This week’s guest is Bruntwood Prize winning playwright, screenwriter and director Anna Jordan. Her work has been performed in theatres around the country from the Royal Court to the Royal Exchange. On screen you’ll have heard her whip smart dialogue in shows such as Succession and Killing Eve. Her down to earth charm is combined with a furiously wicked humour – finding laughter and hope in the darkest of places. And it’s this combination that is so striking in her monologue for The Bunker’s Everywoman, in which playwrights wrote confessions on parenting and identity. Anna’s piece was on her miscarriages and navigating a potential motherhood whilst losing her own mother. In Anna’s signature style, the account is far from hopeless, more, it’s an honest tale about a subject that is still so little spoken of without shame and fear.

Anna had three missed miscarriages before she had her son (who makes a star appearance). She talks to us about trying for a baby, the losses along the way, what a missed miscarriage is and the choices that follow. We discuss how writing can help us find a way to remember and the joy of finding just the right word for some of the most painful experiences of life. Anna explores the shame of blood, who to tell about your miscarriages and the act of falling in love with her pregnant body after years of self-scrutiny.

She says ‘if one in four pregnancies end in miscarriage then why as a society don’t we talk about this more? Why is it that anything that occurs below the belly button and above the knee of a woman is talked about in whispers?’

We do go to some darker places here about so take care if you’ve been affected by miscarriage.

CW: Miscarriage, death

Anna is a terrific workshop facilitator and will running a Nurture Ideas and Keep Them Alive workshop on Thurs 3rd Sept, perfect for anyone who wants to get that writing idea down on paper however experienced you are- you can book on eventbrite HERE

Anna is represented by Camilla Young at Curtis Brown

Read more about Anna's experience in her blog HERE

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For support about pregnancy, miscarriage and pregnancy loss/still birth you can contact:

Tommy’s Charity

The Miscarriage Association provide free advice and support

And Sands.org for stillbirths and neonatal...

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