Marissa Maciel
Postpartum depression is the moon landing, because even though you are like 99% sure people have walked around up there (I mean, we have dirt, right? Moon rocks? Why would science lie about this?), one day some person will come up to you and tell you that it’s not real, which means that it never happened to anybody, least of all you.
Postpartum depression is quiet, sometimes. It snaps at your husband, but he doesn’t snap back. It cancels lunch dates, Bunko nights with ladies from church, ornament swaps. It does not take long before you close so many doors, people lose the way to find you.
Postpartum depression is crying in the checkout line at Walmart because you have an ear infection and your son is teething and he will not stop crying and all you wanted was a bag of peanut butter M&Ms, for the love of everything holy, will somebody please take this baby and let you walk into oncoming traffic?
Postpartum depression can be controlled with exercise! With St. John’s Wort! With meditation! With prayer! With good, old-fashioned positive thinking! With a sugar-free diet! With no caffeine! With breastfeeding!
Postpartum depression is a whistling kettle that just won’t quit, like when your baby is crying again, because that’s all he ever does — he cries to eat, he cries when you try to feed him, he cries when he’s tired, he cries when you try to rock him to sleep. And then one day you decide that he just needs a little more stimulation, because the internet has told you that if you don’t put him down on his stomach he will never develop any abdominal muscles and one day he will be 32 years old and his only means of locomotion will be scooting everywhere on his butt. So you lay out the soft baby quilt that will never fit a real bed, and you place your son down on his chubby belly, and spread an arrangement of colorful, Baby Einstein-approved toys around him, and by the time you sit down on the couch he has begun to cry again. It’s a piercing wail, and it sets your teeth on edge, and you are so angry your vision blacks out for a moment, and the next thing you know you are standing over him and reaching down to snatch him up and you catch yourself at the last possible second, and you do not shake him but just hold him out at arm’s length. He is still crying, and now you are crying, too, and neither of you is louder than the other.
Postpartum depression is that one time you wondered what would happen if you jumped from the top of the staircase.
Postpartum depression is that scene in It’s a Wonderful Life where wheelchair-bound Mr. Potter gleefully rasps out, “You’re worth more dead than alive!” Except you don’t have a life insurance policy because you lost that when your husband lost his job two years ago, so some days the only thing tethering you to this house full of hairline cracks is the sure truth that dying will only make your husband’s financial strain harder.
Postpartum depression is a wine-dark whale road over which no albatross ever flew.
Postpartum depression is that smile-and-nod you give whenever people give you advice. “Treasure every moment,” they tell you. Smile-and-nod. Your baby will only sleep if you swaddle him, buckle him into his carseat, hold the whole contraption in the laundry room with the dryer running, and sway/bounce on the balls of your feet in total darkness. “One day you are going to miss it! Even the crying!” Smile-and-nod. Your baby cries from 5pm to 10pm every single day. There is nothing that will stop it. You know because you have tried everything, from gripe water to running a vacuum cleaner for mindless white noise, and your pediatrician smiles at you grimly and tells you there is nothing she can do. “They grow up in an instant! You’re going to miss this stage! They’re so sweet like this!” Smile-and-nod. Smile-and-nod. Smile-and-nod.
Postpartum depression is not polite conversation.
Postpartum depression is working up the nerve to call your doctor to tell her that you almost shook your baby and that you just aren’t dealing well with things, no, it’s been getting worse these last few weeks, yes, you’re six months postpartum. And when the nurse tells you that it’s too late for you to be experiencing postpartum depression symptoms and that you need to find a psychiatrist to help you with whatever is going on, you do not cry until you have ended the conversation, but you cannot see through your tears as you are texting your husband to let him know that nobody will help you. Because how could that woman not know how hard it was for you to dial and talk to a real, live human being and say, “I think something is wrong with me and maybe this anger and pain and sadness is not my fault, can you please help me?”
Postpartum depression is your husband calling back and demanding an appointment. It’s his brutal honesty about how this can’t go on any longer. It’s a small, oval-shaped pink pill that you will begin taking the week of your birthday, and it’s supposed to take a few days to kick in but you can feel it almost immediately. You are ziplining in Red Mountain Park, zooming down the line to meet your husband at the next stop, and you are breathless as you look around at the green, green trees and realize that you are not looking down. You are not leaving yet.
