Parents coping with baby born during pandemic
“As a social worker, I work for a state agency that helps elderly people and adults with intellectual disabilities who are dealing with abuse. In order to see a lot of my clients, I had to go into hospitals while COVID-19 was raging. Some places had put in security precautions, but others hadn’t yet. At the time, we didn’t have totally clear guidance from the state. Everything was kind of up in the air. And I was really scared. I was thinking, am I going to be able to keep doing this? Because getting coronavirus while you’re pregnant, you don’t know what’s going to happen. I was extremely concerned during the last two months of my pregnancy.
“She was born on April 29. Her name is Alexandra Catherine McMillin. Since bringing her home from the hospital, we’ve taken a lot of precautions. My husband is the only one who goes out. I don’t really go out unless it’s a doctor’s appointment. We’re just trying to be as safe as possible. People usually have a lot of visitors for their first born. It’s the best thing I’ve ever done, so you want to show her off. But the only person who’s actually stepped foot in our house since the baby was born is my mom. She was quarantining the second she heard about the coronavirus. She said, ‘There’s nothing stopping me from seeing my grandbaby.’
“I worry about the effects this all might have on her as she grows up. Typically, a newborn has contact with others besides the mom and dad. So I kind of wonder if she’s going to be behind in some way because she didn’t have that early socialization. Or maybe, is she going to be ahead because she’s so close to her mom? You just don’t know what the outcome of that is going to be.
“Years from now, I imagine she’ll be reading about all of this in school. And I’ll say something like, ‘Well, when you were born, we were right in the middle of the coronavirus pandemic. Your mom and dad had to change all their plans, and nobody was able to see you until you were older.’
“It’s been a struggle. I’ve cried out of loneliness a couple times. But it’s also been kind of nice with it just being me and her a lot of the time. Really, it makes me love her even more. As difficult as it’s been, there is something special about it being just our little family.”
— Catherine Hunter-McMillin (with husband, Matthew, and Alexandra)
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