Elizabeth Day reveals she’s ‘let go of the dream of motherhood’ after several failed rounds of IVF and miscarriages

Elizabeth Day has revealed she’s given up on her dream of motherhood after several failed rounds of IVF and miscarriages.

The 46-year-old host of cult podcast ‘How To Fail’, who has talked openly about her longstanding fertility struggles, has revealed that she has now ‘let go of the dream of conventional biological motherhood’.  

‘It’s very painful if you think something is meant for you and the universe is not giving it to you,’ Elizabeth told The Times.

‘I think what I’ve gone through is understanding that maybe motherhood wasn’t meant for me, because other things are.’

Her desire to have a child also led her to have a surgical procedure to change her uterus, which she later described as ‘so painful’, and undergo an assisted fertility attempt through egg donation in the US with husband of four years, Justin Basini.

While Elizabeth, who is stepmother to Justin’s three children, described herself as ‘much more at peace’ now that she has stopped trying to have a baby, the journalist also admitted that not having a child will cause her ‘sadness for ever’.

She said: ‘Not having children will cause me sadness for ever but it doesn’t mean it’s the wrong thing.’

But Elizabeth, whose new novel ‘One of Us’ is published on September 25, also acknowledged that it would be much more difficult to devote herself to her various creative projects if she had a child.

Elizabeth Day (pictured), who has discussed her longstanding fertility struggles openly, revealed that she has let go of her dream of becoming a mother 

Elizabeth, who has interviewed celebrities including Melinda Gates and Monica Lewinsky on How To Fail, where guests discuss their three biggest failures with the host, has spoken about her fertility struggles on the show. 

In a particularly memorable episode which aired in June 2022, she became emotional when speaking to the late British writer and poet Benjamin Zephaniah, who revealed his own ‘failure to have children and his own struggle with male infertility.’

Last year, Elizabeth, who has spent most of her adult life writing, launched a new ‘podclass’ called ‘How to write a book‘. 

She is the executive producer of the ’12-week masterclass’, which remains available on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.

While Elizabeth, whose fifth novel ‘Magpie’ also won acclaim, contributed to the podclass, its main presenters are award-winning author Sara Collins, literary agent Nelle Andrew and publisher Sharmaine Lovegrove. 

According to Day, the episodes – which are intended for both would-be authors and those interested in understanding how a book is made  – ‘will take you right through from developing an idea to really nailing plot and character.’

In a promotional clip, Jamaican-born Caymanian-British novelist Sara Collins – winner of a Costa Book Award for her 2019 historical novel The Confessions of Frannie Langton – provided an insight into her own practice, giving listeners a taste of the tips to come. 

She explained, for example, that at the end of a scene, she will ‘try to delete 25 per cent of it’. 

The author and journalist, 46, underwent two rounds of IVF as well as other fertility treatments 

Literary agent Nelle Andrew added: ‘You want gaps, you want that elliptical feeling and then the reader is kind of filling in.’

The third presenter is Sharmaine Lovegrove, managing director of Hachette UK division Dialogue Publishing, which she founded as Dialogue Books in 2009.

Dialogue specialises in stories that have previously gone untold in traditional publishing, as Lovegrove explained when she appeared on Day’s ‘How to Fail’ podcast. 

In the episode from 2019, Lovegrove, who is a close friend of Day, opens up about being mentally and physically abused by her mother, leaving home at 16 and enduring a spell of homelessness at the end of the 1990s. 

Reflecting on leaving home as a child and being abandoned by her parents, she said: ‘It took me a really long time to understand that I would be deserving of that love.’

As a teenager, Lovegrove started selling books under the arches of Waterloo Bridge in London. 

Meeting people on the streets who did not have access to education helped Lovegrove ‘deeply understand that people don’t recognise that books are for them’ – an understanding that surely drove her to found Dialogue Books in 2009. 

In 2024, Day revealed that politicians are reluctant to appear on ‘How to Fail’ because they don’t want to be associated with the word ‘fail‘.

Elizabeth admitted that not having children will cause her ‘sadness for ever’ 

Addressing an audience at May’s Hay Festival, Day said: ‘There are some politicians who, I won’t name names, won’t come on the podcast because it has the word “fail” in the title and they don’t want to be seized upon.

‘So if I really thought about it I might not have branded it that way.

‘But I’m not fetishising the pursuit of failure. I’m simply saying that failure is something that happens to us all and it connects us which is really liberating.’

Politicians who have braved the podcast have discussed their failures in Whitehall, their mental health problems and personal relationships.

Ed Milliband appeared on Day’s podcast in 2021 and discussed his failure to win the 2015 general election, suffering from anxiety, not achieving the degree he had worked hard for and failing to keep his late father, Marxist academic Ralph Miliband, alive.

Elizabeth last year launched a new ‘podclass’ with publisher Sharmaine Lovegrove (left), literary agent Nelle Andrew (centre) and novelist Sara Collins (right) 

The ’12-week masterclass’called ‘How to write a book’ is available on Apple Podcasts and Spotify

In 2019, Jess Phillips, Labour MP for Birmingham Yardley, told Day about her failure in politics, living with daily death threats and how prioritising her female friends helps her stay sane. 

She talked about the failure in contraception that resulted in her eldest son, her failure to get on the Home Office Fast Track scheme and, in an extremely moving admission, her self-perceived failure to fix her brother’s drug addiction.

The same year, the former Conservative politician Chris Patten went on the show to discuss losing his seat in the 1992 election and his time as Chairman of the BBC where he presided over the Jimmy Saville scandal.

The Magpie author also shared that her dream guests for the podcast were Sienna Miller, Michelle Obama, Beyonce and Taylor Swift – though the Midnights singer no longer does interviews.