Congratulations are in order once again for the former child actress turned media mogul and entrepreneur Keisha Knight-Pulliam. The Cosby Show star and recently married Pulliam is expecting her second child, her first with husband Brad James.
She shared the news via her Instagram post that was captioned, “Oh Baby Baby!! Baby James coming 2023!”
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Pulliam is already mom to a 5-year-old daughter named Ella Grace, whom she shares with her ex-husband, former NFL star Ed Hartwell.
Pulliam and James began dating in 2019 after they worked on the set of the TV movie “Pride and Prejudice: Atlanta,” reported People.
“Honestly, we just hit it off,” Pulliam told 9MagTV of the pair’s first meeting. “We had a lot of downtime. There was a lot going on filming that project. So there were plenty of times where we would all just be sitting in the cast seats or the van … just talking.”
Pulliam and James announced their engagement in December 2020 when Pulliam shared a photo of the couple and Ella Grace that was taken at their “magical engagement dinner.”
“I said Yes!! I LOVE YOU @mrbradjames!!!!” she gushed in her caption at the time.
“My desire is a lifetime and beyond filled with love & family. My heart is so filled with joy!! So excited to continue to choose each other & our family every day,” she added.
Studies suggest that Black women may be twice as likely as white women to have fertility problems but are far less likely to seek or receive infertility treatment.
Many Black women facing infertility say they face an uphill battle in getting care. Challenges include not having insurance that covers the cost of infertility services, a lack of Black sperm and egg donors, prejudice from physicians, and feelings of shame and isolation. Those who do seek care can find themselves feeling deeply uncomfortable in a medical space that is overwhelmingly white.
The actual numbers of infertile Black women remain unclear because so few women of color have been included in infertility research and studies.
“African American women have been grossly underrepresented, so it’s really hard to quantify the rates. It could be twice as high for African American women, or even higher,” said Yetunde Ibrahim, a reproductive endocrinologist and assistant professor in the obstetrics and gynecology department at the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio.
Back in 2021, Pulliam shared that she decided to freeze her eggs following the end of her first marriage in the OWN documentary Eggs Over Easy.
“I decided to freeze my eggs because I’m 41,” she says in a clip from the project. “I know I want another baby but I also know the time isn’t now.”
Pulliam, who is host and an executive producer on the project, joins other big names, including Academy Award-nominated actress and singer Andra Day, to bring awareness to the health concerns of Black women today, including fertility.
Narrated by Keshia Knight Pulliam and written, produced and directed by Chiquita Lockley, Eggs Over Easy investigates the often taboo subject of infertility in the Black community and brings Black women together for an enlightening and empowering dialogue about the sometimes unpredictable path to motherhood.
Pulliam, who says she never thought she’d actually tell her own story for the doc, shares how a change in marital status threw a wrench in her planning — family planning that is.
“I had my daughter at 38. She’s three now. I had gotten married and I thought I have plenty of time. I’ll have another baby right after this. But with divorce and life, things kind of took a left turn,” she said. “Not to say it was wrong, but sometimes life throws you curveballs and you could have your perfect forever planned out but you have to embrace. Because what I have learned is my Plan B has always been God’s Plan A.”
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