Tricky and sensitive situation.
I’m a woman in a same sex relationship and am currently pregnant with our second child.
Wife had the first baby, at a big London teaching hospital where the care was generally really good, aside from the fact that it was covid and restrictions around going for appointments together etc applied. We did however have a few incidents of staff being clearly homophobic and I’m feeling quite scared that this is going to happen again with me and worried it will make what is already going to be a stressy birth (Im classed as high risk because of a medical condition) a really traumatic experience. The complicating factor is that the three staff who gave us a difficult time were all West African, and I know homophobia is more of an issue in parts of West Africa than it is here, so it feels like a bit of a common denominator. (Yes I do know they were West African, I’ve lived in Liberia and Ghana for a few months each, and I know the accents. Had an amazing time, aside from having to stay back in the closet.)
The worst incident was with one of the midwives who looked after us during my wife’s labour. She was only with us for two hours as was covering a break. A few examples of what happened though, firstly she asked me twice who I was and why I was there and once where the father was, despite me explaining that I was DW’s wife and the soon to arrive baby’s other parent and that there was no father. She said after each time I explained “I don’t know what you mean” then afterwards referred to me as DW’s friend or helper. Lots of dark looks when I was holding DW’s hand. And most upsetting of all when I was helping DW by changing the bed pad things they put under you to catch the amniotic fluid she actually physically knocked my hand away from DW, and snapped “I am the midwife, I look after the mother, you go and stand up there at other end by her head.” This last bit was so upsetting I had to quickly dash to the bathroom for a two minute cry, which I didn’t want to do in front of DW, before returning. We had both been awake for two days by this point, so the crying was unavoidable and I stopped very quickly and went back to DW. Had I been less tired / not where we were I might have pointed out that I was pretty well acquainted with DW’s nether regions and did not need to stay up by her head. Didn’t say anything at the time as she was only covering someone’s break and I didn’t want her to stop caring for DW somehow and soon we were being looked after by someone else who took us through to the end and was amazing.
Other incidents we had were with two staff members on the front desk of the maternity unit. (this was covid so for scans etc the pregnant one went up, waited to be called while partner hovered. Pregnant one then texted partner when called for appointment saying come up now at which point you went up to the front desk staff and signed in and got a pass). We saw both these two staff members twice for different scans and check ups and both got visibly confused when I had to go up to the desk and explain that my wife was upstairs waiting for her scan, and yes I was her wife not a sister. Cue the staff saying “I don’t understand who are you?” “If you are the wife why are you not upstairs getting the scan?” and “Fathers and partners only allowed upstairs.”
I’m worried something like this will happen again, but don’t really know how to try to preempt it without saying something that could come across as pretty racist. All three staff that gave us a hard time were definitely West African, and I know, from the news, as well as from having lived there that homophobia is a big thing. Not at all saying all first gen West Africans are homophobic or that no white people / people from other backgrounds are, but the reality is that was our experience and I don’t want a repeat of it while I’m in labour.
So what the bloody hell do I do? Nothing and hope for the best? Say something general about having had a bad experience with some seemingly prejudiced staff last time and not mention why or who?