Kristen Wiig Opens up on Infertility Isolation for InStyle Magazine

Posted on August 07, 2020

Kristen Wiig is as elusive, risk-taking and hilarious as ever, but the best is yet to come. She’s been more than occupied since welcoming twins via surrogate this past January, and here, the actress opens up to InStyle Editor in Chief Laura Brown about the lonely nature of the infertility process and why she wishes she had talked more about it, plus she looks back at memorable moments from SNL to the Oscars.

 

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On the isolation of IVF: “As private as I am and as sacred as this all is, what helped me was reading about other women who went through it and talking to those who have gone through IVF and fertility stuff. It can be the most isolating experience. But I’m trying to find that space where I can keep my privacy and also be there for someone else who may be going through it.” “It’s hard not to personalize it when you get a negative result. You go through so much self-deprecation, and you feel like your partner may be seeing you in a different way and all this other stuff we make up in our heads. But when I did talk about it, every time I said that I was going through IVF, I would meet someone who was either going through it, about to go through it, or had a friend who just did it. It’s like this underground community that’s talked about but not talked about.”

On living a quiet life in between performing at the Oscars: “Well, I live underground. [laughs] It’s not a conscious choice to be secretive. I just want to exist in real life with my family, my friends, and my dogs. Work is work. With the Oscars, Maya and I were like, ‘Fuck it, let’s write something super crazy, and, hopefully, we won’t embarrass ourselves.’ The longer I’m in this business, the less I care what people think.”

On remembering her SNL audition: “I had never done anything like that before in my life. They said it had to be five minutes, so I bought a stopwatch to use when I rehearsed to make sure I didn’t go over. [laughs] I was onstage like, ‘Hi! I’m going to talk in voices now!’ I heard laughter, but you never walk out thinking you killed it.”

On living in the uncomfortable: “The moment I feel like I’ve really got something figured out, it’s time for me to do something else. Living in that uncomfortable, unsteady, nervous place helps me creatively. But as far as knowing that I wasn’t making a mistake in trying to do this for a living, that was at the Groundlings. I felt like my instinct was right. But with any project, you’re taking a chance. I just go with my gut.”

On her work and life these days: “It’s obviously slower now; almost nonexistent. It’s a lot of waiting. But now that I have these two little ones, my mind is just not on work. Even if this global pandemic weren’t going on, I would want to be with my kids. Obviously, some days I get more sleep than others, but it is what it is. And it’s frickin’ awesome.”

 

The September issue of InStyle, available on newsstands, on Amazon, and for digital download August 21.

 

[Photo Credit: Olivia Malone/InStyle Magazine]

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