Gabrielle Union Reveals Heartbreaking Fertility Struggles in New Memoir
Gabrielle Union, beloved star of Bring it On and Being Mary Jane, has a new memoir out. In it, she reveals a devastating struggle with fertility and pregnancy loss, and the difficulty of dealing with that while in the public eye.
”I have had eight or nine miscarriages,” Union wrote in her new book We’re Going to Need More Wine. ”For three years, my body has been a prisoner of trying to get pregnant ”” I’ve either been about to go into an IVF cycle, in the middle of an IVF cycle, or coming out of an IVF cycle.”
According to PEOPLE, Union married NBA player Dwyane Wade in 2014. Initially she did not want to have children. But after she married Wade and became a step-mother to three boys, she decided she really liked being a parent and having children, and she wanted more.
”I never wanted kids,” she said. ”Then I became a stepmom, and there was no place I’d rather be than with them.”
Unfortunately, that’s been a struggle. Union revealed that she’s been doing IVF for years and has suffered through multiple miscarriages.
She says one of the hard things about going through all that is that people who don’t know what you’re going through are constantly asking about babies. Interviewers, strangers, and even family members constantly asked when she was having kids, if she wanted kids, and why didn’t she have kids. If she was heavier, which is a side effect of certain IVF procedures, people would ask if she was pregnant or play “spot the pregnancy” in red carpet photos. That must have been awful.
Don’t ask people when they’re having kids!
Especially if you don’t actually know them that well. Interviewers shouldn’t be asking celebrities that, either. It’s a shitty thing to ask someone who is struggling with fertility. And there’s no way to know if a person is or is not struggling with fertility issues, so that’s a question that should be avoided.
”For so many women, and not just women in the spotlight, people feel very entitled to know, ”˜Do you want kids?’” Union wrote. ”A lot of people, especially people that have fertility issues, just say ”˜no’ because that’s a lot easier than being honest about whatever is actually going on. People mean so well, but they have no idea the harm or frustration it can cause.”
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(Image: Instagram / Gabunion)