Postpartum depression is the urge you still get, sometimes, to take the car into the guardrail over the long, flowing river.
Postpartum depression is more likely the second time around if you’re already a veteran, but it’s not necessarily going to happen. You’re going to be prepared this time. You’re going to exercise throughout the whole pregnancy. You’re going to start small after she’s born, but you’re going to walk every day — to the mailbox at first, and then to the end of the street. You’re going to drink soy milk and eat Greek yogurt and you’re going to like it.
Postpartum depression is there the moment your son is pulled from the neatly-drawn incision in your belly, which will one day heal in the rictus of a smile. It is there when you reach out your one untied hand to gently stroke your pink baby’s head. It is there when he is whisked out of the room, and you are sewn up alone, while the only person touching you is suturing your belly. It is there when you are riding out the morphine two hours later, and your son is still gone. It is there when you sit in the backseat and your husband drives your new family home, and you are holding your son’s wobbly head straight because you have never loved anything this much.
Postpartum depression is a very different beast the second time around, with a different doctor who wrote you a prescription before your second baby was ever born. It’s a fight for three months, waiting for the bad days to outnumber the good. It’s losing the battle and learning to be okay with that, because you were never going to win; you were the ant to Tom Hiddleston’s boot. It’s calling the nurse’s line to tearfully let your doctor know that you’re filling the prescription she gave you, and crying when she tells you to call any time — call if you want to adjust the dosage, call if you’re going to hurt yourself, if if if.
It’s getting better.
My pill was (and is) a little blue lifesaver, given to me when I was pregnant with my first son five years ago and couldn’t speak on the phone to my midwife for the tears. It’s gotten me through the next two pregnancies and two post-partum periods. I have three beautiful children who I wouldn’t trade for anything. And yet, still there were (and, let’s be honest, are) times when I wanted to walk away from it all, from all of it. You’re right. It gets better. Thank you.
My OB prescribed me zoloft when I was 5 months pregnant and it was the greatest miracle of modern science that’s every happened to me hands down. I remember the day I was walking from the train to my office and I realized I enjoyed listening to music again. pure magic. I gave birth without any painkillers and if for some reason next time I had to choose just one drug I would 100% pick zoloft over an epidural no hesitation.
Zoloft has been my magic best friend for the past four years.
6 years here. It keeps the intrusive thoughts to a minimum, and I am able to drive without picturing driving through a red light and getting hit by a semi.
Any time people who knew I was on Zoloft and pregnant questioned my staying on it through gestation and beyond, I said that it was better for me and for my kid(s) to have a healthy mind. We wouldn’t deny diabetes medications to a pregnant woman, nor should we deny SSRIs, so long as they’re not endangering the mother or the baby.
So over people thinking they know more about pharmaceuticals than your doctor! That’s basically the whole point of a prescription! A doctor tells you it’s a good drug for you! Walgreens doesn’t make you bring in a form with the signatures of ten random busy bodies who approve your drugs!
This is one of the top 10 best things I’ve ever read on the internets, thank you.
I started Zoloft around the time I conceived, I think, although I had no idea that was the timing. Explains why the adjustment period was so rough. I’m 18 weeks in now and so thankful for this help…but sometimes it’s still so, so hard. I’m scared of postpartum…did it get noticeably worse even on the meds?
So much yes. Can I tip the author?
Tip The Toast! They paid the author! And also that will probably help them know people want more writing like this which might come from the same author!
Postpartum depression is quiet, sometimes. It snaps at your husband, but he doesn’t snap back. It cancels lunch dates, Bunko nights with ladies from church, ornament swaps. It does not take long before you close so many doors, people lose the way to find you.
This was so well-put; thank you, Pamela.
I was going to highlight this passage too. It resonates with my experience with PTSD amazingly well.
I second the thank you. I have nothing else brilliant to say, just that.
When I question whether I was really depressed when my child was born, I think of the precious friends that I ignored and ignored because I couldn’t take one more minute of sitting in front of them with nothing to say because I was drowning inside and smiling on the outside. I miss them but I succeeded in pushing them away for good. I will always regret it.
