Already in New York, some overwhelmed hospitals are not allowing pregnant women to bring any support people with them - no spouses, parents, children, friends or doulas.
"I'm pretty nervous about that," Anna said. She and her husband joke that they would schedule a home birth with a midwife if it came down to him not being allowed at the birth - and Anna knows a Catholic mom in the area who has delivered all five of her children at home.
But she's hoping it doesn't have to come to that, and that things will calm down by the time she needs to deliver.
"Right now I feel like we don't need to worry about that too much. We can put it in God's hands for now," she said.
Baylyn Wagner, who is 28 weeks along and due on June 19th with her third child, has already decided to change her labor and delivery plans in light of the coronavirus pandemic.
"Initially I thought, 'Oh, it'll for sure be over and done with by June and we won't have to worry about delivery,'" Wagner, who lives in Minnesota, told CNA.
But then she started hearing reports of hospitals restricting support people for pregnant women to one person, or to no one. Her own hospital emailed her and told her that they would only allow one support person, even though Wagner had been planning on her husband, doula, and birth photographer attending her labor and delivery.
Wagner said her doctor tried to reassure her. Wagner had a late loss in her second pregnancy - she miscarried a little after 21 weeks - and in light of that, Wagner's doctor said she would do her best to advocate for the hospital to make an exception for Wagner's husband to be present for the birth of their third child.
"But she said if it gets to 'full crisis mode,' those were her words, they absolutely could limit it down because their priority is keeping their staff healthy. I know hospitals are doing what they can, but for us...with the anxiety we already had with this pregnancy, we chose to look into midwives to do a home birth option," she said.
After talking with four different midwives, Wagner said it sounded to her like a lot of couples were making the same changes.
Wagner said they've also changed their contract with their birth photographer to a more tentative plan, that accounts for whether the photographer is sick and cannot come to the birth.
Wagner lives with her grandparents, so she said they will watch her son while she gives birth at home. Her grandfather is also a Catholic deacon, and she said she is considering asking him to baptize her child soon after the birth, in the event that churches are not yet open.
"There's really no way to know right now what things will look like by June, if things will be better, if we'll able to have Masses again by that point, or what the world will look like," Wagner said.
Keeping calm, trusting God
Claire Le, who lives in Littleton, Colorado, is expecting her first child with her husband Huy. The Le's said they stocked up on food as they saw the pandemic worsening, and since then they have been staying home as much as possible to avoid any exposure.
"My main fear is if I contract the virus, then I would have been in ICU and then my husband can't be there during the delivery," Claire said. "And then also, if hospital protocols get even worse, there may even be a chance he may not be there. So, right now we're trying to control what we can, and trying to both stay healthy."
"I think we just constantly remind ourselves that this is not in our control," Huy added. "I mean, we can pray for a good May 1st due date where everything's just back to normal, but things like that are not really under our control."
Thinking about postpartum recovery is what makes Claire a little sad, she said. Her family is out in California, and they were planning to come see the baby and help out after the birth. But now, they're not sure when a visit will be possible.
Huy and Claire are also wondering about the baptism, and if it will be performed privately.
Claire said she has found peace in prayer and offering up the situation to God.
"I know God's been with us from the very beginning, from conception, and he's been with us the whole way. I know we'll be okay," she said.
Huy said staying connected with loved ones, watching daily Mass on YouTube, and praying together as a couple has been helping them stay calm at this time.
"We went to a chapel which was relatively quiet, that gives us a little bit of a release where we can just go there and with God for a while," he said.
Anna said she has been trying to balance her worries and anxieties by also counting her blessings.
"I always try to think about what blessings I have at this time: more time with my husband, more time prepare for the baby, more time to rest," she said. "The fact that I'm not on my feet all the time is really helpful...teaching is physically demanding because you're on your feet so much."
The time at home has also afforded her more time to pray, Anna said.
"I did a novena to St. Gerard (a patron saint of pregnancy) when we first got pregnant and I just started the other day to do another novena to St. Gerard," Anna said. "(I'm also) able to live stream daily mass, where normally when I'm a teaching I don't have time for that."
Wagner said she and her husband have been trying to say a daily rosary in order to stay calm at this time.
"(We're) especially meditating on what Mary and Joseph went through and their pregnancy and their birth with Jesus, and uniting our own uncertainty to what they experienced," she said.
She's also been using Hallow, a Catholic prayer app that leads users through guided meditations similar to the popular Calm app, but based on Scripture readings.
"They've had a whole series of little guided meditations on different ways to cope with isolation and stress through all of this, so that's been a nice tool and prayer as well," she said.
Sefranek said the pandemic has made her identify more closely with women experiencing unplanned pregnancies, and helped her realize how much of life is out of her control.
"I planned this pregnancy nine months ago," Sefranek said. "I didn't plan to have a baby in the middle of pandemic...maybe every pregnancy, every birth, in a way, is unplanned."
"I don't want to diminish the pain and the difficulty of a real crisis pregnancy," she added. "It just is reminding me of that…(because) so much of this outside of my control."
Sefranek said she's been saying a lot of "midnight rosaries" when she wakes up from pregnancy discomfort, and that's been helping her to feel at peace, though she deeply misses the sacraments. She said she's also been connecting with loved ones virtually to help ease her anxieties.
She is also paying attention to the small blessings in her life. For example, she said, the other day she found out that she had two extra boxes of sticks for her fertility monitor that she will need to track her cycle once the baby is born. She had previously been worried - panic buying has caused the sticks to be scarce online.
"(It was) a small thing, but maybe God had a plan for me and he used my absent mindedness to give me this small thing right now that could increase my peace," she said.
"So that was a nice reminder that God can work through the things that feel really frustrating in the moment."
Mary Farrow worked as a staff writer for Catholic News Agency until 2020. She has a degree in journalism and English education from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.