Sacked ESPN presenter Sara Walsh at a college football game. Photo/Sara Walsh/Twitter
Sacked ESPN presenter Sara Walsh at a college football game. Photo/Sara Walsh/Twitter
Toronto Blue Jays pitcher Matt Buschmann watched from home as his sports broadcaster wife Sarah Walsh had a miscarriage on live television.
The American TV presenter took a moment on Mother's day (US time) to reveal the heartache she has kept secret for years - and it has nothing to do with getting axed out of the blue by ESPN earlier this month.
The 39-year-old's grief goes much deeper than her employment status.
She revealed her miscarriage secrets in an Instagram post on Monday alongside a happy image of the couple's healthy twins, Brees and Hutton, celebrating their first Mother's Day.
The twins, son Brees and daughter Hutton, born in February are true miracles. Here's why.
"The road down a dark path began while hosting Sportscenter on the road from Alabama," Walsh posted on her Instagram account alongside a picture of her twins.
"I arrived in Tuscaloosa almost three months pregnant. I wouldn't return the same way. The juxtaposition of college kids going nuts behind our set, while I was losing a baby on it, was surreal.
"I was scared, nobody knew I was pregnant, so I did the show while having a miscarriage.
On television. My husband had to watch this unfold from more than a thousand miles away, texting me hospital options during commercial breaks.
"It would get worse. Two more failed pregnancies. More than once, I'd have surgery one day and be on SportsCenter the next so as not to draw attention to my situation."
Three years in-a-row the couple fell pregnant and three years in-a-row their hope turned to heartbreak.
"We then went down the IVF road of endless shots and procedures," Walsh continued on the Instagram post.
"After several rounds, we could only salvage two eggs. I refused to even use them for a long time, because I couldn't bear the idea of all hope being gone. I blew off pregnancy tests, scared to know if it worked. It had. Times two.
"It was exciting news, but we knew better than to celebrate. So I spent a third straight football season pregnant, strategically picking out clothes and standing at certain angles, using scripts to hide my stomach.
"There would be no baby announcement, no shower, we didn't buy a single thing in preparation for the babies, because I wasn't sure they'd show up. We told very few people we were pregnant, and almost no one there were two. For those that thought I was weirdly quiet about my pregnancy, now you know why."
And now we know why the downsizing at ESPN hasn't changed the joy Walsh and Buschmann felt on their first Mother's Day as a family.
Walsh was earlier this month returning to ESPN from maternity leave only to discover that very day her position had been made redundant.
"I was truly excited to return to work today from maternity leave with the twins.
Unfortunately, I will not be coming back as I was included in the recent layoffs. Much appreciation to those I worked with, and especially to those who watched," Walsh tweeted.
None of that appeared to matter on Mother's Day.
"For as long as I can remember I hosted Sportscenter on Mother's Day, and the last couple years doing that have been personally brutal," Walsh wrote on Instagram.
"An hours-long reminder of everything that had gone wrong. I wasn't on tv today, and I'm not sure when I will be again, but instead I got to hang with these two good eggs. My ONLY good eggs. And I know how lucky I really am."
Buschmann, who has been assigned to the Blue Jays' Triple-A feeder team the Buffalo Bisons this season, also revealed his years of heartbreak of going through the couple's miscarriages.
