Bozoma Saint John Was 'Apprehensive' About Sharing Her Fertility Journey on RHOBH: ‘There’s Criticism’

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Real Housewives of Beverly Hills star Bozoma Saint John admits she wasn’t always so sure about sharing her fertility journey in the public eye.

While speaking to PEOPLE exclusively at the ESSENCE Black Women in Hollywood Awards in Los Angeles on Feb. 27, the 48-year-old reality star opened up about initially feeling “apprehensive” about the decision.

“The thing is that when you open yourself up in such a vulnerable way, people can have judgment on it — and so there's criticism” she explains. “People say I’m too old, or I’ve had trauma before. Why am I putting my health through this? Am I sure this man loves me?”

“There's so many things that people have opinions on, and so for me it's been a very tough exercise in making sure that I know the reasons why I'm doing something,” Saint John adds. “And just stick to that, and not worry about what everybody else thinks.”

The former Netflix chief marketing officer also shared that opening up about her experience has led to an outpouring of responses from women who have been on a similar path.

“Oh, that has been the best part really, honestly. And it's the reason why I feel so comfortable in doing it — is that people have been so open about their [own] journeys because I'm sharing mine. And that's what [keeps me going],” she says.

On a recent episode of RHOBH, Saint John opened up about a past experience with pregnancy loss before giving birth to her 15-year-old daughter, Lael, whom she shared with her late husband.

"The experiences of pregnancy have not been easy for me,” she said. “I got pregnant unexpectedly with my first daughter, named Eve. Five months into my pregnancy, I discovered that I had early stages of preeclampsia, a disease that creates high blood pressure and starts to attack your pregnancy.”

“My baby didn’t survive,” she continued, sharing that she went into labor and delivery for high blood pressure at six-and-a-half months. “Two months after I lost Eve, I decided that I was meant to be a mother and wanted to have another baby."

Saint John is currently attempting to have a child with her boyfriend, Keely Watson.

“I am 15 years older than the last [time] I had this issue. I need some assurances, and I don’t know how to get that,” she admitted in the episode, while also sharing that the prospect of having another child is “scary.”

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Saint John also discussed the experience of losing her home in the recent L.A. fires while speaking to PEOPLE at the ESSENCE event. She shared that it is hard to put such an experience into words, while also noting that there is a fundamental misunderstanding in terms of how some people perceive the loss.

“I think people get confused because they're like, ‘Oh, it's your second home and therefore it's fine. You should be okay because you have a place to live.’ I'm like, ‘Are you completely out of your mind?’ It's my home. I worked for it. Nobody gave it to me,” she says. “Nobody was just like, ‘Oh, here's the key to this fabulous house.’ It's like, no, I worked blood, sweat and tears for 25 years for that house. And so for it to go, it's a devastation that I can't actually articulate.”