SARAH VINE: Cowardly trolls may mock – but Carrie Symonds is doing women a great service by speaking with such candour

Carrie Johnson announces she is pregnant with the couple’s second child, having suffered a miscarriage early on in the year – and Twitter springs to life like a putrefying zombie sensing a piece of passing grey matter.

‘Fake baby’; ‘Ooh, look, another dead cat’; endless jokes about nursery wallpaper; and the rest, quite honestly, so unpleasant even Frankie Boyle might consider them a bit de trop.

Most of them, of course, hiding behind anonymity like the pathetic cowardly creeps they are.

Such is the lot of any political partner, especially one married to a Conservative. 

The hard-Left is far nastier and more aggressive than the Right, especially when it comes to the abuse of women.

Carrie Johnson announces she is pregnant with the couple’s second child, having suffered a miscarriage early on in the year – and Twitter springs to life like a putrefying zombie sensing a piece of passing grey matter, writes SARAH VINE. Above: Carrie with baby Wilfred and the PM

Even those supposedly in the responsible mainstream do it: Kevin Maguire, of the New Statesman, couldn’t resist having a dig: ‘Will this be 7 or 8 children fathered by Boris Johnson?’ he tweeted.

How original. And what a lovely sentiment to extend to an expectant mother sharing such deeply personal and bittersweet news.

To an extent, it comes with the territory. Every politician or politician’s spouse has to accept a bit of teasing from the other side now and again. 

But there are times when even the toughest feel vulnerable, and pregnancy and miscarriage ought to be respected.

But no. Some people will always see you purely through the prism of their own political tribalism. 

You are not a person in your right, indeed you are probably not even human, and neither is your family. 

Your feelings and state of mind don’t matter. Not even in moments of great anguish.

I’m sure Carrie thought long and hard before telling the world about her miscarriage. 

She will have been fully aware of how people might seize upon it and twist it out of shape for their own ends.

Which makes her decision to share her experience even more admirable, especially at such a vulnerable stage in her life.

Pregnancy is a special time for most women, but it can also be incredibly stressful, and no more so than when you’ve only just lost a baby. 

I don’t know the details of her miscarriage earlier this year, but I am certain that the fear of it happening again stalks her, as it would any woman in her position.

Even now she is past the high-risk stage, and has presumably had many scans reassuring her, her hormones will mean she is hypersensitive to every worry. 

Having one child already – Wilfred – running around the place will no doubt act as a welcome distraction a lot of the time. But still. 

‘Fake baby’; ‘Ooh, look, another dead cat’; endless jokes about nursery wallpaper; and the rest, quite honestly, so unpleasant even Frankie Boyle might consider them a bit de trop. Most of them, of course, hiding behind anonymity like the pathetic cowardly creeps they are. Above: Mr and Mrs Johnson with England legend David Beckham prior to the Euro 2020 final

She could probably do without the trolls. Especially since what she is doing in speaking out is a genuinely good thing.

Miscarriage is one of the last great taboo subjects, even though countless women experience it every day.

More than one in five pregnancies ends in miscarriage – around a quarter of a million each year in the UK. 

Talking about it, being honest about the realities and, crucially, removing the stigma that still surrounds miscarriage, is an important part of helping women recover.

Carrie is not telling the world because she wants our sympathy; she’s doing so because the baby she lost is as much part of the story of her growing family as the one she already has and the one she hopes to welcome at Christmas.

Like many women who have been through what she has, that baby was as real to her as the one in her belly. Of course she wants to talk about it, of course she wants to share her heartbreak.

Like so many women of her generation – including, of course, the Duchess of Sussex – Carrie doesn’t take a stiff-upper-lip approach to these things. 

And if you ask me, that’s all to the good. Because while I’m not necessarily a fan of oversharing, I also know there are some things that, if suppressed, only make things worse.

Carrie, seen with a push chair on April 21, gave birth to her first baby with the PM, Wilfred Lawrie Nicholas Johnson, last April 

That doesn’t mean to say you have to spill every last detail, but letting the world know what you’ve faced can be a very important step towards processing the trauma.

Women need to feel they can be open about their experiences of miscarriage and loss.

For some, Carrie’s admission is an opportunity to gloat, a reason to diminish her and Boris, to revel in their misfortune.

But for the vast majority, I suspect, it will be comforting to know that behind all the formality and pomp of No 10 Downing Street live a couple who, for all their power and privilege, understand first-hand the kind of experiences that many ordinary people endure. 

That is to be applauded, not mocked.  

Source: Read Full Article