Danielle De Niese Opens Up About Miscarriage
By Francisco SalazarDanielle De Niese is opening up about suffering a miscarriage hours before her performance in “La Bohème” at the Royal Opera House.
The soprano told The Guardian that she sang through the opening night performance with the pain of the ordeal. She had been in the hospital in severe pain from a miscarriage hours before.
According to The Guardian, the miscarriage was confirmed as an ectopic pregnancy two days after the performance, which is when a fertilized egg implants itself outside of the womb, usually in one of the fallopian tubes, meaning it is unable to develop.
De Niese did not know she was pregnant and experienced cramping on June 25 and went to her GP who confirmed she was pregnant.
In the interview with The Guardian, De Niese revealed that “Even though I thought I was having a miscarriage, when Gus and I heard that I was pregnant there was no time to come to grips with it. ‘I was thinking: I’ve had a miscarriage; this will probably come out in a few hours and I’ll then rest for the performance.”
Overnight the pain was so severe and it increased and Danielle and her husband Gus Christie went to the hospital in Brighton, where she was given liquid morphine. “The hospital was unable to scan the Opera singer at the time to determine whether it was an ectopic pregnancy so she returned home.”
The morning of the performance De Niese was reassured by the Royal Opera House that she could pull out if she needed to because the theater had a contingency plan. She said, “I felt so loved in that moment because as a theatre person you want to perform. I suppose, if they had told me not to perform, I may have felt sidelined and even like I was being penalized for talking about it.”
De Niese spoke to medics about going on stage and was ensured she wasn’t putting herself at additional risk. In the end, she went on stage without telling her cast in order not to put them off their performances.
De Niese noted that during the performance she felt the strain on her groin muscles and changed portions of the staging to adapt to her condition.
The soprano added that she chose to speak up to raise awareness “explaining that women face the pain of miscarriages every day.”
Categories
News