Australian soap opera, Home and Away. A powerful female role model, Deb was recently on I’m a Celebrity Australia supporting Ovarian Cancer Australia.
We also hear from Liz Ellis, whose career revolved around sport, doing Australia proud playing for the National Netball team. Liz also appeared on I’m a Celebrity Australia, supporting Share the Dignity.
These brave women and mothers opened up about their pregnancy losses on national television, sharing how their losses stay with them, always. Liz has also published a book on infertility: ‘If At First You Don't Conceive, Your Friendly Guide to Tackling Infertility’
This is a beautiful episode with raw and candid conversations about infertility, early pregnancy losses and the power of connection and support.
This is a beautiful episode with raw and candid conversations about infertility, early pregnancy losses and the power of connection and support.
Connect with Liz: https://www.instagram.com/lizzylegsellis/?hl=en
Connect with Deb: https://www.instagram.com/debralawranceofficial/?hl=en
Share the Dignity: https://www.sharethedignity.org.au/
Ovarian Cancer Australia: https://www.ovariancancer.net.au/
EARLY PREGNANCY LOSS SUPPORT
If you or someone you know has experienced miscarriage or early pregnancy loss, please know you are not alone.
For crisis support, please call Lifeline - 13 11 14.
Access all our support
Join Online Communities
Emotional Support Resources
Follow @pinkelephantssupport
STACEY JUNE LEWIS
If you’d like to reach out to Stacey for counselling she is currently taking new clients. Find out more via her Website or Instagram.
You can also follow her personal Instagram account where she shares some of her lived experience.
JOIN THE MISCARRIAGE REBELLION
Pink Elephants believe everyone deserves support following the loss of their baby.
We have been providing support to many ten's of thousands of people for nearly 8 years, raising funds through generous donors. We now need ongoing Government support to empower our circle of support.
We are calling on the Government to provide us with $1.6million over 4 years to help bridge the gap. Sign our petition.
Early pregnancy loss is not just a private grief, but a national issue that requires collective empathy, awareness, and action. By recognising and addressing this, we can make meaningful change in the lives of 100,000+ women who experience early pregnancy loss every year.
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Transcript
Introduction to Miss Coach Rebellion Podcast
00:00:03
Speaker
Welcome to the Miss Coach Rebellion. I'm Sam Payne, CEO and co-founder of the Pink Elephant Support Network. And I'm Stacey June Lewis, counsellor, psychotherapist and broadcaster. This podcast is where we share stories of many Australians who have lost their babies to early pregnancy loss.
Breaking the Silence on Pregnancy Loss
00:00:20
Speaker
With evidence and empathy, we unpack the shame, blame and stigma and the lack of support that many face. This is a loss that has been silenced for too long. We deserve better. We are here to normalise the conversation. And we're here to make lasting change.
Challenges of Fertility and IVF
00:00:39
Speaker
How old were you when your kids were born? I was a late starter. I was 38 when I had my first one and I was 43 when I had my second. Oh bless, I was 36 with my first and 43 with my second. Oh my goodness, this is so nice to know because I'm 31 and I don't want kids for ages. No, you're fine. But I would say to you, your fertility falls off a cliff theoretically after the age of 35. That's a theoretical. I fell pregnant with my daughter like second week. Really? Yeah, really quickly.
00:01:09
Speaker
When she was born, the obstetrician said, you're old. If you want another one, you're going to start trying straight away. And it took us five years to fall pregnant. We did IVF. I had three miscarriages. How many rounds did you do? I did five rounds. And I fell pregnant twice. And both of them are miscarried. Oh, bless you. It was awful. It's OK because I got my baby. Yeah, yeah.
00:01:31
Speaker
OK. I had that. I lost four babies before I got Will. I'm sorry. No, no, it was they weren't meant to be. I lost two single babies and then identical twin girls. And they were later into the pregnancy, but they had a syndrome. They were never going to survive. And my belief, Liz, is that when Will was born, we got him like immediately. He was the baby we were waiting for. And so it makes him really precious, huh? It does, doesn't it? Yeah.
00:01:59
Speaker
I can't believe I'm the first one to cry in here. No, no, please, it's a big thing and it holds in your body too.
Emotional Impact of Miscarriage
00:02:05
Speaker
Oh, it does. It's such a challenge. When you get your baby, it's sort of, it's all okay. Yeah, of course. Wash it a little. Because they're here now. It's actually good to cry about it. It's actually good to acknowledge the loss.
00:02:20
Speaker
Well, and there's this weird thing about how it's almost like some women feel ashamed if they miscarry, which is so bizarre to me. And you know what the hardest thing is? There's no word for the grief. Yeah, yeah. How long were you, sorry? The first two, really quick. And then the third one, I was about 12 weeks along, and we'd seen the heartbeat. And that's the hardest, isn't it? When you see the heartbeat, you're like, yeah, I can be excited now. Yeah.
00:02:49
Speaker
I'm so sorry. It's a thing, but... You've got to talk about it, right? Yeah, of course. So that when you start to have your babies, you know. Yeah. And nothing will prepare you, but as long as you know. With the twins, because I had a 16-week scan. Oh, I'm going to cry now too. Shearing circle.
00:03:11
Speaker
But what was interesting is that 16 weeks he said the heartbeat wasn't there but I could see the other one beating and he said they had this same syndrome that he could tell from the ultrasound. I'm very pragmatic about things so you've got no choice, it's like when people die, you've got no choice but to accept it. There's no wishing it away.
00:03:36
Speaker
I definitely feel privileged that I got to have that conversation with them. You guys are such strong women.
Guest Insights: Deborah Lawrence and Liz Ellis
00:03:43
Speaker
Thanks, Lee. I can't believe you've been through that. Well, isn't it funny that we get to come in here and talk about it? Yeah, it's amazing, isn't it? Because we don't talk about it enough. I mean, I can sympathise, but I can't empathise. And do you know what? You might fall pregnant and never have any problems at all.
