It's risky to talk about pregnancy.
That's why I'm starting this way, by warning you.
There are women who want to get pregnant,
and unfortunately they can't;
others who, on the other hand, get pregnant unintentionally.
It is estimated that about 50% of pregnancies are unplanned.
Other times, pregnancy
is the traumatic result of sexual assault.
Other times again, a couple has just finished
the last assisted fertilization cycle that they could afford.
When I speak of pregnancy,
I speak not only to women, but also to men.
Suppose a person has to, wants to
or even can conceive children
on the pure basis of her gender
is intrusive and assuming.
25% of pregnancies end with a miscarriage.
One woman out of four - one couple, out of four.
This means,
every time we see three couples announcing a pregnancy on social media,
there's a person at home, a woman, a couple,
who couldn't make that same announcement.
When we mourn,
we used to talk about it with our family,
with our loved ones, with our friends, even on social media.
This allows us to receive the support we need
to overcome a traumatic event.
However, this does not apply to miscarriages.
Abortion remains a solitary, unconfessable event,
where women and couples are isolated from the "12-week rule".
Let me introduce again: I'm Erika, and last year I lost a child.
Talking about miscarriages
it's difficult, it's personal and sad;
but it's not rare, or unnatural.
When, last year, I found
that my pregnancy would not be successful,
I hated myself for not talking to anyone about it.
I had to call my parents, my friends,
and announce: I was pregnant; I no longer am.
This of course complicates the conversation,
because I felt invisible, not enough, inadequate.
How many other women have felt that way, like me?
Precisely because you're isolated from this "12-week rule."
Do you know it?
According to the 12-week rule,
what a woman, a couple should do
is to announce pregnancy
only at the end of the 12th week of gestation,
when pregnancy is out of danger,
and the risk of miscarriage drops.
Warning: it does not zero! But it drops dramatically.
I like to include this 12-week rule
in what I call "Fake Life Rules."
Fake life rules are those lies
we tell each other, and grow up with, believing that they are true.
Some examples?
Go to university; graduate; find the right person;
get married; make children; and so on.
Every generation has its own.
Within these rules there's also a whole series of rules
that affect women and the female reality.
You don't expect a woman to talk about being a woman,
biologically speaking:
he doesn't expect us to talk about abortions or menstruation and so on.
A woman - today, but also in the past -
faces several challenges: social, economic and health.
When these challenges intersect,
what she can do is find an adverse social environment.
And what happens?
That even pregnancy becomes a challenge.
Pregnancy becomes a place to represent yourself:
Am I worthy? Who am I?
But what if a woman doesn't want a child?
What if a couple doesn't want a child?
What happens,
when a person tells us she doesn't want to have a child?
Tipically, we all begin to ask: why?
Why, then, don't we ask
to all those people who want to be parents,
or who already are,
why do they want to be,
as much as we ask people who don't want to be
why they don't want to?
We live in a performance society, where only results matters:
the job we work, how much we make,
what school we attended,
how well we graduated from high school.
It all seems so... fake;
it almost seems that we have to comply
with the standards of the Happy Family tv ad.
Isn't that right?
And what happens when even a child becomes a goal to achieve,
when even that son comes back
on the list of fake life rules that we need to follow?
That we feel a failure, that we feel inadequate,
we feel invisible, we don't feel up to it.
It was therapeutic for me
to share my experience of miscarriage;
and above all to understand that there are different versions,
that every person has their own narrative.
To free us from oppressions, taboos,
what we have to do, maybe,
is just accepting that each person has their own story to tell,
whatever it is;
and above all, stereotypes should be droppped.
How can we break down stereotypes?
By listening.
Accepting that every person can tell us their own story,
making others less invisible.
And most importantly, accept
that there is not a single way to be a mother, and a woman.
Thank you.