Cork woman criticises maternity restrictions after experiencing two miscarriages alone

The first occurred last year.

A woman in Cork has called out the government over Covid restrictions after she was forced to endure two miscarriages alone. The woman says that after going through the heartbreaking situation twice, her husband never even got to hear their baby's heartbeat due to the pandemic. Maternity hospitals across Ireland are still under Government restrictions that don't allow partners of expecting mothers to go to maternity appointments with them. Susan O'Riordan revealed to Newstalk that over the last year she has suffered two miscarriages as she watched other mothers leave with their newborns. Explaining how she had the first of the two this time last year, and saying it was a molar pregnancy, she needed more scans and blood tests than a regular pregnancy. And in one procedure, she was awake for it due to Covid with an epidural rather than a general anaesthetic, explaining how they needed to remove tissue from her womb. Going through the traumatic experience alone, it was again in March when she went for another scan on her second pregnancy that no heartbeat was detected. She told The Hard Shoulder, speaking outside Cork University Maternity Hospital: "Went in for the scan and the heartbeat had stopped - my husband never got to hear that baby's heartbeat. "They said 'We can ring him,' but we live the bones of an hour away and he'd our son at home. "I just wanted to get out of there and so I had to go outside, and I had to phone him and tell him that we'd lost that baby as well". Susan also explained how she miscarried in her own mother's driveway and being immediately rushed to A&E, where she spent three days recovering and coming to terms with her loss all without any support, calling for the government to ease these restrictions.