Exactly how I feel even after 3 yrs
Thank you, so very much, for these beautiful illustrations. I love them so much. They perfectly capture what I was trying to say and I seriously cannot believe that there are such beautiful images on something I wrote. Thank you.
Thank you for saying that, Pamela! I enjoyed making them, and maybe we can work together again some time.
Thank you
This is lovely and well done, thank you for writing and sharing. Very brave. I have a dear friend struggling with this right now and I’m going to share it with her.
My husband did the exact same angry follow-up call after the birth of my second (except I roll with PP anxiety, not depression). Because my first call netted me an appointment 3 weeks out, which as anyone with a newborn and anxiety or depression knows, might as well be sometime next century. We need a much, much more responsive mental health care system.
And god, does it get better. I love my kids, I love being a mom, I might even have another kid, but I will never miss the newborn stage.
Oh yes, I am not looking forward to doing the newborn stage again. I didn’t experience anything dramatic, but the hormones are pretty crazy no matter what, and the lack of sleep will make anyone lose their mind at least a little bit. I know it won’t be more fun the second time around when I have to keep a toddler alive at the same time.
Yeah, those three months are the biggest hurdle to me having a third. It’s like a penitence I’d have to do to basically become this Onion mom in 25 years, ha.
For what it’s worth, I think the wall-to-wall business of the toddler/baby combo made Round 2 a little easier for me. Less time to ruminate. But I could be wrong because I already don’t remember any of it??? Ah sleep deprivation.
I didn’t tell anyone until a long time later that whenever I closed my eyes, my newborn daughter’s face morphed into a demon. The experience utterly killed any desire to have another child, and dammit, people are so nosy about why I have an only child.
To this day, I feel so lucky that I belong to a religious tradition that does not believe in demons or messages from God, and that I was able to understand that it was just a trick of my brain. Also, my husband is a doctor and quickly realized something was wrong and got me help, even if he didn’t know the full extent of it until later.
Our society has such an idealized view of new parenthood, it makes it so much more difficult.
Thank you so much for sharing. It’s so hard to talk about these things when they’re happening (I certainly didn’t do that). I really think that part of the sickness is believing that you can’t tell anyone. It’s insidious. I’m very glad that your husband was able to get you help.
This was really gorgeous, thank you for writing it.
Very powerful and very true.
This made me cry at my desk, remembering how the preacher’s wife visited me and cooed over the baby, while I sat and wondered how she couldn’t see that I was drowning right in front of her, right there in the living room.
Yes. How can everyone not see it? How can they not tell you are THIS CLOSE to just being done? It seems so obvious! I remember being shocked that everyone around me wasn’t getting the very strong ESP vibes I was sending them.
The article got me close to tears… your comment pushed me over. Exactly. “Help me, I’m drowning. Can’t you see that? Please, please help. I don’t know how but please.” I had too many visitors, and only ONE asked me if I was alright. She already knew the answer. I’m so grateful to her for that. Even if she couldn’t do much but sit there with me.
F*ck that nurse.
Yes, absolutely right.
‘Because how could that woman not know how hard it was for you to dial and talk to a real, live human being and say, “I think something is wrong with me and maybe this anger and pain and sadness is not my fault, can you please help me?”’
People don’t seem to realize that when you get to the point where you say, “I’m depressed, I need help,” that you have already reached the point where you wanted to do something really bad; you just don’t feel like sharing your very worst, most humiliating, and un-motherly impulses with strangers on the phone. They seem to think you are just being a bit whiny and tired, and a cup of tea will make you feel better.
THIS. If I am telling you I am in trouble, then the troubled thoughts are already here. No English Breakfast in the world is going to fix that.
I need more thumbs up for this. If I’m in dire straits, I’m definitely going to downplay it. Needing help was (is) coded as a weakness and I have a hard time showing it to anyone, even if they’re trying to help.
me to self “oh I feel so so badly for her, this is how I was after my first was born and I can so sympathize”
me to self a few minutes later “… I wonder if the same feelings are still called PPD when your last kid is 3 years old”
I’m not sure, but I’m leaning toward yes. They are called something, for sure. I hope you are able to find a way out of these feelings, and soon. Do you have a supportive doctor you can talk to?
I have pretty terrible depression as it is, and I am terrified of becoming pregnant because I assume it makes me a good candidate for developing postpartum depression. Does anyone know if this assumption is true or not?
