Our fertility as women is a blessing and a curse

Naked Attraction host Anna Richardson wants to break taboos around menopause, she tells

- ABI JACKSON

ANNA Richardson said facing up to the loss of her fertility with menopause hit her "like a brick wall"

The TV presenter and podcaster, 52, who started experiencing perimenopause symptoms in her mid40s, still hopes to start a family - but said her feelings around having children have always been complicated, following the trauma of an ectopic pregnancy at 21.

"Fertility, particularly if you are a woman, is absolutely core to our identity, and I think sometimes we don't give enough weight to that. I've always had a conflicted opinion or feelings about being a mother and having my own children, because of my early experience of traumatic pregnancy, so that informed me not having my own children, explains Anna.

"I was relatively comfortable with that as my life has gone on, because I've got a very successful career, and I could see friends around me having kids and thinking, 'I don't want to deal with that that looks like a nightmare!' 

"However, there is something about hitting menopause where the choice is removed from you, and suddenly you're faced with: A, your mortality, and B, the end of your fertile years and you suddenly think, God, even if I wanted to have kids, I can't now. And where does that leave me in terms of building my own family and future? That's hit me like a brick wall in my face, oh hang on a second, I've missed. out on building a family."