Image copyright PA Image caption Zara Tindall and her husband Mike with her oldest daughter, Mia

Zara Tindall has spoken about suffering two miscarriages before having her second child.

The Queen's granddaughter had announced in 2016 that a pregnancy announced the previous month had ended in a miscarriage.

Now she has told the Sunday Times she later suffered another miscarriage before becoming pregnant with her daughter Lena, who was born in June.

She said for a time "you don't talk about it because it's too raw".

"But as with everything, time's a great healer," she said.

The Olympic medal-winning equestrian is married to ex-England rugby captain Mike Tindall. The pair have a four-year-old daughter Mia as well as Lena.

Mrs Tindall does not hold a royal title and is not an HRH but, as a descendant of the Queen, her pregnancies were announced publicly.

After announcing that she had lost her baby in 2016 she said she and her husband had been inundated with letters from people saying they had been through the same thing.

In a joint interview with her brother Peter Phillips, Mrs Tindall said: "For me, the worst bit was that we had to tell everyone, everyone knew."

The 37-year-old went on: "I had to go through having the baby because it was so far along.

"I then had another miscarriage really early on."

Mrs Tindall praised her "concerned" husband and "protective" brother, saying: "It was a time when my family came to the fore and I needed them."

Mrs Tindall said: "In our case, it was something that was really rare; it was nature saying, 'This one's not right.'."

Image copyright Getty Images Image caption The couple were at the wedding of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex in May

Mr Phillips explained how he and his wife Autumn and their two daughters live 200 yards from Mrs Tindall and her family.

He said: "When Mia arrived it was quite difficult to compute. Zara has always been the little sister and suddenly I thought: 'Christ, you've properly grown up now'.

"That rather annoying little sister is now a well-respected equestrian and an exceptional mother. If my daughters come close to achieving what Zara's achieved, I'd be happy."

Miscarriage: The loss of about one in four pregnancies

Miscarriage is the loss of a pregnancy up to but not including 24 weeks of pregnancy. If the baby is lost after this point it is classed as a stillbirth

Unlike stillbirths, miscarriages do not have to be registered or recorded anywhere so there are no official statistics, but it is estimated that about one in four pregnancies ends in miscarriage

The majority of miscarriages happen within the first 12 weeks and by far the majority of those happen within the first eight weeks. When a woman gets to the second trimester - the middle three months of pregnancy - there is a much smaller likelihood of miscarriage

About half of miscarriages are thought to happen because something has gone wrong with the early development of the egg cell or sperm cell

Miscarriages can also happen because of a blood clotting problem which can starve the baby of oxygen, hormonal problems, a problem with the shape or strength of the uterus or cervix, large fibroids (non-cancerous growths) in the uterus, or infection

The main two risk factors for miscarriage are a woman's age and the number of miscarriages she has had before. As women age, their eggs too get older and there are more likely to be abnormalities

Source: Miscarriage Association