In 2014, Chari Pere received devastating news from her doctor: her pregnancy was not viable, and she was likely going to have a miscarriage. The artist, who already had a 17-month-old son with her husband Eli Schiff, spent an agonizing few days waiting for the miscarriage to happen – and when it finally did, she mourned her loss and tried to process what had happened.
Pere, an illustrator who has worked for Red Bull, Comedy Central and Disney, later took to the drawing board to create a comic about her experience, calling it “Miscarried.” When she released it, Mayim Bialik helped her promote it, and she received messages from people all over the world who resonated with her work.
Now, 10 years later, Pere, a mother of three, has transformed her comic into a short cartoonmentary, a five-minute video called “Miscarried,” which tells her story. It’s the first in an animated series of “Unspoken” cartoonmentaries, which are animated shorts featuring real stories about fertility, pregnancy and raising children.
“When I suffered my miscarriage, I was most frustrated to find out how common it was and how many of my friends had suffered from a wide range of issues, and how few spoke about it,” said Pere, a former Los Angeles resident who now lives in New Jersey. “I was so thankful to reach out to the couple of friends who were open about their miscarriages well before I had mine, and they were instrumental in helping me get through without completely falling apart. I hope that my cartoons can help people who are in positions where they are deeply in pain, feeling lost or that their pregnancy trauma is their fault, and need a friend to tell them that they are not alone.”
What makes Pere’s story different is that it includes her husband’s perspective as well. In “Miscarried” the comic and cartoonmentary, Schiff cries while embracing his wife. When Pere had her miscarriage, he was on a work trip, and when he came home, the fetus was already gone.
“He had his own emotions and experiences that he had to put aside to make sure I was strong thousands of miles away from him,” she said. “He didn’t have anyone to talk to. It was important for me to depict that Eli had his own emotions and had kept them in check until the first opportunity he actually had to release them. While he may not have been carrying the baby himself, this was his future child that was now suddenly gone too.”
As little as women talk about miscarriages, Pere found that men don’t discuss them at all. After putting out her comic, she received an email from a fan, who told her she should consider telling a story from a man’s perspective.
“That fan’s story became the second comic in my series, ‘Michael’s Miscarriage,’” Pere said. “The animated short version of that story is underway, and I’m hoping to have that premiering around Father’s Day.”
Following the release of “Miscarried” and “Michael’s Miscarriage,” the artist – who collaborated with the Jewish Writers’ Initiative Digital Storytellers Lab to make the series – wants to tackle more topics like stillbirth, postpartum depression and adoption, along with other challenges and genetic disorders that parents and children have to deal with, such as diabetes, autism and ADHD.
“It’s my dream to have more individuals sharing their true stories to help others feel seen and supported,” she said. “The main goal would be to make all the ‘unspoken’ stories become more ‘spoken.’”
She continued, “I hope that my work can really make a difference in the world. I may not be a doctor, or a firefighter, but I hope that my work can help people in ways that matter.”
You can find “Miscarried” on YouTube or visit ChariPere.com.
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