“Mom-to-be should have been preparing the nursery, spending way too much time shopping for baby’s perfect take-home outfit. Instead, she’s buying diapers and wipes online—worried there may not be enough to go around. She thinks of her husband—will he be allowed to see his son come into this world?”
‘She’s cancelled the baby shower. She stands alone, quarantined, for her first prenatal appointment. There will be no visitors—at the hospital or at home.’: Woman pregnant during pandemic says ‘I will choose to be fearless’
‘Something hard cracked over the back of my head. I could feel his fingers on my neck, checking for a pulse to see if he’d just committed murder.’: After surviving domestic abuse woman says ‘don’t stand by in silence’
“I woke up that morning and I just felt this bad feeling. I felt a searing pain. I remember dropping to my knees, the cat taking off, and my bag going flying. As darkness was taking over, I felt my body being flipped around. The last thing I saw before everything went black were C’s eyes looking down at me. It was my own personal horror story.”
‘Will my husband stay at home and miss the birth?’ My contractions were 8 minutes apart. I was shrieking in pain.’: Mom births baby during pandemic, ‘We pray we can all embrace again’
“Our parents cancelled their flights. We debated what to do. With each contraction, I started cursing for my husband. I needed him. In a movie-worthy scene, my husband arrived, breathless, as I dug my fingernails into his hand. Being in the midst of a pandemic while becoming a mother is something I truly never anticipated.”
‘I didn’t sign up to walk into every shift with gut-wrenching fear I may take a death sentence home to my immunocompromised child.’: Nurse says ‘give us some grace as we navigate these uncharted waters’
“I’m tired of hearing, ‘People in the medical field shouldn’t complain. They knew what they signed up for.’ I signed up to be compassionate, to use my skillset to assess and treat illnesses. I did not sign up to fight a global pandemic wearing a bandana as a make-shift mask. I did not sign up to practice Nursing while our patient’s visitors steal supplies already on a nationwide shortage.”
‘I found an older couple on the street, walking and holding hands. ‘Is this how it is all going to end?’ I worried how hard it must be to be over 65 in this crazy time.’: Woman says ‘we’ve been given the gift of time with our loved ones’
“Running through the streets in the midst of the coronavirus felt like time had turned back 25 years. I ran by a group of neighbors standing a few feet apart, talking and laughing like they had all the time in the world. I passed by a man spraying his bushes, a woman jumping rope in her garage. Everything had slowed down.”
‘You’ve seen me blow up and shed tears on my pillow. Please forgive me for not being more patient and gentle with your spirit.’: Mom apologizes for unstable emotions during pandemic, ‘I will focus on your little heart instead’
“I’ve lost my temper and unstable emotions have got the best of me. I focused on the panic and fear instead of the issues going on in your little heart. At the end of the day when you’re tucked in bed, I watch you peacefully sleeping and I’m so grateful God gave me you.”
‘I know this is a wildly unpopular opinion, but get dressed. It actually helps.’: Mom says during pandemic ‘I have nothing to prove, but everything to save’
“We’ve all seen the jokes about day pajamas and night pajamas. Or the ones asking those of quarantining in jeans, what exactly do we have to prove. I have nothing to prove, but everything to save.”
‘They are truly our heroes. We see them, we love them, and we are eternally grateful.’: Thousands cheer from balconies for Covid-19 frontline workers in touching video
“Every night since Sunday, we have come out at exactly 8 p.m. to cheer for and support all those who are putting their lives on the line to save ours. Every night gets louder than the last.”
‘He forgets appointments. He never knows the party dates and doesn’t feed him as I would. But our son lights up because daddy is ALWAYS there.’: Divorced couple learns to co-parent ‘to the level our son DESERVES’
“We were oil and vinegar 75% of the day, every single day, for the vast majority of our 14 years together. Many would say, ‘None of that is your problem. You shouldn’t have to work around that.’ He still often needs to be handled with grace, even if I don’t feel like he deserves it.”
‘I just spent 30 minutes under the hotest water, crying in the shower out of fear so I don’t scare my family.’: Nurse urges ‘our lives are just as important as the ones lying on the stretchers’
“Here I am today, shaken and crying. I’m not scared of this virus. I’m angry. Every day I set foot in the ER, there’s a high risk of contamination, injury, and possibly death because of lack of masks, gloves. Yet, without a second thought, I will always choose to risk my life to save someone else’s. That makes me extremely sad for my children. I hate that I’ve put them in this situation.”
