‘I endured labour in a car park with my husband rather than alone in ward’

A MOTHER has told how she chose to spend hours of her labour in a hospital car park rather than be separated from her husband.

Breege O’Connor gave birth to her fourth child last Sunday at the Coombe Hospital, where partners are only allowed to attend with their pregnant partners when they are admitted to a delivery room.

On Newstalk Breakfast yesterday Ms O’Connor said she gave birth last March and was separated from her partner for the majority of her labour.

This time she delayed going into the hospital for as long as possible, as she was not yet at a point in her labour where she and her partner would be admitted.

‘I was bad but I wasn’t bad enough,’ she said.

Ms O’Connor tweeted about her options: ‘A bed alone on a ward with the promise of pain relief or public car park labour for hours with my husband at 3am. Car park labour it was. I needed him.’

She said: ‘We stayed out there as long as we could, as long as I could take it. We had to just stand in the car park. There is no way I could sit in the car. We just found a quiet spot and he helped me through it,’ she said.

The couple stayed outside for ‘a few hours’ before going inside.

Ms O’Connor said: ‘By that stage, I just couldn’t take it anymore. I had to go back in.

‘To be honest, I was afraid to stay out any longer because it was ramping up so much and I know my body and I knew I was pretty close.

‘So thankfully when we got back in, they were happy enough to bring us straight through to a delivery room because that is the only time your partner is allowed to be with you.’ Writing online, Ms O’Connor referenced the nationwide Better Maternity Care campaign, which id calling for the end of partner restrictions on maternity wards implemented at the start of the pandemic.

She said that she had a ‘very strong opinion’ about partners ‘absolutely not being a visitor’.

She added: ‘My husband and I live together, we drove in together, we laboured together in the car park.

‘We are fully vaccinated and we are doing everything we can right and yet there is this idea of just being ignored and being told, “Well we are following HSE guidelines, we have compliance”.

‘They are using the right kind of terminology buzzwords on their website but when it comes down to it, my partner was not allowed to be with me.’

Hundreds of pregnant women and mothers with their babies gathered outside the Dáil on October 6 to call on Health Minister Stephen Donnelly to end partner restrictions in maternity care.

In June, Mr Donnelly said there is no reason all restrictions on maternity visitation and accompaniment shouldn’t be lifted. However, individual hospitals are responsible for their own restrictions, leading to inconsistency on maternity wards across the country.

Mr Donnelly said last week that his department is ‘doing absolutely everything we can’ to resolve the ‘really upsetting situation’, The Journal reported.

In a statement to Newstalk, the Coombe said it does not comment on individual cases but that partners are permitted to join women as soon as they are admitted to a delivery suite.

The Coombe has also been contacted by the Irish Daily Mail for comment.

‘We stayed as long as I could take it’