00:04:03
Speaker
When we get out of here, you can ring us at any time and say. Yeah, please. Yeah. Welcome to today's episode with Deborah Lawrence and Liz Ellis. I can't believe I'm bringing these two women to you who incredibly generously opened up a conversation around a campfire on I'm a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here about their experience of pregnancy loss 10, 20 years ago.
00:04:28
Speaker
That in itself tells us how long these experiences stay with us and that miscarriages for many are not just a moment in time. They're something that stay with us forever. By opening up these conversations, we normalize this experience, we challenge the false narratives. Absolutely love having Deb and Liz on. It's a brilliant episode, so let's get straight in and give you the privilege of listening.
00:04:49
Speaker
Liz, I'll start with you, it's all right. I've read a little bit about you and I've read your fabulous book as well many years ago and that came out. And I know that you've had a heartbreaking journey of three pregnancy losses and multiple rounds of IVF that didn't work out into a baby in your arms. If you could just tell the listeners a little bit more about your experience in your own words, and if we could start there, that'd be great.
00:05:12
Speaker
Sure. So when my husband and I decided very belatedly that we might like to have children, I was in my late thirties and we fell pregnant really quickly with Evelyn. So we decided we'd like to have children and six weeks later we were pregnant. So, you know, we used to joke about how we had more sex to get her out and to get her in. And, you know, it was all very funny and we thought that
00:05:35
Speaker
We were great at making babies. We could just do it like that. Anyway, when Evelyn was born, I went back to my six-week checkup with my obstetrician. He said, right, you're old. If you want another child, get into it. I thought, yeah, right. We'll be fine. We started trying to fall pregnant whenever I was about six months old.
00:05:55
Speaker
Within a few months I was pregnant and I thought, see, what would the obstetrician know about fertility? And we lost that pregnancy fairly early. I miscarried fairly early. And I wasn't too concerned because I thought, oh, well, I can get pregnant easily. And then that's when our journey within fertility started. So it took a long time, about six months or more of trying and we did it all pregnant.
00:06:21
Speaker
Then I took fertility drugs, fell pregnant again, and miscarried again, and that was hard that time. But I thought, still I thought, oh well, it just took a few drugs and off we go again. Anyway, six months ago, there were drugs that didn't happen, so we moved to IVF. And I felt confident with IVF because my sister had had her two children with IVF, so I thought, right.
00:06:41
Speaker
It's pretty mechanical, I'll be fine. But during that time I turned 40 and I just hadn't given much thought to how much your fertility falls off a cliff at age 35 and then again at age 40. So we went through IVF, I did I think five rounds, every round really we only ever came up with
00:07:01
Speaker
two or three eggs when they were harvested and one of my best girlfriend did one round and had sixteen eggs. She was only a few years younger than me so it really started to hit home. We did an implant that was unsuccessful and then another implant that was my third pregnancy and
00:07:21
Speaker
Then, and we saw his heartbeat and I started to, you know, you start to dream and hope. Like I'd had two pregnancy losses. So I thought right now that I've seen the baby's heartbeat, this is good. I can start to think about, you know, names and G dates and all that sort of stuff.
00:07:38
Speaker
We went back for, I think, the 12-week checkup, sorry, and the obstetrician couldn't find the heartbeat.
Society's Response to Miscarriage
00:07:46
Speaker
So I got sent down to the ultrasound unit at the hospital and they were lovely, but they just said, I'm so sorry, there's no heartbeat. And really, the bottom fell out of my world that afternoon because if I was 42, it hit home just how unlikely it was going to be that I would have my second child.
00:08:07
Speaker
And I really did grieve that pregnancy loss for quite some time. And my husband just said to me one day, you know, so I got really angry because we'd been together since I was 20 and we got married when I was 26 and I beat myself up because
00:08:25
Speaker
We didn't preserve embryos while I was still young. You know, it wasn't like I was looking for the baby daddy. He was under my wing the whole time. And he was like, you know, we had a bit on your winning World Cups and I was building my business. And I was like, yeah, but yeah, the technology existed. So I really didn't feel guilt and grief. And I beat myself up for quite a long time after that. And we just got to the point where we thought we're concentrating so hard on this baby that we just can't quite get, that we're forgetting to concentrate on the baby that we do have.
00:08:54
Speaker
three by this point and we just thought you know it's just not worth the grief and it's not worth the heartache to keep going through this. So I just got to the point where I thought I was just was going to have the one child but I think the thing that I found when I went through my miscarriages especially with the third one is that you know I was working on television I had to turn up week in week out and do the netball and pretend that I cared about the outcome of the game. I couldn't give a shit because I was had this big ball of grief inside me but there's no words for it because it's
00:09:24
Speaker
You know, it's just 12 week old embryo. It's not like it's, you know, you can't talk about it because there's not the words for it. So that's, that was the hardest thing, especially with my third pregnancy loss. Yeah. 100%. I relate. The lack of language that we can use to describe our experiences is something that's still lacking now. And often we get met with the at least because people try and make us feel better as well. Yes. At least you've already got one. Yeah. At least. Yeah, right. Shut up.
00:09:54
Speaker
And what that does is there's an element of shame to your grief. We kind of then start to add shame on top of grief and that's where it starts to really become quite isolating because then you find yourself potentially not wanting to share as much even when you might have shared that one time or
00:10:13
Speaker
that time with that person that you thought may understand and it felt safe. And those tiny little comments where somebody might have actually tried to do the right thing, the right thing can actually be quite, yeah, they can be quite damaging. Yeah. And you feel torn, right? Because you feel like, well, I'm not ashamed. I want to express the grief. But then when you express it and someone says something that makes you feel like they don't understand, it's like, well, why did I bother? She just kept it to myself.
