Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced today (July 31) that he and his wife Priscilla are expecting a baby girl. He also wrote candidly about the couple’s difficulties in having a child, including three miscarriages over the last few years:
We want to share one experience to start. We’ve been trying to have a child for a couple of years and have had three miscarriages along the way.
You feel so hopeful when you learn you’re going to have a child. You start imagining who they’ll become and dreaming of hopes for their future. You start making plans, and then they’re gone. It’s a lonely experience. Most people don’t discuss miscarriages because you worry your problems will distance you or reflect upon you — as if you’re defective or did something to cause this. So you struggle on your own. … We hope that sharing our experience will give more people the same hope we felt and will help more people feel comfortable sharing their stories as well.
Zuckerberg added that Chan and their daughter are both healthy—and that “in our ultrasound, she even gave me a thumbs up ‘like’ with her hand, so I’m already convinced she takes after me.”