Victoria Derbyshire describes ‘upsetting’ time she miscarried on a plane then went back to work
Victoria Derbyshire has described her “bizarre” experience of suffering a miscarriage on a plane, before continuing her work day despite it being “very upsetting”.
The BBC presenter recalled the experience while speaking to Giovanna Fletcher on the latter’s Happy Mum Happy Baby podcast recently.
Derbyshire, who now shares sons Oliver, 20, and Joe, 17, with her husband Mark Sandell, spoke openly about the pregnancy loss and said: "We had a miscarriage first, that was very upsetting.
"I actually had the miscarriage on a plane. I was so practical and pragmatic, I was like, ‘Well, this is happening now and I’m going to work’, and I just carried on," she said. "It’s absolutely bizarre."
Derbyshire, 56, said that although she is a "talker" and is usually "very open" about her life, the miscarriage was "the one thing I couldn’t talk about for about five years".
"It was so odd, I could not speak about it," she said of her grief. Derbyshire added that she didn’t "give myself time to process" the loss because of her habit of "just [cracking] on with stuff".
"[I] don’t dwell and don’t particularly analyse because I don’t want to," she said, but admitted that the "pain never quite leaves you".
"It’s a really horrible way to start your mothering journey, to end in a loss. I don’t think you really think about miscarriage - especially 20 years ago. People really wouldn’t have been speaking about miscarriage."
However, she found telling her sons about the loss of their sibling "cathartic". "I was discussing it as a family and they were really curious about what happened, [wondering], ‘Oh gosh, we might have had an older sister, brother, whatever’."
Now, Derbyshire’s sons think "fondly" of what could have been. "They fondly think of, ‘Oh, what if it had been a sister? What would you have called her?’ I know what we’d have called her. They would’ve liked a sister."
In the podcast, the presenter also said she would love to be a new mother again, despite not having had a period since she underwent chemotherapy for breast cancer, which she was diagnosed with in 2015.
Reminiscing about how much she enjoyed being pregnant again with her sons, Derbyshire said: "I loved it. I obviously can't now, I'm in my fifties and I haven't had a period since I had chemotherapy; I feel like I could have a baby now. Isn't that mad? I love being the mum of a newborn."
For more information and support you can visit Tommy’s or stillbirth and neonatal death charity, Sands UK.
Read more about pregnancy loss:
What is a baby loss certificate and how do I apply for one? (Yahoo Life UK, 3-min read)
Mother who lost her baby over three decades ago helps others with their grief (EssexLive, 4-min read)
Nine women share what it's like to have a miscarriage (The Conversation, 6-min read)
