Celine Dion was one of a handful of celebrities to publicly discuss her struggles with infertility in the early 2000s. Along with other women like Brooke Shields and Joan Lunden, she opened up about previously taboo topics like IVF and miscarriage.
Dion helped make infertility a part of the cultural dialogue.
The prolific singer is now the mother of three adult sons, but it took years and many setbacks to grow her family — a difficult time she touches on in the intimate documentary “I Am: Celine Dion,” available on Prime Video on Tuesday, June 25.
“Celine Dion's openness in speaking about her struggles with fertility treatments was incredibly courageous, especially considering societal attitudes at the time.”
According to the World Health Organization, one in six people worldwide suffer from infertility. In vitro fertilization is now common, but has been controversial in the past. According to a Gallup poll, 60% of Americans say they support IVF since it was first introduced in 1978. By May 2024, that number will rise to 82%, Gallup reports. The Catholic Church remains opposed to IVF.
When celebrities like Dion speak out, “it raises awareness and understanding, and it inspires more women to step up and freeze their eggs,” says Rachel Goldberg, a licensed fertility therapist, “It also helps validate the intensity of their emotions, provides inspiration and hope for a positive outcome, and encourages them to feel less guilty, more open-minded, and less isolated.”
Dion's honesty about her challenges, disappointments and resolve may have helped start to normalize the conversation among couples trying to conceive today.
Getting pregnant and staying pregnant
Dion, the youngest of 14 children, gave birth to a son, René-Charles, on January 25, 2001, after one round of IVF.
After completing her residency in Las Vegas in 2007, she decided to try IVF again, and Dion announced she was pregnant, but suffered a miscarriage soon after.
According to CNN, after five IVF attempts, Dion announced she was pregnant for the third time in May 2010. The twins, Nelson and Eddie, were born on October 23, 2010, when Dion was 42 years old. But that pregnancy was also tinged with sadness.
Dion revealed that she was initially pregnant with triplets, but the third fetus' heart stopped shortly after she found out she was pregnant. “He chose to give him up to give his siblings space to grow up,” she said at the time.
Dion had one child with her husband, Rene Angélil, who died in 2016 after being diagnosed with throat cancer. The couple had been married for more than 20 years.
When Oprah Winfrey asked Dion about her miscarriage in 2010, she replied, “That's just how life is. A lot of people go through this and nobody talks about it.”
When Winfrey asked if these difficult times made their marriage stronger, Dion replied, “I don't think kids or pregnancy make anything stronger or weaker. Kids aren't going to fix a marriage or bring happiness to a marriage. Don't put pressure on them.”
She continued: “It's obvious to everyone that I am pregnant. If not, I am a very lucky artist, wife and mother to an amazing son.”
Share her suffering
In 2010, the same year Dion spoke out about infertility, NBC News reported that 61% of people with infertility hide their struggles from family and friends.
“For people who have always assumed they would easily conceive when the time was right, infertility can come as a sudden shock, causing them to question their past actions and future prospects,” Goldberg says. “Given societal attitudes and the lack of social media support at the time, it was incredibly brave of Celine Dion to speak openly about her infertility struggles.”
While infertility issues in general may be discussed more openly today, the dialogue can change dramatically when it becomes a personal issue.
Dr Alice Dormer, health psychologist and chief compassion officer at Inception Fertility, believes that while people are becoming more honest about infertility diagnoses, the topic hasn't been mainstreamed enough.
“And now all the football players are wearing pink shoes in October,” Dormer says, noting that first lady Betty Ford and second lady Happy Rockefeller were diagnosed with breast cancer in 1974. When celebrities started talking about fertility treatments, IVF and surrogacy, “I figured it would end up the same way,” she shrugs.
But many people who struggle with infertility keep their struggles secret, she said.
“Even though people are starting to realise that millions of babies, children and young people in this country are born through IVF, I'm still shocked by how many patients feel embarrassed or guilty and don't want to tell anyone,” she says.
“Infertility is a disease,” Domar says. “It's surprisingly common, and there's a lot of support available,” she adds. But to get help, people need to be open-minded.
Accepting Support
Celebrity success stories can give people comfort and encouragement.
But celebrity success stories can be misleading, Goldberg says, because they suggest that “while pregnancy is possible in your late 40s and 50s, it's still rare.”
Average Americans don't necessarily have the same resources or support as celebrities (IVF is expensive), and even if they do, they can still go through the grieving process in the form of “loss of dreams, loss of time, loss of finances, loss of normalcy, loss of a baby that was meant to be born in the form of a miscarriage,” Goldberg says.
