Table 2 Boxes of verbatim
Box 1 | -COVID 19: Minor or moderate symptoms, but questioning about an unknown virus |
Anxiety related to the health of the child to be born and relatives | “For me, the first worry that I had when I left for A&E, was to find out whether he was ok (the baby)”. P1 “I was afraid that my husband might die, you know. When I left with the ambulance, I thought to myself, maybe this is the last time I’ll ever see them. Either because I was going to die, or because they were going to die… I could see death everywhere, it was horrible”. P10 |
Fairly unreliable, even contradictory information | “Because it was the same thing for babies on the news, they were saying: blablabla.. fœtuses are not at risk, blablabla, and then, two weeks later we heard there had been one case.” P1 |
Box2 | -Identifying oneself as a mother in an anxiety-provoking climate with a loss of social references |
Giving up on daily activities | “But it’s true that having to stop work, and then stop sport on top of having to stay at home, it was complicated.”P1 |
Isolation, restriction in freedom, missing the family | “Frankly I found it…it was hell being at home on my own.” P4 “So, I felt lonely on my own during my pregnancy because of this. I missed my mother particularly; I missed her a lot.” P10 |
Giving up the pregnancy that was planned in a world before COVID-19 | “There wasn’t the fun side of having a first baby, going to look at things… I don’t know. Going to look at buggies, perhaps… We did everything on the Internet… That was it.” P2 “ I would have liked to have had the sensation of what it is like to float at the deep end of the pool with a big belly, when your feet can’t touch the bottom”. P2 |
Break with the world before, loss of references | “ I was worried about the world and globalisation, about everything surrounding us. Being pregnant in such times, it was really horrible.” P10 |
Box 3 | -Medical care: fine line between indispensable support and ill treatment |
Tele-consultation: not satisfactory | “I didn’t particularly appreciate the follow-up on the phone, I must say. It would have reassured me if I had been examined a bit for my baby. On the phone, it’s not at all the same thing.” P2 |
Fear of disturbing | “No, in fact, so long as I didn’t have a temperature, I didn’t dare, I didn’t want to kick up a fuss.», P7 |
Ill treatment, obstetrical violence during birth | “Oh well, that was a catastrophe, it was a total catastrophe. The anesthesiologist was screaming at me because I was not obeying him.” P4 |
Box 4 | -Individual and social resources in the face of adversity |
Distancing | “It’s true that the COVID-19 pandemic… we were rather serene about it… We are not in the risk-prone categories and I still think that children are not part of the risk-prone categories.” P9 |
Previous history of serious illness | “I have seen worse! I have a very loaded medical history, so I’ve seen worse.” P1 |
COVID-19 infection | “I was happy to have had it because I thought: Ok, so that’s done! We’ve all had it. We are… in a way, well, safe now.” P10 |
Digital social links insufficient | “I also missed having that kind of contact… even if we could use the phone, it’s not the same.” P11 |
Box 5 | -The central role of the partners |
Supporting role | “Being with someone, it was reassuring. I felt protected.” P2 |
Not being allowed to take part in the pregnancy follow-up experienced as an injustice | “I’m not sorry for myself, I’m sorry for him. These are moments you can’t relive afterwards…” P2 “We live together, we lived through lockdown together, so we didn’t understand these things, why should we by separated for this medical follow-up?” P7 |
Intense anxiety at the idea of not being allowed to attend the birth | “We weren’t sure that the father would be able to attend the birth, and it’s something that I would have felt I was robbed of, this particular moment. Even the first days after my daughter was born. It’s for him, really, I would have been sorry to be with her and not him…», P9 |
Box 6 | -The unexpected benefits of the suspension of social norms |
Spending time as a couple or as a family | “Being able to do things once more together, without the pressure of having to go out, of absolutely having to do something. For our part, we loved lockdown.” P9 |
A cocoon and a privileged relationship with the new-born baby | “An enriching (experience) in the sense that I really experienced the end of the pregnancy cut off from the rest of the world, and the birth, and my daughter, without any outside pressure whatsoever. I could discover my daughter, without the outside world looking on, it was great.” P6 |