I had depression and it definitely increases your chances. I didn’t expect it to hit me so hard with my first kid, but once I got it addressed and somewhat under control, I kept taking my zoloft because it made me function better as a decent human being. When I wanted to have my second, I talked to my PCP and OBGYN about it and my husband was very supportive and proactive about addressing it with me, which helped a lot.
Yes, it does increase your risk. But! Because you know you’re at risk, you can watch out for it and get help early. I started getting help at 3 weeks post partum (increase in the dosage of my antidepressant and a PPD support group) and I think that prevented it from getting too bad.
I also have depression and my mom had PPD with me, so I was super-prepared and even resigned to having PPD. I saw a therapist while pregnant (still do), told my doctor and the pediatrician about my history, and have been being really honest with my husband about any negative feelings and need for sleep/food/time alone I need. I have had downs since the birth but not PPD, and I can’t say it’s because of what I did or didn’t do or if it’s just a quirk of my current brain chemistry, and I’m going to be just as proactive for any future pregnancies.
Same! I was certain I would and I… Didn’t. A ton of anxiety, but for once, the depression stayed away. I actually skipped a year of seasonal affective, and i felt quietly, calmly satisfied and happy when the anxiety was quiet and it was kind of amazing – is this what life is like for other people?!
you need a great doctor. Being honest with mine helped so much. We increased dosage at about 7 months as blood volume increased so I wouldn’t be caught off guard when I delivered. It is possible.
Thank you for this. Just the phrase “it is possible” honestly means so much.
also terrified :/ but want a baby so bad, but so scared that I’ll hate it, or just completely lose myself and leave my husband to have to look after the both of us 🙁
I’m not allowed to get pregnant whilst I’m on my current meds (for bipolar – my care co-ordinator told me), and if I deliberately weaned myself off them I don’t know how soon I’d be able to go back on them whilst I was pregnant/after having the baby – also worried about how it would affect breastfeeding, as people say so many things about how you are a terrible mother if you don’t breastfeed…
I’ve heard from a lot of people about how it gets better, but also still feel slightly guilty about why would I deliberately do that, to have a baby with even a bit of a risk of being a not-so-good mother.
I’m worried the same thing. I’m about halfway through my first pregnancy, still on 150 MG zoloft, and worried about ppd. Thank you to everyone else who replied.
Take care of yourself, and I hope everything goes well!
Yeah, I’m terrified of this. My depression is bad enough when I’m not gestating, and most people I talk to are like “But SSRIs will ruin your baby foreeveerr!!!!!”
That’s exactly where I am. It’s great to hear from others that they have theirs under control and are being taken care of though! Thanks to everyone who replied.
Exactly like this. Thank you for writing this.
Yeah, that nurse was seriously wrong. PPD stuff can surface up to a year out, and fuck the more I type the angrier I’m getting so just…I’m glad you wrote this. I’m glad you were around to write this.
“…some days the only thing tethering you to this house full of hairline cracks is the sure truth that dying will only make your husband’s financial strain harder.”
Yes. And there’s no polite way to ask if your life insurance policy will still be paid if you commit suicide.
And God forbid you attempt it and don’t succeed and end up in even worse condition.
ETA: PPD was not my thing. I did have severe depression while pregnant, however, which I didn’t know was actually a thing.
Right? There’s nothing good when you’re in that headspace. It feels like a game that nobody is going to win. Thankfully for me, it made more sense to keep trying than to attempt the alternative. I’m glad you made it through depression, too!
Well thanks, now I’m having PPD flashbacks at my work desk. When I finally (6m pp) told my PCP that I was researching how to get admitted to a behavioral ward so I could try to get my head together, she immediately wrote me a scrip for zoloft and bless those little pills. By that time I’d also looked up ways to surrender my colicky non-sleeping baby, as well as my husband’s benefits regarding bereavement leave and if he’d get paid if I died.
Fuck PPD, and fuck anyone who thinks it just needs sunshine and exercise.
