By Alexis Grant-Panting, Illustration: Brett Ryder, Health Affairs, October 2023
In December 2020, at the height of my fear and uncertainty during the COVID-19 pandemic, I learned that I was pregnant with my second child. Previously, I had joked with my husband’s maternal grandmother, Nana, about not wanting to have a baby in Texas as a Black woman. Now the joke didn’t seem funny anymore. My pregnancy, which should have been an empowering journey, was characterized by fear. I feared being pregnant in Texas. I feared giving birth in Texas. I feared that I would go ignored and unheard. I feared that either I would die or my baby would. I feared birthing while Black.
Through introspection, reflective writing, oral journaling, and conversations with my partner, I have sought to make sense of my pregnancy and birth story—to understand why Black women like me have come to fear their birth experience instead of being able to enjoy and celebrate it. It is a knot that I am still untangling.
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