00:10:41
Speaker
Yeah, you feel like you're having to explain to them how they should react. So you're trying to hold space for your own grief and also educate others in how to meet you. And it's too hard when you're in it. You shouldn't have to do that. And that's what we want to change up in Gellithance. Deb, I've looked a little bit at your story and I know that you had your first baby, Grace, in 1992. And then there's a gap. There's about seven years. And then you have William in 1999.
00:11:03
Speaker
We can see that you had your experiences of losses during that time, so if you could share a little bit about what your experience was and what that looked like and what it felt like for you. Yeah, thanks. Thanks, Sam and Stacey. For me, when I met Dennis on Home and Away, as soon as he walked in the door, I told him that we were going to head for a baby or we weren't heading.
00:11:25
Speaker
And so he became quite clear about that. We actually had a blighted ovum when I was in 1991.
00:11:34
Speaker
That was before we decided that we were going to go ahead with anything early on in our relationship. Because it was a blighted ovum, I felt nothing about that. That's just a medical thing. I wasn't ever going to turn into a baby. And then once we decided that we were going to try, we got Grace. She's a wedding baby. She was born nine months after our wedding.
00:11:58
Speaker
Which was great, I was 36, nearly 36 at the time. And then we were both working very hard on Home and Away, so we were going to delay anyway. And then in my last year in 1998, we decided because I knew I was going to be leaving.
00:12:13
Speaker
We decided that we would give it a crack and we got pregnant quite quickly. I mean, I've been lucky, incredibly lucky with my fertility because I've been able to get pregnant quite easily. But, and so my heart goes out to the women who can't. So we were pregnant, but of course,
00:12:35
Speaker
Eliz was saying before about telling people because we got married in secret because we didn't want anybody to find out about like bother us so we also got pregnant in secret as well so nobody knew i rang my mom in melbourne to say we were pregnant and so i miscarried about 12 weeks and strangely enough it was on a friday afternoon at the end of the studio week.
00:12:57
Speaker
So I went home, went to the San Hospital in Wurrunga on the Saturday for the DNC, recovered on Sunday and came back to work on Monday. Nobody was the wiser. So, and I mean, I'm very pragmatic about these things. If a baby's not going to stay on board, there's a reason for it.
00:13:16
Speaker
But your body goes through havoc, basically, and also emotionally, because you start to hope. As Liz said, you start seeing... Well, I mean, we hadn't even got to heartbeats or anything at that stage. And then a couple of months later, exactly the same thing happened again Friday after. It's like my body's so professional that it knows to only miscarry on a Friday at the end of the studio where you say, really weird.
00:13:40
Speaker
So same visit to the San, the procedure, recover on Sunday, back to work on Monday. Once again, nobody, why is there except for my mum?
Deborah's Personal Story of Loss
00:13:50
Speaker
And then I finished up that year and then Dennis and I with Little Grace, who was six at the time, we're on tour with Melbourne Theatre Company around Australia. And just towards the end of the tour, I was really sick, like really, and I knew it was morning sickness. I didn't even bother to tell Dennis because I was just in a place, as Liz said, you go, why bother?
00:14:08
Speaker
And so I remember we were driving between Port Augusta and Port Pirie and I said, you have to pull over, I'm going to be sick. And Dennis knows I'm not car sick. So I thought, oh, well, he's going to ask questions, which he did. And Grace was asleep in the back and I said, oh,
00:14:26
Speaker
I'm really sick, it's probably twins, I joked. Anyway, we finished the tour, came back to Melbourne and moved into our house here and went to an obstetric gynecological clinic and it was confirmed that we were carrying twin baby girls, identical girls, and I saw their little heartbeat, two little heartbeats there.
00:14:48
Speaker
So, you know, you'd go through all panic, twins, oh my goodness me, and it was girls. And I thought, oh great, yeah, we've loved having Grace, so I've got more girls. And then Dad just sort of, you sort of, I named them. I fantasized about names and worried about university fees. Later you compose a story. And as much as we'd been cautious,
00:15:09
Speaker
I think because I had seen the heartbeat distinct from the other two miscarriages, then it became a different ballgame for me. Because I was older, I was 42, the lovely obstetric doctor who was at the clinic said, you'll come back for a 16-week scan.
00:15:29
Speaker
So we did, and one of the twins had succumbed. There was no heartbeat. And so that was really crushing. But also still in secrecy, we'd only told my mum. So Dennis and I just knew this, and we certainly hadn't mentioned it to Grace. And then a beautiful man said, because they were identical, they were probably both suffering with the same syndrome.
00:15:56
Speaker
And so we came back at 18 weeks and the other one had succumbed as well. They had a syndrome called Turner syndrome, only 3% of pregnancies go to turn. So in some ways that also made it easier to
00:16:11
Speaker
come to terms with because they were not healthy babies, they weren't healthy fetuses, they weren't viable. But it's still the grieving process, because what you're grieving is the future that you've imagined. It's the same with death of a loved one. If you lose a loved one early, you're grieving the future, you miss their presence.
00:16:35
Speaker
But with a baby, because you've had them in your belly, you haven't seen them or felt them, you're grieving your imagined time with them. And in some ways that's sort of harder because you don't have photographs, you don't have memories, and you don't have things to fall back on.
00:16:54
Speaker
Plus, there is an enormous hormonal impact on your body. Four babies in two years was quite difficult. Because they were a bit bigger, there was a different procedure for their removal, so I had to wait for a couple of weeks. The story I share with you is that while I was waiting for the procedure to remove the twins, I went to a 50th birthday party
00:17:20
Speaker
And my sister-in-law said to me in front of everybody, what's this here I hear about you being pregnant? And we hadn't told anybody, but a young woman who'd been in the pregnancy clinic had recognized Dennis and I, and she'd rung a radio station and had won $1,000 for the best celebrity gossip that Dennis and Deborah from Home and Away were pregnant again.
00:17:44
Speaker
And I nearly went mad with that. I was so angry, and my mum and Dennis advised not to phone them. And of course, the family were none the wiser, but that we had to bear that as well. So the invasion of our privacy during a really painful time was difficult.
