Tara Lipinski is opening up about the heartbreaking journey she’s been on in order to grow her family.
The former Olympic figure skater recently shared with People that she and her husband Todd Kapostasy have been “on the fertility journey from hell” over the past five years.
“I have never really publicly spoken about it,” the 41-year-old said. “So it just felt like at this point I finally felt ready.”
“I grew up as an Olympic athlete and at a very young age I was in the spotlight and sharing my life publicly,” she shared. “This was just the first time in my life — and it’s gone on for so long — that I felt like I was living this lie or living with this big secret.”
In the beginning of her IVF journey, Lipinski said she was amazed at the possibility of having “a little football team of embryos there waiting for us whenever we decide to get pregnant.” But she quickly realized that would not be the case.
“It’s just been years of facing almost every obstacle you can in the world of IVF,” she recalled. “There’s so many different moments that I look back on where I thought, ‘Oh, we’re there, we’re nearing the end.’ And it just never got there for us.”
She explained the past five years have been a “winding journey full of failure after failure after failure.”
“In the last five years, I’ve been under anesthesia 24 times, had four miscarriages, four D&Cs [dilation and curettage], six failed transfers, eight retrievals and was diagnosed with endometriosis with two subsequent major surgeries,” she said. “My life revolved around doctor appointments and procedures.”
Last summer Lipinski had back to back miscarriages. It was her “lowest point.”
“One miscarriage was heartbreaking but four made me feel like a shell of myself. After the second miscarriage, I stopped crying. There were no more tears left. I just felt numb.”
The former Olympian said people often ask about her time competing and how she was able to do the “impossible.”
“If I thought the Olympics was a difficult journey, I had no idea what was in store for me because this is by far the most difficult thing that I’ve ever encountered in my life.”
Despite the intense struggles, Lipinski and Kapostasy have not given up.
“My urge to become a mother is what had gotten me through and has kept me going. I’ve never wanted anything more.”
READ MORE:
- Laura Benanti shares she suffered a miscarriage during performance
- Mom hopes for baby after agonizing miscarriage, is blessed with quadruplets instead
Even though more and more people are talking about infertility and miscarriages, they’re both still such taboo topics. But the reality is so many people experience them. We need to continue the conversation to let others know they aren’t alone.
