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- Loneliness during pregnancy e childbirth in the pandemic has been exacerbated for some mothers with COVID-19.
- In hospitals, new COVID-19 policies meant that expectant mothers could not have their partners, doules, and other supportive people by their side during childbirth.
- A recent study found that most babies born to people who had COVID-19 late in their pregnancy are largely healthy and doing well by the time they’re 6-8 weeks old.
Donna Molina was ill for most of her fourth pregnancy. Nausea was the norm after taking prenatal vitamins and she vomited almost every day.
But, in late March, when the 32-year-old found herself with no sense of taste or smell after a week of headaches, muscle aches and stuffy nose, she knew something was wrong.
A test would soon confirm his suspicion of COVID-19.
Things went downhill – fast. She was rushed to Hackensack University Medical Center in New Jersey with a fever of 103 ° F, intubated and induced into a coma for 11 days.
“When I woke up, I was very confused. I forgot I was pregnant and didn’t know which hospital I was in, “says the New Jersey mom.” A hospital psychiatrist explained that I had given birth to a baby girl by an emergency cesarean section at 30 weeks. ”
The next day, he got to meet his 3-pound daughter, Harley, in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) via FaceTime.
Molina would not be able to keep Harley until May 7 (more than a month after her birth), as she had to test negative for COVID-19 twice and recover from ongoing medical complications.
Despite the ordeal, Molina considers herself lucky. He says he has received a lot of support from his support team.
According to a recent study, 61% of people who had babies during the pandemic believe they received inadequate support for childbirth.
It’s just one of the many ways childbirth has changed this year, especially for people who were diagnosed with COVID-19 during pregnancy.
The threat of COVID-19, coupled with a lack of consistent guidance from health authorities, has left hospitals and obstetricians to develop their own strategies to keep expectant parents and caregivers safe.
At the start of the pandemic, some providers switched to telemedicine for antenatal visits and banned partners, friends and family from accompanying patients to appointments in person.
In hospitals, the new policies meant that expectant mothers couldn’t have their partners, doules and other supportive people by their side during childbirth.
This has left many people alone and unsupported during their pregnancies this year, says Dr. Jennifer Conti, an obstetrics and gynecologist based in the San Francisco Bay Area and co-author of “The Vagina Book.”
“Every single element of that normal support structure is being torn down,” he says. “Even people you would normally ask to be a support system in the postpartum period cannot be present due to travel restrictions, home stay orders and the risk of COVID-19.”
Loneliness and isolation during pregnancy and childbirth in the pandemic have been exacerbated for some moms with COVID-19, such as Kate Glaser, a 32-year-old mom of three in upstate New York.
After testing positive for the disease during her 39th week of pregnancy, Glaser was no longer allowed to go to the doctor’s office in person for follow-up and was put to bed at home in quarantine. He felt like he had “the flu times 10.”
“It was very isolating,” he says. “I was also worried if my husband might be in the delivery room with me. This is our last baby, so there was a lot of concern. “
Wearing a mask, she gave birth to a healthy baby girl Isla a couple of weeks later with her husband by her side. It was still positive for COVID-19.
Mental health problems appear to be on the rise during pregnancy amid the pandemic.
In a recent survey of 885 women who had babies in hospitals across the country between March and July, nearly 34 percent of participants experienced anxiety, compared with 20 percent before the pandemic.
The research also showed that depression rates among pregnant women were up to nearly 19%, compared to a typical rate of less than 13%.
“They don’t know what will happen when they get to the hospital or if they can or should send their children to kindergarten or school. Many families are also experiencing financial insecurity due to job losses, ”says Dr. Lisa Wynn, a gynecological obstetrician and head of the women’s helpline at UCHealth Highlands Ranch Hospital in Colorado.
“We are trying to be proactive with patients about stress management both from the world and from their homes,” he adds.
In addition to depression and anxiety, many of those who test positive for COVID-19 during pregnancy can add another condition to their list of emotional concerns: mom’s guilt.
“When they told me I was positive for COVID, I collapsed in a chair and sobbed,” Glaser recalls.
She had taken every precaution, from wearing a mask and disinfecting her hands to avoiding social encounters, but she still felt “incredibly guilty” about her illness potentially putting her baby at risk.
The guilt continued throughout the quarantine, when she could not see or care for her 3-year-old twins.
And after giving birth, when she had to watch nurses clean the inside of her newborn’s nose to test her for COVID-19 and he couldn’t have skin-to-skin contact with her immediately.
“You also feel guilty for getting sick,” adds Molina, who also acts as a caregiver for her partner with multiple sclerosis.
Molina and Glaser both delivered their babies relatively early in the pandemic, when there were even more unknowns about how COVID-19 could affect pregnancy.
Since then, a study has found that most babies born to mothers who had COVID-19 late in their pregnancy are largely healthy and doing fine by the time they are 6-8 weeks old.
The findings should offer some relief to worried expectant parents, but research is still ongoing.
Now that researchers have gained a better understanding of COVID-19 and how it spreads, many hospitals have begun to ease visitor restrictions and allow at least one support person during childbirth, in line with guidance from the
The
These policies and recommendations should help give people some peace of mind when planning delivery during the pandemic, but doctors say there’s still plenty of room to improve their experience.
“I think it would be great if hospitals invested in in-house doulas that are checked and tested regularly to support moms during this particularly difficult time,” says Conti.
Meanwhile, social media has filled some of the support gaps for pregnant women with COVID-19.
After Glaser shared her COVID-19 birthing experience on Instagram, she received messages from moms all over the world, who all experienced the same thing.
“I helped them on their journey. They want to know if there is hope at the end of all this, “he says.
“As difficult as the physical symptoms of the virus were, the emotional symptoms were even worse and it’s really important to rely on other people who have been through it,” says Glaser.
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