00:18:05
Speaker
The doctor who performed the removal procedure at the women said to me, this is, Liz will relate to this. He said, don't wait for your next period. You're not getting any younger. You may as well go straight away. So we did and we got William. So we had a lovely, like Liz, we had a lovely success story. But my heart goes out to the women who continually miscarry and don't get a baby.
00:18:31
Speaker
So, you know, Liz and I are really lucky. We've got our sons who came after difficulty. But yeah, as I say, my heart goes out to the women who don't have that outcome.
Cultural Shifts in Miscarriage Conversations
00:18:43
Speaker
So that's our story. And also I had acupuncture right from the beginning of the pregnancy with William. And I thought just to deal with the hormonal stuff in my body and the grief.
00:18:55
Speaker
which I believe lives in your body in a negative way. So I had acupuncture every week of the pregnancy was great with William. So I don't know if that worked or it was nice. So yeah, exactly right. Yeah, yeah. How it helps you cope with such a difficult time. I think we see that a lot.
00:19:17
Speaker
So I feel angry for you, really, really angry for you that someone outed you in that way. That is just not okay in any way, shape or form. Really angry. Thank you again for sharing something that's so personal. But I know that the purpose of sharing is the way that other people will be able to listen and relate to so much of both of your stories. There is so much in that that I can relate to with my stories and all the women that we support will.
00:19:43
Speaker
Stacy, I think you had some questions around that as well. Yeah. Thanks for showing. I just acknowledge all the losses and that big journey from both of you. Sorry, just wanted to say, for those each losses, regardless of the pragmatic element of it, they happen and that's something that, yeah, not everybody has to go through. I wanted to talk a little bit about
00:20:07
Speaker
the change of time because those stories that you're telling us, it's a time where whether it was a personal choice to really keep it quite private. I think obviously for the specific circumstances about the example of the radio station story for sure, but also perhaps the time of the conversation of something like pregnancy loss and what you have noticed about any changes in that conversation
00:20:36
Speaker
I think potentially what I've realized from my own experience is that when I've shared, and it may have been even potentially by sharing on I'm a Celebrity what you've experienced from sharing on such a big platform like that.
00:20:51
Speaker
How you've noticed the conversation may have changed if it has, I'll start with you, Liz. I think what I'm trying to say is that I suppose when I shared some of my losses, there were so many people that came out sharing theirs, say for example, a girlfriend's mother who'd never shared, or an auntie or a cousin who had never said anything about their losses. I was interested to know whether you have seen any of the conversation change in your experience from when you had your loss to now.
00:21:19
Speaker
Yeah, there's a couple of observations to make.
00:21:24
Speaker
Pregnancy loss was something that was never talked about when I was growing up. And it wasn't until I mentioned that I had miscarried that I suddenly heard all of these stories. And one of the stories that I heard was from my, she's since passed away with my mother-in-law. And she had seven children and the first six were all two years, two years, two years, two years. And then I married her younger son and there was six years between him and the next eldest and his siblings used to call him, oops.
00:21:56
Speaker
Which is funny until one day I mentioned that I'd had a miscarriage and she said, well, I had two miscarriages between Jane and Matthew. No one really ever knew that. Her daughters were like, why don't you tell us that mum? She said, well, you just didn't talk about it. Whereas now I think you can talk about it more openly, but we're still all searching for the words. Once I realized that, I thought, I'm just going to keep talking about my miscarriages because
00:22:23
Speaker
I'm in a really privileged position that I can have conversations with lots of people here at different times. Probably the conversation we had on Celebrity was the biggest audience that I'd had for one of those conversations. I didn't go into the jungle thinking that I would have this conversation. It just came up. I think it was in the early days and I was missing everyone and I burst into tears. I was like, I can't believe I'm the first person in the jungle to cry.
00:22:46
Speaker
But it's one of those things that I decided years ago to never shy away from. And then when I wrote my book about fertility, so if at first you don't conceive, I put the story in there because I just wanted to normalise the conversation. And I think there's lots of things to think about in this space. It's around normalising the conversations, about how we think about when we tell people we're pregnant.
00:23:12
Speaker
Because you always, you know, the rule of thumb when I was having my kids was you don't tell anyone you're pregnant until you've had the 12-week scan. And then you don't have to tell people if you've lost it. But that's just assuming that there's no way to tell people that you've fallen pregnant and then lost a baby. Whereas I think if we get the right words, people can tell that story and it doesn't have to be done in silence. And I really admired, there's a netball player called Greta Bueta.
00:23:36
Speaker
who was one of the greatest players in world netball at the moment. Well, she's just had her second child, so she might be the second greatest three weeks postpartum. But she had her first baby and then came back and played and then fell pregnant again.
00:23:51
Speaker
last year and announced in the first couple of weeks that she was pregnant and then since and after that then announced that she had miscarry and then she's fallen pregnant but I actually really admired her for going early and announcing it and then being quite open with her story about miscarry. I think you know I'm 50 so the norms that I learnt are sort of 20 years old or 30 years old when my friends started having kids but I think now this younger generation are far more open to it and I think
00:24:21
Speaker
People like me keep talking about it. It's good for 50 year olds to talk about it because we've still often got unprocessed grief that we carry with us. I just love that Greta was so open. She can process her grief. She can have people offer her sympathy. Part of this whole conversation, I think we touched on it before, is not just
00:24:44
Speaker
having the words describe what's happening to you, but understanding when you're listening what the right thing is to say. And often that's nothing. It's just, you know, I'm so sorry.
00:24:55
Speaker
That's all that needs to be said. It's just that education component. I feel like for me, the conversations that I have are around helping people understand the right thing to say or understand how to respond when someone tells them that they've lost a pregnancy. I think the conversation for me personally has changed to someone who
00:25:16
Speaker
Initially was trying to find the right ways to talk about my pregnancy loss to now trying to help people understand what the right thing is to say in response or that the right thing, a more appropriate response would be. And now I look at younger women and I'm really wrapped that being really open about when they, telling people when they feel pregnant and they're comfortable in saying, well, actually I've lost this child and I'm now grieving.
