Meet Katy Leeson, Managing Director of Social Chain who also hosts a podcast called ‘I Shouldn’t Say This But’ and at the time of our chatting had just been nominated for an award for ‘Leading the Charge and Pushing the Boundaries’ with Campaign Magazine ( a big industry title ) I spoke with Katy in real life at Social Chain’s very cool office in central Manchester, in the days where you could do that, which is why Kate isn’t in this episode.

Self Protection

Katy spoke about her struggle with the responsibility of being a young female Managing Director. She had imposter syndrome and took herself into therapy sessions to get support on how best to deal with it. In the context of this chat, Katy explained how she made sure she was mentally prepared to talk about her miscarriage in the public sphere because she had no idea what the reaction would be and she was nervous that people would tell her it wasn’t the right place or platform- something so many people fear when talking about infertility.

Baby Loss Awareness Week

Katy shared her story in October 2019, a year after her miscarriage which happened in December 2018. She spoke about the challenges of that time of year with everybody being together and how it forced her into telling people that I was pregnant, as she wasn’t drinking in the Chrimbo celebrations – this was before the ’12 week’ point. Her family and friends knew and so she also had to share with her that she had miscarried on Christmas Eve because she didn’t want to get messages wishing her the best Christmas and New Year because she was going to have a baby in the next year. Katy talked about feeling that she was also ruining other people’s Christmas because she’d tell them such sad news.

Miscarrying Naturally Katy spoke about how she miscarried naturally the day before she was due to be put under for the operation. The first scan she had, she said felt a good connection to someone who really cared and she said ‘You look healthy, everything there on the scan looks healthy, you’ve just started an unfortunate experience, there was just a problem with that egg or that sperm, and you should be fine and I can’t wait to see you again’ which Katy said gave her such hope as every other interaction she had, felt like she was just being told to get on with things.

Breakdown in Communication.

Katy explained how she was still getting letters about having scans for her pregnancy after she had miscarried due to being registered with two different hospitals and how they were ringing her partner but wouldn’t speak to him so he couldn’t even act as her gatekeeper. This meant in the end, she had to have numerous conversations reliving her experience over and over/

Telling Work

Katy talked about how she had spoken to others about how much of a lift it is, to be told it’s not your fault, which is such a straightforward piece of information to give to somebody. We talked about how she had no follow-up conversations after going through it and wasn’t given any guidance on where to find support. She had stopped her therapy and hadn’t told her work as she didn’t want to tell them she was going through ‘something so horrific because she was worried they would think she would then be trying again and be off on Maternity. So she didn’t tell anyone and struggled with it from Christmas until Easter – which is when she said the broke down. When she did tell them, they were amazing

Talking it through in Therapy

Katy discussed the grieving process with her therapist and how she had been putting so much pressure on herself with her work and doing the right thing by others. She talked about giving herself permission to grieve once she had accessed support once again. She also talked about how she went to the doctors and was given antidepressants, which she is still on

The Impact of Miscarriage

We talked about how misunderstood…

Have a listen to an episode where we also talked about miscarriage here:

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