Member-only story
No Guests Allowed
Before COVID-19, partners were able to attend prenatal appointments with pregnant patients. Now, patients are left to navigate prenatal care solo.
I found out I was pregnant just before my state went into lockdown due to COVID-19. A week later, when my OB called to confirm my seven-week ultrasound appointment, the receptionist had a message for me.
“Please come to the appointment alone. No guests are allowed.”
“Guest” is the word that has now been used in several interactions with my OB to convey to me that my partner is not allowed to attend my appointments. This is markedly different from my first pregnancy, five years ago, when he was by my side for everything.
Though I felt bad for my partner that he wouldn’t get to experience things like seeing our baby’s heartbeat for the first time, and, later, hearing it for the first time, at first I saw this as an inconvenience more than anything else. Then I went to my 12-week appointment.
Toward the end of my 12-week appointment, the nurse-midwife said she was going to listen for the baby’s heartbeat on the doppler. She struggled, for about 15 minutes, to find it. As I felt my stress…