00:25:42
Speaker
Yeah, thank you. I think it is important because I think when people are in it, I know a lot of the clients, they're in it trying to re-educate and have that language conversation with loved ones. As Sam mentioned earlier, they're buggered. They're bloody buggered. They're just trying to deal with their own stuff. If you're in a position where you may be a little further out of that particular time and be able to then educate on behalf of
00:26:07
Speaker
then it's such an important thing. What about you, Deb? What have you observed of those conversation changes? Yeah, it's interesting because my mum was a nurse and I'm one of six, and there's a gap between she had two girls and then a four-year gap and a boy, and then she had another four-year gap and two girls and a boy.
00:26:27
Speaker
So from an early age, age appropriate, I guess, we knew that mum had miscarried twins between Deidre and Charles, who are older than me, and then she'd miscarried another baby between my brother Charles and I. So we just knew about that. That was just, because mum was a nurse, we always used the right terminology for stuff. She didn't
00:26:51
Speaker
She didn't train us or anything it was just part of the conversation so i was aware of that right through my chains about it being a thing. Yeah it's interesting and the change of the conversation and what i love about the way liz approaches things.
00:27:10
Speaker
One of the many things that I love about Liz Ellis is that she's very good at disseminating information and passing it on in a useful way that's going to be meaningful for the people who are listening, like even educating people in how to listen, which I think is really important. Dennis and I did an article for one of the magazines after we had William.
00:27:34
Speaker
And we deliberately talked about the miscarriages for this reason. So that because a lot of people read those women's magazines. And that was a long time, 20 odd years ago that we did that. So we've always, from then on, we've been open about it. But I think what's interesting is that what you guys are doing is fantastic because you're giving a forum or a place to go. People can Google and there's a place to go through in pain at home.
00:28:04
Speaker
that you Google and pink elephants come up and they're on their way, they've got support. I'm an ambassador for Ovarian Cancer Australia and it's the same. You Google and there's somewhere to go. There's a group of women who have got experience of that disease or miscarriage and there's somewhere to go. So I think in some ways social media and the internet have made it a whole lot easier to have the conversation.
00:28:29
Speaker
And the other thing about talking about it is that you're dealing with other people's expectations of you being pregnant.
Family Dynamics and Miscarriage
00:28:36
Speaker
Like there might be whole family members who are really excited and have told their hairdresser and they've told everybody that you know Lucy is pregnant again with her second baby.
00:28:47
Speaker
Or you know lucy's miscarriage and i mean they're very free with the sharing information which they think is really great information. And so then they then have to go around and say lucy miscarried so then the hairdresser has to offer condolences to auntie mary because lucy's lost the baby it's a.
00:29:04
Speaker
It takes a village for most things, and so often you're dealing with the excitement of the people around you as well, and you're then dealing with the grief of the people around you. You're then dealing with the inadequacy those people might feel in how to talk to you about it.
00:29:21
Speaker
So it's a big thing. So arming the women who have miscarried with huge emotional support and also just the knowledge that people around them are going to be a bit weird maybe. Sometimes it's nice to know if you're going through a grief process and just accept that people won't know what to say and that they're going to feel a bit awkward about the whole thing.
00:29:48
Speaker
And it's also that sense of failure, dealing with that sense of failure. You haven't failed anybody. And I think that's what's being transmitted more now because women are talking about it. Whereas before when there wasn't so much conversation around it, women quietly felt like failures without being reinforced that they're not failures, if that makes sense.
00:30:16
Speaker
100%, the silence perpetuated that shame and that internalization of it and feeling that level of, it's my fault because you had nowhere to share that with. And to your point as well, Deb, about meeting other people with lived experience of this. And that's what Pink Elephant's offers in those safe online communities. Who can say to you?
00:30:33
Speaker
It's not your fault. For any more questioning today, I'll say that again because it's really important. It's not your fault. You haven't done anything to lead you to where you are on this journey and experience of pregnancy losses. It really isn't your fault. Nothing you can do can make this happen. It's really bloody unfair. Then if we widen that out again to, yes, it's great that we've got safe spaces and online communities where people can connect and hold space and help each other through this.
00:31:01
Speaker
But simultaneously what Pink Elephant is trying to do is to shift this narrative, is to change this conversation so it moves from those platitudes of at least it happened early, at least you know you can get pregnant. I'm really sorry, your baby died, but just like Liz said, that's enough. We just want you to acknowledge our losses, bear witness to our grief and allow us to grieve in however way that works for us because grief is personal and individual and no one person griefs the same as another person and that's okay too.
00:31:31
Speaker
I'd love to add to that, Sam, as well. I think we're all sharing a lot about sharing and there is a time for that and there may never be a time. I think the conversation happening and we're having it at the moment is super important.
00:31:50
Speaker
And I think, as myself as a broadcaster, Sam, you felt very empowered and both of you have both been very generous with your sharing. But I think it's also really important to state that that doesn't have to be your experience, that these conversations are here to connect you. And that may be that you listen to this show and that's it. And you go home and talk to your partner or you talk to a counselor or a therapist, and it isn't something that you want to put on your social media.
00:32:16
Speaker
I think sometimes with the conversation change, it's like we all have to have it. I think there's a time for that and I think it is very individual. I was a broadcaster at the time of some of my miscarriages and it was the first thing I didn't want to share, ironically. I shared my whole life on radio for years and I went, oh sure, that's what this feels like. Holding back, not sharing because it really does start, it stops you in your tracks a bit.
00:32:45
Speaker
Or a lot. So I think it is also important to acknowledge that conversation is so important, but you can be involved in that in many ways. In many, many ways.
