Dame Laura Kenny has bravely opened up about her harrowing experiences while trying to conceive her second child with seven-time cycling champion Jason Kenny.
In a candid interview with The timesThe 32-year-old Olympian detailed having suffered a miscarriage in November 2021 and two months later having to have a fallopian tube removed due to an ectopic pregnancy.
An ectopic pregnancy occurs when a pregnancy develops outside the uterus, usually in one of the fallopian tubes. An ectopic embryo will not survive and the pregnancy will be aborted.
The professional cyclist, who announced her retirement from the sport in March, admitted she and her husband Jason, 36, were unable to talk about the loss because they were “consumed” by their own grief.
Lady Laura explained: “I couldn’t talk to anyone. I wasn’t the open Laura I normally am. I didn’t know how to express what I felt…”
Dame Laura Kenny has bravely opened up about her harrowing experiences while trying to conceive her second child with seven-time cycling champion Jason Kenny (pictured 2021)
She continued: ‘Everyone forgets about the man. I understand that I had to go through a really scary operation, but he had to hold down the fort at home and everyone was thinking, ‘Is Laura OK?’
‘No one asked me about him even once. In fact, a lady did once at a Q&A and he was speechless in front of an audience of 300 people. So I couldn’t share with him how bad I felt, because I knew he felt even worse.
‘We both kept it to ourselves. I was consumed by my own brain.’
Jason and Laura welcomed their son Monty in August last year. The younger brother of their six-year-old son Albie.
The five-time British Olympic gold medallist has previously said she wanted a baby more than any sporting medal.
Speaking to Women’s healthShe said: “I can’t tell you how sad I was for a year and 18 months. I mean, you could ask Jase how he was, he was a different person.
“I just shut myself away because it was consuming me. All I wanted was this little baby; I didn’t want gold medals, I didn’t want to compete in the Commonwealth Games. I wanted a baby. And that wasn’t happening.”
Before the birth of her second child and a year after her ectopic pregnancy, Laura won a silver medal at the 2022 Commonwealth Games but admitted she found no happiness in victory.
Jason and Laura welcomed their son Monty in August last year. A younger brother to their six-year-old son Albie.
She explained: ‘I thought, why would (my body) do that and not do what I want most…
“I felt like I lived in this yin and yang world where I could only have one of them.”
Laura candidly described this period as “the most difficult” of her life, and it was not easy for Jason either.
“No one asked him if he was okay or how he felt,” he explained.
‘And then I guess I totally underestimated how much I was using him and how much I would talk to him and never say, “Jase, are you really okay?”
Laura announced her retirement in March this year and in an interview with the BBC explained: ‘I always knew deep down that I would know when the time was right.
‘I had a great time, but now it’s time to hang up the bike.
‘I’ve been thinking about it for a while: the sacrifice of leaving the children and family at home is really very big and it’s a very important decision to make.
‘It was becoming increasingly difficult for me to do so.
‘More and more people were asking me what races I was doing, what training camps I was going to. I didn’t want to go and that’s where the situation came down to.
‘I had a feeling of hesitation. Winning another gold medal, as much as I loved doing it, no longer gave me the energy I wanted.
“I wasn’t thinking, ‘I really want to go on and win one,’ I was thinking, ‘I really want to stay home with the kids.'”
Dame Laura is Britain’s most successful Olympian with five gold medals (pictured at the Tokyo 2020 Olympics)
Laura won gold in the omnium and team pursuit at both London 2012 and Rio 2016.
After giving birth to her first child, Albie, in 2017, she won the Madison with Katie Archibald at Tokyo 2020, as well as a silver in the team pursuit. She also claimed seven world titles.
During the candid interview, she also revealed that the miscarriage and ectopic pregnancy had “more to do” with the decision than “I ever imagined.”
She said: ‘I was quite open about having had a miscarriage and the ectopic pregnancy.
‘I think maybe that had a lot more to do with it than I ever realized or anticipated.
“The only thing I ever wanted for Albie was a brother. I always saw Albie as a big brother, and if that didn’t happen and I couldn’t have another baby…
“Then once he was here and I had another one, I just didn’t want to waste that time.”
For help and support, contact the Miscarriage Association on 01924 200799