Chrissy Teigen took to Instagram yesterday to share the devastating news that she and her husband John Legend had lost their unborn child, whom they had named Jack.
Teigen was believed to be halfway along in her pregnancy.
The 34-year-old, who has two other children with Legend - four-year-old Luna, and two-year-old Miles - had been updating her 31.5 million followers on the progress of her pregnancy, which became more complicated in recent weeks.
Alongside several black-and-white candid photos - which showed the aftermath of her miscarriage in an incredibly raw manner; one of her in tears, her head bowed on a hospital bed, and another of her holding the child in a bundle of blankets, with Legend's face resting on her shoulder - Teigen wrote:
"We are shocked and in the kind of deep pain you only hear about, the kind of pain we’ve never felt before. We were never able to stop the bleeding and give our baby the fluids he needed, despite bags and bags of blood transfusions. It just wasn’t enough."
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Teigen surely knew what was going to happen next.
The model and TV personality has long been an outspoken user of Twitter, where she has previously shared many intimate insights into her family life, as well as speaking brazenly about politics (in a particularly scathing manner about the Trump Administration).
That being said, she is no stranger to criticism and internet trolling.
So amidst the condolences and support she and Legend received from celebrities and her followers, Teigen was subjected to people who questioned her outlet for grief.
Why did she choose to share something so personal and intimate? Many people accused her of seeking attention, while others criticized how she handled her pregnancy to begin with.
Others even questioned whether she chose to go to the hospital too late.
And, of course, there were comments regarding why she decided to "pose" for photos in the wake of her miscarriage.
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Teigen has never shied away from sharing her vulnerabilities with the world; she chronicled the process of getting her breast implants removed, has spoken candidly about the realities of being a working mother, and now about pregnancy loss, in all of its raw pain.
By doing so, Teigen has given a voice - at her own expense - to something that is very common, but rarely given a public platform.
Per the NHS, miscarriages are much more common than most people realize.
The website details that amongst women who are confirmed to be pregnant, it is estimated that around one in eight pregnancies will end in miscarriage. And 1% - approximately 24,000 pregnancies each year - end after 20 weeks in stillbirth.
Teigen's refusal to grieve silently (she later tweeted: "Driving home from the hospital with no baby. How can this be real") will undoubtedly go a long way to comfort a legion of women and families who have experienced the same thing, but found it difficult to speak about.
Miscarriages are often shrouded in secrecy, partly due to the language of "failure" that surrounds conception, and the lack thereof, but also due to the scale of pain suffered by those who have lost a child.
Women are expected to carry about their normal routines during and afterward; speaking about their experience, and the hope they had for their unborn child, will inevitably render outsiders uncomfortable, and is therefore stigmatized.
So, Teigen's honestly most likely came at great personal cost.
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In fact, after Teigen shared her heartbreaking loss, actress Kate Beckinsale spoke out - not only to slam those attacking the model for "posing" for photographs or taking to social media when she "should be mourning" - but also to share that she has also gone through the pain of a miscarriage.
Beckinsale wrote:
"I’ve noticed people criticizing @chrissyteigen for sharing deeply intimate photos of the loss of her baby.
"As if there’s some protocol during [the] soul-scouring calamity that, if not observed, emboldens people who do not know her or her family to say how she should be handling the unimaginable."
The Underworld actress then opened up about how she herself lost a baby after 20 weeks of gestation, and how she was left emotionally devastated by the experience.
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"Years ago, I lost a baby at 20 weeks. I had managed to keep my pregnancy quiet and I absolutely collapsed inside and no one would have known," the 47-year-old star wrote.
"There is grief, shame and shock so often that come with an experience like this, plus the heartbreak of your body continuing, after the loss, to act as if it had a child to nurture," she added.
Beckinsale then explained: "Your milk comes in, with no one to feed. It can be the loneliest, most soul destroying period of time, particularly if you are not in the position of having an emotionally connected, supportive partner like Chrissy has."
She continued:
"I think it’s an honor to be allowed into another [person's] grief, especially with a subject like this which so often puts a woman into that hall of mirrors state of life continuing as if the world hasn’t, for you, come to a bloody and terrible halt."
Teigen refused to make her story or her pain palatable, which we are collectively expected to do. But nothing about losing a child is comfortable, and speaking about it should not lead to accusations of oversharing, rather we should praise the individual's strength and vulnerability.
October is Pregnancy Loss Awareness Month, and when we look at the photos of Chrissy Teigen, we must swallow the feeling of being uncomfortable in the face of such clear anguish.
The loss of a child is something that many women and families cannot just ignore, and neither should we.
If you are struggling with any of the issues discussed in this article, in the United Kingdom miscarriageassociation.org.uk provides support services including a helpline and online live chat.
In the United States, womenshealth.gov provides advice on coping with pregnancy loss.