A Pregnant Emma Roberts Spoke About Endometriosis, Fertility Issues And Freezing Her Eggs In Her 20s
For us women, so much of our life is tied closely to our biology. And I don’t just mean what most people think is the epitome of womanhood—giving birth. Even if you remove that out of the equation, our lives still revolve heavily around our bodies, whether it is menstruation, menopause, hormonal changes affecting us in unpredictable ways, being perceived in certain ways because of our anatomy and even being punished and shamed because of it. Deprived because of it. I love how today, we’ve accepted that biological clock ticking is no more a limitation for women who want to live their lives. But there’s also the question of the other section of women, like Holidate actor Emma Roberts, who want to have children, want to have a career, but time is closing in and so is their body.
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Emma Roberts, at 29 today, is pregnant with her first child with boyfriend Garrett Hedlund. To a lot of us, that would seem like a pretty normal age, well within a woman’s fertile years, so to say. However, the Roberts recently revealed that she struggled with undiagnosed endometriosis at 20, which compelled her to freeze her eggs. The entire process of being diagnosed for the first time, coming to terms with her fertility problems and being told that she would have to freeze her eggs if she wanted to get pregnant eventually was terrifying for her. And she’s finally talking about it.
The American Horror Story star and niece of Julia Roberts is on the cover of Cosmopolitan’s December/January issue. It makes her the magazine’s first pregnant cover star too. In the interview, Emma Roberts talked about the difficult journey that she had to endure, which began way back with painful periods in her adolescence.
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“I always had debilitating cramps and periods, so bad that I would miss school and, later, have to cancel meetings. I mentioned this to my doctor, who didn’t look into it and sent me on my way because maybe I was being dramatic?”
This, right here, is something a lot of women have to endure. Second guessing what’s happening to them. Being told they’re overreacting, that the pain happens to every woman so our is not different or more painful. It’s the reason why so many cases of PCOS and endometriosis go undiagnosed for so long. And it’s sometimes thanks to the very professionals who should be helping us out.
Also Read: Sonam Kapoor Reveals She’s Struggling With PCOS, Shares Tips On How She Keeps The Symptoms In Check.
Luckily, Emma Roberts decided to switch her doctors and that’s when her real diagnosis came through. Unfortunately, it wasn’t good news.
“In my late 20s, I just had a feeling I needed to switch to a female doctor. It was the best decision. She ran tests, sent me to a specialist. Finally, there was validation that I wasn’t being dramatic. But by then, it had affected my fertility. I was told, ‘You should probably freeze your eggs or look into other options.'”
Imagine being in your early 20s and learning that a possibility of something, that you don’t even know you want now or later, could be snatched away from you.
“At 16, I thought, By the time I’m 24, I’ll be married with kids. And then I was 24 and I was like, Remember when I said I would be married with kids by now? With work, especially with acting—the travel, the hours—it’s not always conducive to settling down in a traditional way.”
And timing was Emma’s issue. She realised at 24 that even though her fertility was a concern due to endometriosis, she wasn’t ready yet to be a mother. And the whole thing was too much to take in. “I said, ‘I’m working right now. I don’t have time to freeze my eggs’. To be honest, I was also terrified. Just the thought of going through that and finding out, perhaps, that I wouldn’t be able to have kids.”
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What is even more devastating is that through all this, Emma Roberts couldn’t help but feel that it was somehow “her fault” that this was happening. Like she did something wrong, which brought on the endometriosis and the fertility issues. But soon, she started speaking to other women about her condition and that helped her realise that it wasn’t so.
Though we don’t know if Emma got pregnant the natural way, she did confirm that she eventually did freeze her eggs. She called it a “difficult process”. The actor also said that the moment she stopped thinking about getting pregnant is when she did get pregnant. Which might suggest that it could’ve been a natural pregnancy.
What Emma Roberts has gone through seems to be happening to a lot of women today. Our lifestyle has changed drastically over the years, which is bound to impact our biology. More women are being diagnosed with PCOS now than before. And more women are having fertility issues and difficult pregnancies too. However, the whole idea that women need to grin and bear it when they should be speaking up about what’s happening to them and be heard needs to change.
https://thehauterfly.com/lifestyle/from-sharing-pictures-of-her-breastfeeding-to-flaunting-her-stretch-marks-ashley-graham-is-redefining-motherhood-and-we-love-it/
