Myleene Klass shared some miscarriage science - and it's helping people heal
She explained that her “rainbow baby” carries cells from “the four babies that went before him”
Singer and TV presenter Myleene Klass has shared her experience of baby loss and pointed out a fact that’s prompted a powerful response on social media.
Speaking on the We Need To Talk podcast, Klass said she’d found comfort in the fact that cells from a foetus can remain in a mother’s body for years, even decades after a miscarriage.
“If you have miscarried a baby, that baby’s cells are still in your body… they’re still there,” Klass said. “That never leaves you.”
Klass was referencing a scientific phenomenon called foetal microchimerism, where low levels of cells pass through the placenta from the foetus into the mother’s bloodstream. Some stay – embedding in her organs, bloodstream, and even brain.
Researchers have found these cells decades later, and they appear to play a role in tissue repair, immune function, and long-term health. Some scientists call it “a cellular legacy” – a genetic trace that remains, even if the pregnancy doesn’t continue.
For Klass, who’s experienced four miscarriages and campaigned to break the silence around baby loss, it’s been a comfort. “The most unforgiving part of miscarriage is that when you lose a child there’s nothing, you don’t have photos, you don’t have memories, you have ‘what ifs’,” Klass said, explaining that parents can be left feeling they have little to mark their child loss, wondering things like: “Oh, they’d be starting school now. I wonder if they’d have your eyes.”
“But microchimerism really did give me something, and I know it’s helped a lot of mothers that I’ve spoken to about it.”
Microchimeric cells from a pregnancy can also be passed on to subsequent siblings, because cells from a mother also travel the other way, from a woman to a foetus.
Klass had a son in 2019 after multiple miscarriages, and calls him a ‘rainbow baby’, a term used for a child born after pregnancy loss.“The real magic? My little rainbow baby. He carries all of us,” she said, explaining that her son could have cells from her two daughters, as well as “the four babies that went before him” who were miscarried.
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A clip from the interview shared on TikTok has been viewed hundreds of thousands of times – and the comments show just how deeply it’s touching people.
One reply said, “I did not know this. Now sitting here in bits because that means she's still with me 💖” while another said, “About to go through my 8th miscarriage. It brings comfort knowing my babies are all still with me 💔.”
Another shared, “We had a rainbow baby. She was already special but knowing she has the cells of the ones we miscarried just makes her even more special.”
Whilst this science doesn’t fix the grief, it helps offer a new perspective on loss. And for many, like Klass, it’s an anchor: “I just think that’s so beautiful. That there’s a part of you that never leaves me.”
Years of silent loss and sadness, suddenly a little bit reduced and calmed within me. Thank you so much for sharing. Life changing.
Incredible story 🩷