HUNTINGTON, Ind. (WANE) – Being pregnant in general comes with its stresses, but pregnancy during the COVID-19 pandemic takes those stresses to another level.
This is a reality that the Cochran family in Huntington knows all too well.
“I got pregnant in the middle of quarantine,” said Christie Cochran. “I was isolated from people. All of my normalcy in life was completely off.”
She had a spiral into mental darkness, explaining that carrying her dear Nola for nine months in this pandemic was a period of deep anxiety and depression. It got so bad she was put on medication.
“Immediately, I just had the anxiety of it’s already new to have a birth experience and now I can’t have people who I thought were going to be there,” Christie said. “I can’t bring my older daughter to the hospital to meet her new born. I don’t know if my husband has COVID if he’s allowed to be with me. If I have COVID, if I’m going to have to mask up through labor. There were just so many anxious thoughts that you have on top of the already anxious thoughts of birth that just weighed on me heavy from the very beginning. It felt like I wasn’t myself at all.”
Two-month-old Nola has a two-year-old sister Eve, but Christie said pregnancy with her was way different.
“My first pregnancy was kind of a breeze,” Christie said. “I didn’t really have any emotional feelings, just the normal pregnancy experiences that people talk about, but pregnancy was a lot more difficult this time around, especially with just not being able to have someone go with you to the ultrasounds and appointments because of COVID restrictions.”
Her husband Keirsh had the challenge of playing support, largely alone.
“Being the partner to a pregnant woman during the pandemic was difficult to watch because she relies so heavily on her community and to watch her kept from that community for the safety of that community was incredibly difficult,” he explained.
He shared that some of the most joyous moments of labor were stripped from them.
“For me, the most difficult part of going through the birth during the pandemic was not having family come to the hospital,” he said. “Not having Eve come in and meet her new sister or not having that one moment where I go into the waiting room and announce it to cheers. Not having that it doesn’t take away the significance, but it takes away such a fun moment.”
Ultimately, the family of four is choosing to keep their eyes on the bright side.
“I think no matter what the stressors are in life you still just want to raise happy, healthy, and optimistic children,” said Keirsh. “Has it been a little more difficult this year? Sure, but we still get time with them. We still get to play with them. We still get to watch them grow and laugh and smile. So I think we’ve tried to be really intentional about not letting this pandemic define our relationship with our children. It’s something that we’ve had to adjust to and maybe hopefully we’ve modeled how to overcome adversity a little bit for them.”
Pregnancy in the pandemic can obviously be difficult and the Cochran’s say raising babies in this time is also a challenge, but through faith and love, they’re making their way.