Eva Amurri Martino on Sharing Her Miscarriage: The Support Has Been 'Healing'
It’s been over a month since Eva Amurri Martino shared the heartbreaking news that she had suffered a miscarriage at nine weeks pregnant, but the actress and lifestyle expert is still overwhelmed by the outpouring of support.
“I didn’t really know how I was going to feel about sharing, I just knew I felt really strongly about sharing it. I couldn’t have known how healing it was going to be,” Amurri Martino, 30, tells PEOPLE.
“It was an amazing process to hear from other women who had gone through the same thing. My doctor told me the statistics and I was just blown away. There are women all over the world experiencing the pain and heartbreak that I felt.”
She adds, “Unfortunately, the fact that it became a news story dictates more how little people share. I shared because I want to be honest in my life and I thought how disingenuous to be writing this blog and have this huge thing happen in my life and not share.”
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The stigma surrounding a miscarriage — and the decision to keep it quiet — is one the actress knows is all too real.
“I think we equate femininity and our value as a woman in being able to reproduce and be a mother to a certain extent,” she explains. “There’s not a lot of information so I think people often assume that they did something wrong, that it was something they did. And so they feel shameful about that.”
Despite being a “pretty progressive thinker,” Amurri Martino says her doctor warned her that the weeks following the miscarriage could be emotionally challenging.
“I totally had feelings like, what if I had done this? And you just have to get that part out of your head,” she says. “People assume there is something that could have been done and it’s not like that.”
And the mother of 13-month-old Marlowe Mae, her daughter with 36 Hours host and former soccer player Kyle Martino, says her new lifestyle site, Happily Eva After, has been another source of comfort — and not just for Amurri Martino.
“What moved me so much was other women speaking to each other and comforting each other on my website. That’s really what made me decide that I want to continue to do this for a long time,” she explains.
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Amurri Martino, who celebrated the success of her launch with a party hosted by Hormel Gatherings, is continuing to find strength in her community of fellow moms.
“If motherhood has taught me anything, it’s how to ask for help. And now, I find so much strength in vulnerability,” says Amurri Martino.
“I’m not perfect, my life isn’t perfect, my child isn’t perfect and that realization helps you become a truer version of yourself.”
The idea to start her own blog came after Amurri Martino found herself trying to transition into motherhood while struggling to not lose herself in the process.
“It was such a tough time. I was looking for a resource and I wasn’t finding it. I couldn’t find anyone who was doing what I was doing, having a career and being a great mom and being a great wife and being a woman,” she says.
“I wanted to find the joy in parenting. I didn’t want to be one of those parents who was trying to have it all.”
As far as the future? “I think I want to have two kids, maybe three. We’ll see,” she shares. “You never know where life is going to take you so I’m just trying to keep an open mind.”
— Aili Nahas