Tomorrow, I board a plane to Washington, DC, for my first ACOG Annual Meeting, although I have been a Fellow for over three decades.

That gap is not an accident. It is a complicated story.

My early years felt connected. My residency director, the late Dr. Sterling Williams, led ACOG’s Clinical Education nationally. Through him, I felt seen. After his death, things shifted. And quietly, preventably, mothers began dying at alarming rates.

Then one story stopped me cold.

A 16-year-old in New York City was stopped on suspicion of shoplifting. She lived in the same Brooklyn housing project where I once lived. I knew that world. I understood what it meant to grow up there, to hide things, to have no one explain your options.

Inside her bag was a newborn born alive the day before in her friend’s apartment. The baby did not survive. The teenager was convicted of homicide. She had been pregnant twice before and told no one.

Had she known about the Safe Haven law, that child might be alive today. And that young woman might not be in prison.

I called ACOG’s national office and demanded to speak with the President and Vice President. They listened. That conversation changed how I see this organization.

Now, on the eve of ACOG’s 75th anniversary, I am proud to make this trip. The new Patient Safety department tells me leadership understands that system failures are not abstract. They cost lives.

Those of us in this space carry an extraordinary obligation. We are not just clinicians. We are the last line of defense in rooms where no one else is watching.

ACOG is not perfect. Neither am I. But the commitment to get this right matters, and ACOG’s leadership reflects that goal. And I am showing up to be part of it.

I write about the gaps between documented warning signs and clinical action, and what it costs when we close them too late. Follow along here or on Substack at pregnancyblindspots.substack.com