“Any issue that I’ve had, I’ve been able to speak to someone about it.”
Reflecting on suffering an ectopic pregnancy, which happened in 2022, she said: “It was a scary circumstance to be thrown in. You go into hospital thinking you’ve got COVID, and then literally, within three hours, I’m on an operating table because they were telling me it could kill me.
“It was just a traumatic time. Jason, my husband, is also an Olympic cyclist, so he sees me at my best and at my worst. We don’t really say, ‘I think you’re depressed’, because they’re not words that have ever been in our vocabulary until that moment.
“I became this shell of a person who, when I looked in a mirror, it wasn’t me, it wasn’t the person that I always am, this bubbly personality that everyone sees. Except I was on the outside.
“I got back on the bike because it was my normality. It was the only thing that was giving me the headspace to think.
“Because when I was at home, just the desire to have another baby was consuming me. And so every minute I was in the house, that’s all I could think about.
“When eventually I was able to speak about it, I came to terms with it, mainly through my mum and dad and Jason’s family and being able to talk to Jason.
“I think once I started opening up, all of a sudden my tool was my voice again. That’s how I dealt with what I would call my biggest mental health issue that I’ve had throughout my whole career.”
Dame Laura Kenny opened up how husband Sir Jason Kenny and his family helped
PA
Explaining why she’s happy to open up about such a personal issue she said: “My main drive for coming out and speaking about [the miscarriage] in the first place was it’s such a lonely experience when you go through it.
“And I didn’t realise how many people it actually happened to until I’d actually started opening up.
“So my mum, for example, had actually had a miscarriage, but hadn’t told me until I told her about us.
“You’re sitting there in hospital or wherever it happens to you, and you’re Googling and you’re Googling and you’re searching for answers, and you’re searching for anyone else that is in your same position, because ultimately, you want your happy ending. You want the happy story.
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