00:32:58
Speaker
We've covered up a lot about how the conversation's changing. I still don't believe it's changed anywhere new enough and I want to see a lot more change and I know that we at Pink elephants really do. But I guess one of the things that we want to speak with everyone that comes on and shares their experience with us is that if there is one thing that you could change about this experience for the next generation of women and partners that go through this, if you could make that change, what would that be? Deb, perhaps we'll start with you.
00:33:27
Speaker
Yeah. Look, I love it that this is cool. I've got the miscarriage rebellion here. I can see that written down. And it's all part of the conversation around women's health and women's everything.
00:33:43
Speaker
Do you know that we, and I think that's been shut down for, well, we know, yeah, blah, blah. We can have that whole conversation about what's happened to women the last thousand years. And I think the more it's talked about, the more it's normalized and the more women feel as though it's okay to share things. Because I think we've all inherited this unconscious bias that women are not allowed to speak up.
00:34:08
Speaker
that men are allowed to speak up about stuff. And there's that whole thing about mansplaining. And even as left field as watching the Matildas win, watching the Diamonds win. It's women are now going right to becoming the forefront of the conversation.
00:34:27
Speaker
and being seen as the mighty beings as we are. But it's also that we have issues that should be talked about and not hidden. Why were periods not talked about? You hear head stuff, that whole Victorian thing about putting women in corsets and all that, to control them.
00:34:46
Speaker
So, there hasn't been a free conversation about women's bits,
Generational Changes in Women's Health Discussions
00:34:50
Speaker
you know, like women's gynecological bits, like literally about what happens in our real estate down there, you know, all of the things that can go wrong, you know, whether it's cancer or miscarriage or, you know, dysfunctional periods or, you know, difficulty having sex, blah, blah, blah. All of that stuff is never talked about.
00:35:10
Speaker
So the change I'd like to see is that it's normalized and not just women business. I mean, men don't really have to take notice, but I want all the women to feel free that they can talk about absolutely everything.
00:35:27
Speaker
It's what you people are doing. It's what everyone's doing. She's just talking about it and sharing the stories. Because when you share something, I really believe the moment you share it, the grief is halved or quartered or whatever. See, that would be the main thing. It's happening anyway. The awareness, the internet is giving women a voice, so watch out, fellas.
00:35:52
Speaker
Yeah, watch out, Greg, wholeheartedly normalize this conversation about pregnancy loss. I think I just second that and I look forward to the rebellion part being taken off and then it's just a conversation. Yeah. Because I feel like we're having it, but it's like where these, which is important and needed, but it will be nice when my son is talking about it in a way that isn't rebellious per se. Yeah, but women are not the enemy.
00:36:20
Speaker
100% and it relates to so many women's health issues, as you said, Deb. And I loved that you went into the jungle for a very Council Australia as well. Absolutely loved that charity and the organization and everything they do too. Yeah, well, I'm very glad that Liz won for period products for women who can't afford it. Like, go us. Seriously, seriously. Yeah.
00:36:44
Speaker
And the great thing about that was that, you know, Rochelle Cortner, the founder. Oh, what a legend. When she founded Share the Dignity, she couldn't get on breakfast television because they didn't want her talking about periods during breakfast. And then she was just like, so happy because we're talking about periods on primetime TV when people were having their dinner.
00:37:06
Speaker
Great, I want to hear more of it, but it also plays into why pregnancy loss is not talking about, right? Because of the fact that it sits in this messy Venn diagram of periods, blood, baby death, it's all taboo and women's health and tigmas, it's all played, it's all interconnected. And again, the more that we normalize conversations around all of these issues, then the more that we open up support, empathy, validation, connections, all those really things that we know are really important. Liz, what would you change? What would you make happen?
00:37:36
Speaker
Well, there's a couple of things. I've always been really open with my kids about the miscarriages. So Evelyn, since when she was little, she knew that a baby died in my belly. And she was pretty happy to have got out alive, actually.
00:37:54
Speaker
So I didn't want them to feel like there was something going on, that they sensed there was something wrong, we didn't know what. And then Austin knows that some babies died in my belly before he was born. He also knows that I'm crossing him for taking his sweet time to come out. So that's part of the conversations that we have with our kids. So I'm hoping that when they're older, those conversations are normalized.
00:38:21
Speaker
But I guess for me, it's about, it's more around a much bigger conversation around fertility and miscarriage and fertility are linked. And when I was trying to fall pregnant, especially when I was trying to fall pregnant with Austin, the more I read, the more I realised I didn't know the first thing about my fertility. And I was in my early forties, late thirties, early forties. And so much of what we learn at school,
00:38:48
Speaker
is around how not to fall pregnant. You know, everyone knows the condom on the cucumber that teachers do and everyone loves, right? So it's about how not to fall pregnant. Whereas I think the education needs to be about how your fertility works for boys and girls, for men and women. When do you need to be thinking about making sure that you maximise your fertility? And part of that conversation is about
00:39:15
Speaker
the really high number of pregnancies that end up in miscarriage, right? It was years ago and I did the research, but it's something like one in three. This is not an unusual occurrence. Most women, when you scratch the surface, can tell you either about their miscarriage or someone they know and loves miscarriage. Most men can tell you the same thing, but it has to be part of a wider conversation about fertility, about how
00:39:40
Speaker
The amazing thing is not that something goes wrong and you miscarry. The amazing thing is that occasionally things go right. You end up with a child. There's so much to happen from intercourse for that nine months. There's so many marks that have to be hit to end up with a child, but that conversation doesn't happen. I think really it's about educating this next generation or generations who are at school about
00:40:09
Speaker
fertility, how you fall pregnant, what's a healthy way to do it? And then that extends into conversations around consent and all that sort of stuff. So it's a really big area. I think it needs to be addressed well before you hit adulthood and you start trying to fall pregnant and then have a pregnancy loss.
00:40:28
Speaker
It's all, to me, it's all really wrapped up in fertility, and it's something that I talk to my children about so that they understand it, so that when the time comes, it's not a shock. I speak to my mum, and she didn't have miscarriages, but it took her a long time to fall pregnant because no one told her how to do it.
