Whenever Sharon Gaffka sees a mother pushing her baby in a pram or a toddler playing in the park, she starts to think of her own child – who would be celebrating their third birthday this summer.
‘What would they look like? Who would they become? What would their name be?’ the former Love Island contestant asks – as she begins to sob.
For the 29-year-old will never know the answers to these questions. Three years ago she suffered a devastating miscarriage that left her grieving, in pain and fearful of having children in the future.
It took Sharon 18 months to speak about her experience publicly – revealing it to her 334,000 Instagram followers in August 2023.
But it is only now that she has chosen to share the full, candid details of her story with the Mail – as she campaigns for a change in the law to offer statutory miscarriage leave from work.
Sharon found out she was pregnant in January 2022 – six months after appearing on the seventh series of Love Island.
The former civil servant won a legion of fans on the ITV reality show for her brains, eloquence and career ambitions – leading one male contestant to controversially complain she didn’t want to be a ‘housewife’.
Sharon Gaffka found out she was pregnant in January 2022 – six months after appearing on the seventh series of Love Island
Sharon with fellow Love Island contestant Georgia Harrison as they campaign for better online protections for women and girls
Indeed, since appearing on the dating competition, Sharon has shown she is far from your standard influencer. She has led a campaign to boost awareness of drink spiking, become an ambassador for the domestic abuse charity Refuge, and has ambitions to become an MP.
Yet, for the past three years, she has struggled with the grief and pain of experiencing a miscarriage.
In February 2022 – just one month after finding out she was pregnant – Sharon was walking her dog in a park near her parents’ home in Oxfordshire when she suddenly felt ‘shooting pains’ in her abdomen and started bleeding.
Struggling to manage the pain and the bouts of intense sickness, she called her GP who told her to go to hospital.
‘I knew it wasn’t normal to feel that level of pain,’ she recalls. ‘I felt incredibly unwell and immediately felt huge fear about what might be happening.’
At the gynaecology department, she was initially placed in the same waiting room as new mothers – some of whom were holding their ‘freshly born’ babies. Sitting with them, she said, only ‘added to the trauma’.
The bleeding was so heavy by that point that nurses gave her a nappy to wear to stem it.
Having gone freelance as a consultant and content creator, Sharon had decided to take her laptop to the hospital so she could continue working.
‘I remember how horrible it was to sit there and go through one of the worst things that somebody could ever go through while trying to make a spreadsheet,’ she recalls.
A blood test that afternoon confirmed she was no longer pregnant. She had miscarried during her first trimester.
But any further support was lacking. ‘I was told to take painkillers, to take it easy on myself and just see how I go,’ she says.
‘I felt very mixed emotions. In a way, I felt a bit of a relief because I hadn’t planned to be pregnant. But I also felt such sadness, shame and guilt. Society says a woman’s purpose is to be able to reproduce and I thought, “Am I a failure as a woman, because I can’t do this one thing?”‘
She recalls the rest of the day as being a blur. She drove herself home, refusing to tell anyone – even her family – out of fear that she would be judged.
Sharon has led a campaign to boost awareness of drink spiking, become an ambassador for the domestic abuse charity Refuge, and has ambitions to become an MP
Since appearing on the dating competition, Sharon has shown she is far from your standard influencer, instead working on a variety of campaigns
‘I’d only left the Love Island villa a few months prior. I wasn’t in a stable relationship with anyone. I thought people would judge me.
‘I was so paranoid about public opinion. I was so afraid of people finding out that I had “failed”.’
As the pregnancy was unplanned, she adds: ‘I felt as though I didn’t deserve to feel grief. I didn’t deserve to feel sad about it. Am I allowed to feel sad?’
Starting to cry again, she adds: ‘I was so confused about motherhood. But, at the same time, I didn’t want what was happening to me.
‘It left me with so many questions. Would I want to run the risk of putting myself through this again? Would I be strong enough if I did?’
Like many in the public eye, Sharon suffered social media ‘trolling’ after appearing on Love Island and was nervous to share anything personal online.
But struggling with the feelings of grief and isolation, a few weeks after the miscarriage, Sharon told a group of friends on WhatsApp. Some of them, it turned out, had similar stories.
‘I had known these women for years and it was the first time I was hearing about their miscarriages,’ she recalls. ‘We just don’t talk about these things.’
She didn’t speak about her experience publicly until August a year later – on what would have marked her baby’s first birthday.
Writing on Instagram, she said the grief had hit her ‘like a train’ and that she was finding it ‘incredibly tough to function as I normally would’.
She added: ‘Breaking the silence surrounding miscarriage is crucial… Opening up these conversations can lead to validation, understanding and a sense of community.’
By the end of the day her post had received hundreds of comments, with many fans and well-wishers sharing their own stories.
It was also the first time Sharon’s parents, Robert and Linda, had found out about her loss.
‘I have very conservative parents. We don’t talk about these things. Dad was like, “Oh, well, as long as you’re OK”. They tried to make it into a positive thing – “It’s for the best and if you want children your time will come.”‘
Linda, who had bowel cancer when Sharon was a teenager, was more emotional. ‘I feel very protective over my mum,’ Sharon says. ‘I would put her in bubble wrap if I could.’
Her brother Adam, 26, is a nurse and was also very supportive when he found out.
Her post prompted the Miscarriage Association charity to get in touch, asking if Sharon would like to collaborate on their Leave For Every Loss campaign, which was launched last month.
Under current legislation, there is no statutory bereavement leave for miscarriages – which the NHS defines as the loss of a pregnancy during the first 23 weeks. Instead, women affected must rely on sick leave or the goodwill of their employer.
It is thought around one in eight known pregnancies will end in miscarriage, according to the NHS, although the real figure could be higher – as Sharon points out.
‘There’s a narrative that’s been given to women for far too long on many different things about life. Like, periods are meant to be painful – deal with it. Pregnancy is meant to be challenging – deal with it. Childbirth is difficult – deal with it. You’re constantly told to deal with it.’
Partners also have no legal entitlement to bereavement leave during pregnancy loss, which Sharon says further adds to the taboo.
It took Sharon 18 months to speak about her miscarriage experience publicly – revealing it to her 334,000 Instagram followers in August 2023
‘It’s one thing for women not to feel supported – but the other person gets even less support,’ she says. ‘A miscarriage affects two people. It’s an incredibly hard thing to deal with when you don’t have a partner. Having your partner to legally get leave as well is incredibly important.’
The parliamentary women and equalities committee, chaired by Labour MP Sarah Owen, is examining the workplace impacts of miscarriage and early pregnancy loss.
Ms Owen, MP for Luton North, has spoken in the House of Commons about her own experience of having to take sick leave after miscarrying and has backed calls for a change in the law.
Initial steps were taken in February last year with the introduction of baby loss certificates, which parents can request from the Government website in memory of the child they’ve miscarried.
But a more radical change in the workplace, says Sharon, will further help grieving parents.
‘People already don’t feel supported in many workplaces in the first place, so why do we need to make it any harder?’ she asks.
‘It’s about changing how we view and support women in the workplace. Stop telling us that this is just part of life and we’ve got to deal with it. We don’t need to live like that any more.’
- The Miscarriage Association provides free support and information to anyone affected by miscarriage, ectopic pregnancy or molar pregnancy. For support or more information go to www.miscarriageassociation.org.uk.
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