As we not-so-patiently wait for former First Lady Michelle Obama's highly anticipated memoir Becoming, ABC's Robin Roberts gave us a preview this morning on Good Morning America. In the clip, Obama opened up about her miscarriage and fertility struggle.
“I felt like I failed because I didn't know how common miscarriages were because we don't talk about them,” Obama told Roberts. “We sit in our own pain, thinking that somehow we’re broken.”
The Obamas eventually turned to in vitro fertilisation, where the sperm and egg are combined outside of the body, to conceive their two daughters, Malia and Sasha. Obama said she thinks it's important to talk to young mothers about miscarriages, so they never have to suffer alone.
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"I think it's the worst thing that we do to each other as women — not share the truth about our bodies and how they work and how they don't work," Obama said.
According to the American Pregnancy Association, about 10-25% of all clinically recognised pregnancies end in a miscarriage. There's also something called a chemical pregnancy, which is a term for when a pregnancy is lost very shortly after conception. Chemical pregnancies account for 50-75% of all miscarriages.
Celebrities such as Carrie Underwood, Jana Kramer, and Refinery29's global editor and co-founder Christene Barberich have bravely spoken about their own miscarriages and fertility struggles too, in order to let other women going through similar situations know that they're not alone. Obama's memoir will be released on November 13.