“and fuck anyone who thinks it just needs sunshine and exercise”. -exactly, and in relation to every form of depression/ptsd/pmdd…
but unfortunately this is the norm, and even these threads and publications are dismissed as fora for hysterical women…
You know… my daughter is only 4, but I don’t miss the 0-6 month stage at all. Not even a little, not even for a minute. Once in a while I’ll see a small baby and say “awww”, and then they’ll make that little squawk that indicates they’re going to cry soon, and I’ll think: “Oh thank God I’m past that”. Which is to say – I really, really hated “treasure every moment”. Not every person finds much to treasure in having a newborn and that’s ok! Kids go through lots of developmental stages and some are amazing and make you feel blessed to be able to witness them, and others are more grit your teeth and get through it.
Thank you for sharing this.
When I had my first kid and things were rough immediately with her, people would tell me ‘oh, don’t worry, give it 6 weeks and it’ll be better’. When you’re only 6 days into it, 6 weeks is fucking forever. And then they tell you when 6 weeks is up, ‘oh, you have to wait for 3 months to go by and then it’ll get easier’ those lying fucks. She’s 2 now. I like 2, I can deal with 2. 2 is workable.
Of course I signed up for another round that starts in March and everyone thinks I’m all gooey over having an infant again, no matter how much I tell them that so far, that’s the worst part. Nice to know I’m not the only one that thinks that way.
Yes. It took 4.5 years before my husband and I even entertained the notion of having another kid. Every night that first year, up in the middle of the night, multiple times, we’d look at each other and say “never again, we are NEVER doing this again” Infants were so much the worst part for me and that was without the PPD on top of the exhaustion and frustration.
That’s interesting, because we went the other way with it because we were both sure we wanted two. We tried to have another fairly quickly because we both wanted to get the worst bits over with as soon as possible. Miscarriages interfered with that, so yay nature I guess.
I’m sorry about the miscarriages, I had only one and it was completely and utterly the worst thing ever, you have my commiseration 🙁
Thanks, you have mine too. It’s a terrible club to be in.
Truth.
Oh hey, I have one who will be 2 in April and the second one is due in March! I am so, so, so not looking forward to the first 2 months after he gets here. Newborns are only fun when you can hand them back to their parents when they start to cry. I look forward to the moment the second one is 18 months old and they both can run around and play together, but until then I know it will be more of a marathon.
I realised when my daughter was about six months old that I miss it the same way I missed doing my final exams at university or my very first major break-up. People talk about nostalgia as if it always means looking back to something good, but I think you can look back on something very, very difficult and stressful and it feels like nostalgia, just because the sheer intensity of the feelings you experienced means it comes back so vividly. I could feel that it was going to be that kind of experience, which is a sort of treasuring but it’s not really what people mean when they say “treasure it”.
My daughter is 13 months, so we have just been reliving the first terrifying six weeks, when she had an undiagnosed tongue-tie and wasn’t getting enough to eat and was (probably literally) starving. All the photos of her as a tiny newborn upset us, and I feel so, so sorry for myself and my partner that they didn’t know that they were going to have a brilliant bouncing perfectly-averaged-sized monkey a year later.
This post and comments make me terrified. I have a rabid anxiety disorder that I used to manage will pills but now manage with idk, thinking sternly to myself that it’s just wrong brain chemicals (as you might imagine, sometimes this is hilariously unsuccessful) bc the pills are too expensive in my current life situation, and I really really hope this 1 month old and counting parasite I’ve got doesn’t end up making things worse.
Hey, I was thinking about you, and I hope you are well. Please keep in touch here and know that a lot of us have your back, if needed. <3
It’s a correlation but that doesn’t mean it will happen to you! If you do start feeling worse, there may be social workers at your hospital who can hook you up with therapists etc. for free. My hospital had that, and tbh they were a little too obsessed with breastfeeding, but it was good to know I had someone I could always call and talk to. And congrats on your pregnancy!
Hi, I wrote about anxiety and pregnancy, from my perspective, for The Toast before, and a lot of what you’re saying sounds very familiar to me.
Have you talked about continuing on something (medication wise) during pregnancy? Not everything is a D or X grade drug, and most doctors will figure out what the best option is for pregnant women, risk-wise. Also, regarding $$$: Some pharmaceutical companies provide financial assistance to people who can’t afford their prescriptions.
If you ever want to talk, and maybe you’re on Twitter, you can DM me. I’m @standardtuber. Just give me a heads-up if you follow me and I don’t follow back right away.