00:40:48
Speaker
They just kept missing the window, I think, there, Dad. Because there was nothing like, you know, she didn't understand ovulation because it wasn't the thing that was talked about. And I still really didn't understand it until...
00:41:01
Speaker
until I couldn't fall pregnant. So I just feel like miscarriage is part of that greater conversation around fertility. Holy, great. It sits under sexual and reproductive health and we need to have those conversations much, much earlier than what we're doing now. I normalize this as well and move from that
00:41:19
Speaker
There's like this social narrative, isn't there, that you basically, you go to school, you go to university, you might have a little gap here and travel the world, then you get your job, you tick, tick, tick, tick, you work hard at things, and then you just get married and you just have a baby. That's what we're told. And then that's not what this is for not just a few people. This is a huge portion of women and partners either struggling to conceive it's around one in six. And then obviously pregnancy loss, like you mentioned, Liz, is somewhere between one in three and one in four. It's the most common pregnancy complication.
00:41:49
Speaker
his pregnancy loss. So why do we know so little about it? Why do we not talk about it? Why do we not offer more support for it? Why is there a complete lack of funding support from government into this issue? There is nothing. So yeah, I agree. It needs to start much earlier and in a much broader scope as well. But I just want to say, I'm so grateful.
00:42:08
Speaker
I'm not comfortable doing these things. This isn't a way outside of my normal comfort zone, but I do it because it matters. And I know that when we shared your story from I'm a sled, I'm not going to get out here. It resonated so much. We got so many women messaging us saying how amazing that they're still talking about it now that they want to make this better for women like us today. It was just, so I'm really excited about this going out and what it could do.
00:42:30
Speaker
Yay. I was really pleased that Channel 10 got in contact with you and they understood it. Actually, it just probably showed how far we come that the producers understood that conversation and a bit more support around it.
00:42:48
Speaker
maybe 10 or 15 years ago, that wouldn't have happened.
Media's Role in Miscarriage Narratives
00:42:51
Speaker
So at the time, we didn't know anything. We didn't even have a watch on. That's how little we knew. But when we got out, in our post, when you left the jungle, you actually had a debrief with the psychologists and the doctor and the producers. And in the debrief with the producers, they said, look, in that conversation,
00:43:14
Speaker
they realized it was going to raise issues for a lot of women. So they contacted you. But what else I was pleased that they did was that they contacted my husband and said, Liz has said this, do your children know this story? This is how we're going to manage it. How do you want to manage it? And that was all good. But I was really pleased actually that we had been really open with our kids. So when they heard that story, it wasn't a trauma for them. It was like, oh, mum's being on about this again.
00:43:44
Speaker
So I was actually really pleased that care was taken. And I think that probably shows the maturity of the discourse. It shows where the discourse is going and there's a maturity around that. The producers who were blokes, largely, or a couple of them, understood the sense of enmity around it. And the women who were producing
00:44:09
Speaker
also put their hands up and said, right, we need to do this in a way that is helpful, rather than a way that is traumatizing people who are watching and listening. It's so good to hear. Yeah, so good to hear this. It was so good. Like he rang me, I was at school, imagine me, I'm at a school pickup and I've got a WhatsApp call from England with a person who's on England telling me he's from, I'm a celebrity and can you mention pink elephants? I was like,
00:44:31
Speaker
Well, I don't think I'm so lost. And then he was really, really good. He took his time, he properly explained, and he said, we want to make sure that we're giving a referral. We know how hard this is. And we want to make sure that if someone's watching this, they're not just triggered and left. And that just in the eight years that I've done this has shifted. So when I first started Pink elephants and there'd been media talking about miscarriage, there'd be no way, they'd be awful really, sorry, 10 miscarriages.
00:44:56
Speaker
La la la la, and then nothing at the end. At least point people to where they can access. I think you say it in one of your interviews, Liz, that I read online. For every article on Google that's good, there's about 10 others that are not evidence-based, that are not trustworthy, that are telling you, my aunt's aunt did this, and if you do this, if you take this miracle pill, you'll be pregnant again. It's a minefield out there. When you're in that vulnerable state of life,
00:45:21
Speaker
Yeah, but like, you know, podcasts like these raise awareness and you probably don't see it because you're in it. But then to see how that awareness has since now at the forefront of people's minds, it was really reassuring that, you know, sometimes you don't understand how far the conversation has come. And that to me was a really good example of how far it's come. I mean, obviously you're never satisfied.
00:45:46
Speaker
Well, no, and it's just not so nice to hear. I mean, that was as a radio book, we were doing it and Sam found us when we were talking about it. I think it's also a credit to having something there to go to. I think years ago, the organizations didn't exist.
00:46:03
Speaker
Yeah, so it's interesting. Yeah, it's very interesting. But so, so nice to hear the backstory of that from just a personal perspective, just to know that there's people that are actually having your back, as well as everybody that's viewing and not just looking at it as, oh, this would be interesting content. Let's just see what happens. I'm going to be uncomfortable. Yeah.
00:46:26
Speaker
It's called a duty of care. It doesn't exist. And I will say, you know, when I was seeing, when I got asked to do, I'm a celebrity. I was like, no.
00:46:36
Speaker
And then the more I spoke to the guys who were producing it, the more I understood that they actually, they cared about us and they were trying, they were trying to make great content and television that rated, but they also did care about us. And that's what sort of made me think that it was worthwhile doing. And then when I got out of the jungle and heard how they, how they handled the story around Deb and I and our conversation with Asha around miscarriage, I was so pleased. I thought, yeah, that's exactly, that's, that should, that's
00:47:04
Speaker
I shouldn't be pleased that should be the gold standard but it's not.
