Kim Kardashian West: My Fertility Struggles Took ‘the Fun out of’ Trying to Conceive
Weeks before her daughter turned 2, Kim Kardashian West confirmed North would soon be a big sister.
But the mom-to-be says in the September issue of C Magazine that the announcement came more than a year after she and husband Kanye West first began trying for a second child.
“I had so many complications. I had this condition called placenta accreta. There were a couple little operations to fix all that, so that created a little hole in my uterus, which I think made it really tough to get pregnant again,” she explains.
“It was a long road. I would go to the doctor in Beverly Hills every day at five in the morning to get tested to see if I was ovulating.”
In the revealing cover story celebrating the magazine’s 10th anniversary, Kardashian West admits she was forced to keep track of when she was ovulating and the strict schedule took “the fun out of” getting pregnant.
“I’m like, ‘I’m ovulating, get home now!’ He’d be like, ‘Wait, I’m in the studio,’ ” she recalls.
Courtesy C Magazine
In addition to her doctor’s appointments, Kardashian West tried other avenues to help her conceive. “I was trying everything: I did acupuncture and got a nutritionist to eat healthier, thinking that was an issue,” she shares.
Although Kardashian West, 34, did eventually get pregnant — she and West will welcome a son in December — the possibility of a third child could be nonexistent.
“They think I’ll have placenta accreta again, so if the placenta grows a little bit deeper than it did last time, then they are prepared to have my uterus removed, which is a little scary for me,” the Keeping Up with the Kardashians star explains. “I think we’re just gonna go day by day, see how overwhelming it is, and see how the delivery goes.”
But her fertility struggles haven’t been the only difference between her first and second pregnancies. After being widely criticized for her fashion choices while pregnant with North, Kardashian West has decided to take a new approach this time around.
“The first time I was pregnant, Kanye and I were dating and I was just being introduced to the world of fashion. I wanted to work with a bunch of different stylists, and when you work with a new stylist, everyone wants to possess your look,” she explains. “They wanted me in really outrageous things, and really fashion-y things. It probably wasn’t the time to be experimenting.”
Then the couple decided to take their style into their own hands and chose pieces that worked best for them.
“After that, Kanye and I were just like, ‘Let’s do it ourselves.’ It was mainly him figuring it out — what my look was and what I was comfortable in,” she says. “So now I’ve had two years to really come into my own and have my own style.”
The mom-to-be now opts for a “more simple” look, she adds. “I figured out a formula of what works,” Kardashian West explains. “I also feel lucky that, as of right now, I don’t feel like I’m gonna get preeclampsia again, which last time [contributed to] not only the weight, but also the swelling that everyone would make fun of, not understanding that I had this condition.”
She continues, “It was the worst! I couldn’t help it, and everyone would say, ‘She can’t stop eating.’ I delivered at 180, and they were like, ‘She’s 210 pounds. She’s getting dumped because she’s too fat,’ and all these ridiculous stories. It really took a toll after the fact, when I was losing weight.”
As Kardashian West worked out to get her body before baby back — the reality star gained 50 lbs. during her pregnancy — she realized that her shape wasn’t the only thing that had changed over time.
“It changed the way I viewed wanting my picture taken. Before I was always smiling, and so into being out and about,” she recalls. “After I had the baby, I was like, ‘These are the same people that made fun of me, and posted the stories that were so awful, calling me fat for something I couldn’t control. I don’t want to smile for them. I don’t want to be out.’ ”
She adds, “Even if I was more confident, I just didn’t feel like being that girl who was going to be smiling for every photo. It changed my mood; it changed who I was; it changed my personality a lot.”
Despite her new outlook, Kardashian West admits the paparazzi have been “really respectful” when she’s out with her family, allowing both her and her sister Kourtney Kardashian to keep their children’s lives relatively normal.
“That’s probably why I can take [North] to ballet and things that she enjoys, because I feel like there has been a boundary that we’ve set,” she says. “It’s about teaching our kids that it’s a different world; there’s social media where you can be scrutinized … but it can be hard on your soul when you are so scrutinized. So it’s just about raising strong children. I would pray that whoever we bring into this life could handle this lifestyle, and I really believe they can. They chose us because they can.”
Kardashian West notes that being a mother to 2-year-old daughter North has helped her learn to prioritize her personal life.
“When I was pregnant with [North], I thought, My life is so hectic — how am I gonna take her to ballet classes and soccer?” she shares. “I had these visions of all the things I did growing up, and I was really freaked out. And when it happens, you just instinctively know how to do it.”
The step back from the spotlight during her first pregnancy paid off: While taking some time for herself, Kardashian West felt a sudden burst of inspiration.
“I was forced to take a break for awhile, I never liked downtime, but I decided I enjoyed it — that’s when the fun ideas come about. I felt like I was, I don’t want to say overexposed, but I had too many different projects,” she recalls.
“When I was brainstorming on my maternity leave, that’s when one of my greatest projects, the video game, came about. And that’s also when the book concept came — I was sitting there going through old photos, organizing my desktop.”
— Anya Leon and Aaron Couch