Samantha Armytage reveals private IVF heartbreak: ‘There is a fulfilling, happy life on the other side of no’

For years, Samantha Armytage was asked whether children were on her radar. Now, for the first time, she has answered the question on her own terms.

The Golden Bachelor host and former Sunrise star has revealed that she and her then-husband, businessman Richard Lavender, went through IVF in private during their marriage. It ended without the baby they had hoped for.

“It was a long road filled with much emotional and physical pain, many miscarriages, heartbreak and profound hope,” Armytage said on her new podcast, Act Two. “Ultimately, it did not end with the baby we were trying for.”

Speaking straight to camera, she said: “I’m choosing to tell a deeply personal story, one I’ve never told before. In fact, even some of my closest friends and family don’t know this story fully.”

Armytage pointed out that IVF stories tend to become public only once they have a happy ending.

“Many high-profile women are happy to talk about IVF when the journey is successful. But coming to terms with a failed IVF journey takes time, and there is a unique kind of grief in letting go of that specific future.”

Armytage and Lavender

Armytage married Lavender in 2020, when she was 44 and he was 60, at a headline-making ceremony in Bowral. The pair split in 2024.

She was clear that IVF did not end the marriage: “While that chapter didn’t close the way we initially wanted, and I add it was not the reason for that marriage to end, it opened up a different, beautiful path for me.”

She also cast new light on her bond with her dog: “But this may explain why I always refer to my darling Labrador Banjo as really being my baby, and why I felt his loss so deeply.”

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The question taken off the table

Armytage looked back on the question she kept being asked early in her career, and thanked the editor who put an end to it.

“I am no longer indignant that early on in my career I was constantly asked about whether having children was on my radar. Those sort of questions to young women with careers rarely happen these days.”

She singled out her former News Corp editor, Sarah Le Marquand: “She changed the policy of magazines under her control. And from that moment, that question was off limits for other young women coming through the ranks after me.”

Firmly in Act Two

Armytage insisted the story was not a lament. “This is not a sob story. I am completely fulfilled and at peace with my path.”

“I’m sharing this now because I’m ready. And because I know how incredibly lonely the fertility rollercoaster can feel. And I want any woman sitting in a waiting room today to know that you are not alone and there is a fulfilling, happy life on the other side of no.”

She once got the question in interviews. Now she has answered it herself, on her own show.