00:47:08
Speaker
Yeah, that's right. I think as well, it's a story show. I think they've created conversations in the jungle because you're camping. It's that lovely energy that you get when you have a yarn because you've got nothing else to do. Then there's these things that you get the D&Ms around the campfire. I think they've created that nicely, which is for commercial telly, bravo. I've been really interested actually, lots of people
00:47:37
Speaker
Have said to me seen that it was a show that they could watch with their kids and their things were handled really well and I can then have the conversation with their kids, right? So there'd be kids who would have watched that conversation Deb and me and Asia and You know, it will be it will be in their mind. So I think it's really good
00:47:55
Speaker
It also shows that you can talk about these things anywhere, right? That's what's really important about it, not just pregnancy, that's what other things brought up that, like you said, and if our children's seals have these conversations, you're normalizing it. It's just part of everyday discourse that it should be, right? And that's where it changes, yeah.
Support Networks and Healing Stories
00:48:16
Speaker
People don't talk about it, but it's happening behind closed doors, hidden behind smiling faces.
00:48:24
Speaker
There are so many people suffering in silence right now, unable to access the support that they need and deserve, simply because they don't even know that there is support available. The Pink Elephants community is made up of people from all over Australia. Some come from the big smoke, others from the bush.
00:48:50
Speaker
Some of us have heaps of friends and family around. Others have none. Some have lost babies at five weeks. Some had ectopic pregnancies. Some had multiple ultrasounds. Others only ever saw the two red lines on a positive pregnancy test. But we all have something in common.
00:49:15
Speaker
We have all lost a baby. We are all bereaved parents. There are estimated to be over 100,000 of us across Australia every single year. Please help us connect with these people to give them the support that they deserve. No one should have to lose a baby and be left on their own to navigate their grief.
00:49:42
Speaker
Help Pink Elephant support more brave parents. Visit pinkelephants.org.au
00:49:53
Speaker
Absolutely, absolutely loved that conversation. I feel like it was such a brilliant conversation that covered so much of generations that had losses many years ago and those that had maybe going through it today from a unique perspective of women who went through their losses 10 and 20 years ago. Deb and Liz, a huge fan girl moment.
00:50:15
Speaker
They just are absolutely beautiful that want to continue to give back. They want to change the narratives. Deb talks about women's health and how it's been silenced for too long and why they both do work in this space to kind of makes us more awareness and support, and I just absolutely love that.
00:50:31
Speaker
Now that when we shared Deb and Liz from I'm a Celebrity, it got shared over a million times on our TikTok and I really feel like it did this massive part about normalizing conversations about pregnancy loss and fertility challenges in a really big setting that hasn't been done still much to this day. So I think that that was really important. So yeah, just what are your thoughts around all of that?
00:50:53
Speaker
Oh goodness. I really, I loved just the whole fact that this really, this episode stemmed from a campfire conversation, you know, the actual picture of that and the storytelling elements that women deserve and can do, you know, between each other. But what we've experienced is that that may have happened very privately back in the day when they were both going through these losses and then fast forward to how many years later, maybe 20 or so years later.
00:51:22
Speaker
They're sitting around a campfire with cameras and this conversation is being broadcasted to an entire country and across the world. So I think, you know, that in itself also then add to the fact that, you know, Deb played a role of Pippa from Home and Away, who for many of us was this iconic picture of what a mother looks like.
00:51:42
Speaker
And yet, all the while in her own life, having all these kinds of experience of what the reality of motherhood and fertility can look like. So there were so many things that kind of sang about this conversation changing. And also, I really took away
00:52:00
Speaker
I guess the effects of what can happen if that conversation doesn't happen you know research does suggest that women explore experiencing traumatic events during pregnancy that are related to their pregnancy. Is really as exacerbated by the isolation by the silence and that that can really stand out to be.
00:52:16
Speaker
a much more severe mental health diagnosis if not spoken about versus if it is. Watching the shift, not only in their stories, but then they were so beautifully shared their own mother's stories. I also shared a story around my girlfriend's mother who is much older, even a little bit older than my mum.
00:52:39
Speaker
I was one of the first people that she shared her journey and I wonder if I had shared mine Sam whether she would have shared her's with me you know so it is this really interesting story telling.
00:52:56
Speaker
element that I really received the healing. I really understood the healing of storytelling amongst generations, not just amongst women and amongst people and amongst professionals, but what it looks like to be sharing stories from different generations, women that have walked before us. I really got the benefits and the healing qualities of that.
00:53:21
Speaker
Yeah, I feel like it was that vulnerability and that led to connection and that meaningful connection. And I feel like that really helps us when we need to hear those stories. And it also then reinforces how long these experiences stay with us because there are many things that Liz could have chosen to open up about around that campfire. There are many things that they could have talked about in the jungle and there are many other things that they talk about.
00:53:45
Speaker
But if you remember your losses and they were 10, 20 years ago and there's still something that is significant to them in the history of whatever's happened in their lives that they used to share in that way, that really, really demonstrates and challenges that false narrative that a miscarriage is something that just happens for a moment in time and then a week later you're all better. Actually, no, our losses stay with many of us forever.
00:54:10
Speaker
We will always remember those babies and those children they could have been and the lives they may have had. It's like this living with the what-ifs forever. But I feel like that was just put to the world in such a beautiful way. They're both incredible women doing incredible work and so grateful that they gave us the time. Hopefully, if you're listening today, you're hearing it from the same way that we've heard it. Again, you're not alone. Pink elephants is here for you. If you need any support, everything is linked within the show notes.
00:54:39
Speaker
But yeah, super grateful for your time as always. Today's episode may have brought up some feelings for you that you need some support
Resources and Support for Listeners
00:54:47
Speaker
around. That's totally okay. Head to pinkelephants.org.au to find access to our circle of support, your safe space where you can be met with empathy and understanding throughout all of your experiences of early pregnancy loss. We're here for you. You are not alone.
00:55:04
Speaker
If you enjoyed listening to The Miscarriage Rebellion, please help us by leaving a five-star review wherever you listen to podcasts. The Miscarriage Rebellion is a Pink Elephants podcast produced by our friends at Three Piece Studio.