I hope things are going well for you. I realize this post is almost a week old and you may have thought of this already and it wouldn’t work for you, but a lot of the drug companies offer free (or at least low cost) meds. I know GlaxoSmithKline does, definitely. Their website for their program is bridgestoaccess.com if this helps at all.
Postpartum was a struggle, only for me it hit me in the anxiety. I was terrified of putting Voldemort in the car seat and had vivid mental images of accidentally breaking his fingers or his arm. And corners? I had to put my back against the wall and hold one hand entirely covering that tiny head to slide into the kitchen – there were so many CORNERS on cabinets and tables and counters and I just knew I would smash his head open.
Thank you for sharing this. I’m so so glad you’re ok.
I’m glad you’re okay and I hope the same for everyone commenting and reading.
(And even if you don’t have PPD, it is 100% a lie that you will definitely miss the crying-for-hours stage!)
This time last year, I had an eight-week-old and I met up with a bunch of schoolfriends, two of whom have kids who are in the 6-9 year age-group, and one who had a toddler. The two with older children cooed over how amazing my daughter was and how it was the most precious time in the world, and the one with a toddler frowned and said, “Hm – M was colicky and cried for four hours nearly every night. I don’t think I miss that.” I NEARLY KISSED HER.
Thank you so, so much for writing this. It upsets me so much when doctors – DOCTORS – are just like “oh you’ll get over it.” I was lucky to have great treatment for my depression and I will never give up my drugs.
After my first baby was born, it is now clear to me that I was struggling with PPD. No one around me seemed to notice or encourage me to seek care. The hospital I delivered in is a teaching hospital, and they even called me to see whether I qualified to participate in a study on PPD. They decided based on my phone responses that I did not. So I assumed that I did not in fact have PPD and just went on struggling, and got pregnant a second time, and struggled some more, and lost my marriage. To this day I’m not sure whether getting treatment earlier would have saved my marriage or just delayed the inevitable.
Thank you so much for writing this. I hope other women who are struggling will see this, or will remember this as they struggle in the future, and seek help right away.
I don’t know how many times I’ve said to new parents: “If someone comes up to you and tells you to ‘cherish this time,’ you stab them, you stab them in their black heart.”
YUP.
So, so true. Thank you for sharing. I will say that for me, being prepared this (my third) time has made such a difference. My second, I went on Zoloft only a few weeks Pp. With this baby I started Zoloft somewhere in my 8th month of pregnancy. And I was in a place that I was able to be open and honest with family and friends. Thank goodness for magic pills, they really can save your life. Thanks again for writing, glad you’re okay.
What do you say to someone who really is cherishing every moment? I didn’t cherish a single moment until my son was at least 4 months old, and don’t feel too bad about it because those moments sucked. But my cousin, who has one year old twins, has been deliriously happy for every moment of their lives. We’re close, she would tell me if she were unhappy, so I believe her when she says she is happy. But I don’t know how to respond to it. Everything I say just sounds churlish. I only know how to be a depressed mother.
Does “I’m really glad you’re having such a great experience (and then segue into specific detail about what the twins are doing these days)” come out churlish?
You’re right. I have said exactly that, and indeed it does not come out churlish. But it does come out, from me at least, as sort of false. To me it does not sound different from “CHERISH EVERY MOMENT !!!!1”. But I guess, “I’m glad you are cherishing these moments” is acceptable to say to someone who actually is, rather than saying “Cherish-every-precious-moment-because-they-go-by-so-fast-and-you’ll-miss-it” to every single new parent.
If you think your cousin might hear a falseness and be concerned/offended by it, you might mention something to her along the lines of “sorry if that sounded weird–you know I had a rough time when my son was an infant, but I’m genuinely glad for you”–but otherwise, you might be like me and being too hard on yourself.
This was an emotional, and very interesting read. As a young woman who has never had children, I can’t relate directly(though I really empathised through your writing!) but I’ve found myself drawn lately to narratives of pregnancy, birth and what comes afterwards. It’s something I’ve always assumed I’d do (in five or ten years), and it’s only quite recently that I’ve started thinking about having children as a choice, rather than something that just kind of happens. So now I find myself wanting to know all about the process: what might happen to me? how might I feel about it? etc. This article was another piece of that picture, and it feels important to me to hear about the difficult and complicated and gross and scary aspects of motherhood as well as the joyful ones. Anyway, PPD sounds absolutely awful, and I hope that everyone who experiences it gets all the support and treatment they need as soon as they need it.
