Johana Mendoza Chancay hasn’t been in the same room with her baby since she giving birth while in a medically induced coma.
Chancay talked about delivering her daughter amid the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus pandemic on CNN’s “Cuomo Prime Time.” Now, after recovering from the virus, a traumatic labor, and the emotions of being separated from her premature baby, she says there are no words for the experience.
Diagnosed late last month with COVID-19, the disease the virus causes, Chancay said she wasn’t initially worried. At the time, she didn’t believe the virus was affecting pregnant women as much, she said, and thought she would only face flu-like symptoms. She decided to ride it out in self-quarantine.
But then she began having respiratory issues.
“That’s when I just couldn’t take it anymore,” Chancay told CNN.
Almost immediately after arriving at a Connecticut hospital, she was told she would have to be put into a coma and have an emergency C-section to deliver her baby early, she said.
“It was told to me right away and that’s when I called my family and told them ‘hey, I’m going under,'” she said. “And that’s the last time they heard from me.”
When she woke up, it was April 1 and she had a one-pound baby she named Zion, born 14 weeks early.
But instead of holding her in her arms, Chancay met her daughter for the first time from a webcam. Both she and the baby are fragile, she said, so while she is recovering at home, Zion is still at the hospital.
They will likely not be reunited until July 8, Zion’s due date.
Chancay is now undergoing a long recovery that includes physical therapy.
Meanwhile, she said she is “trying to understand” the absence of her baby. “I am a mom, she’s just not here.”
Last week, another mother and daughter got that long-awaited reunion Chancay and Zion are waiting for.
Angela Primachenko, who lives in Vancouver, Washington, held her baby last Wednesday for the first time after delivering in a medically induced coma as well. When she woke up, her baby was already five days old.
“Crying right now,” she posted on Instagram. “Our little sunshine is doing amazing!”
The CNN Wire and NTD staff contributed to this report.