All of this. Plus I was also grieving the death of her twin sister which made it especially bad. Not looking forward to the next time, but I will have extra support now.
Yes. All of this and more. Thank you.
I advise all women and health professionals to educate themselves about ALL the perinatal mood and anxiety disorders (PMADS). Apart from postpartum depression there are seven other PMADS listed on the excellent Postpartum Progress FAQ page:
http://www.postpartumprogress.com/frequently-aske…
I was diagnosed with the PMAD of bipolar, peripartum onset (postpartum bipolar/PPBD), a.k.a. childbirth-triggered bipolar.
For more information I suggest checking out the outstanding website Postpartum Support International:
http://www.postpartum.net/learn-more/bipolar-mood…
and the APP (Action on Postpartum Psychosis) website:
http://www.app-network.org
which addresses antenatal and postpartum bipolar disorder.
My postpartum bipolar disorder, or bipolar, peripartum onset is rare but it definitely happens. Postpartum psychosis can be accompanied by bipolar, peripartum onset, but that’s not always the case. At age thirty-seven I had my second baby. I walked into the maternity ward in labor with no previous diagnosis of bipolar disorder. Within 24 hours of my daughter’s birth I was hypomanic and hypergraphic (compulsive writing); no one recognized I was in trouble until six weeks later when I was acutely manic.
It was then when I voluntarily admitted myself for hospitalization and received an official diagnosis of bipolar, peripartum onset with no psychotic features. That was in 2007, and I’ve finally achieved mood stability and a full, wonderful life. I want to help other moms living with this postpartum mood disorder so they don’t suffer the way I did, and one way to do this is to educate about the existence of this PMAD and its symptoms. My story is published on Postpartum Progress’ website: http://www.postpartumprogress.com/story-postpartu…
Thanks for reading!
Dyane Leshin-Harwood
@birthofnewbrain #EveryPMADCounts #NotJustPPD
Founder, Depression and Bipolar Support Alliance (DBSA),
Santa Cruz County, CA
Thank you so much for linking to this invaluable resource, and sharing your experience! You are absolutely right–we need greater education about PMADs, not just PPD.
Thank you for this. It was beautiful and true.
I have suffered from depression ongoing from age 9 up until now. For me I had one really bad week after my son was born where I thought for sure it would all end But it was only one week. I actually found that having my son improved my hormone balance. My son is now 4yrs old and I have had only a single deporesivte episode that lasted roughly 3 weeks. Although you suffer from depression, you may not experience PPD.
You would be an excellent mom. No woman is perfect. I was diagnosed with bipolar at 9yrs old and I am a mom. My son is amazing and people always say how awesome I am at it (also a single mom now). Breastfeeding isn't the be all end all of motherhood. Your baby is so impotart. Why breastfeed if you're on meds that help you feel like you?!? Formula is so advanced and your baby will know you love him/her regardless of how you feed.
Thank you for saying that, Pamela! I enjoyed making them, and maybe we can work together again some time.
Thank you, thank you, thank you. I have four wonderful beautiful children 6 and under, and never experienced PPD until my 4th. He is almost 9 months and I’m starting to round the corner of it now, I think. I feel like I’ve missed so much drowning in a big black nothing over the last year. You wrote this so perfectly. Thank you for being real.
Thank you for putting this in words.
Yes. Thank you for sharing this. I cried as I identified with everything you wrote. I finally sought help when my daughter was 10 months old. I wish I had done it so much sooner.
Thank you so much for this. I know that, if my Mum could read English, she would cry right through this piece. Although she never directly admitted it to me, I know from her own stories and the accounts of others that she had had this experience with me, and it got worse when my brother was born two years later. Of course, in my country in the 80s, “there was nothing you could do”.
I feel kind of odd replying because I’m in my 60’s but had a horrendous bout of PPD. I was crying all the time…ALL the time; worrying; having intrusive thoughts about harming my baby; severe anxiety. I was 19 when I had my daughter and had a limited support system. My father noticed a change since I didn’t get dressed all day and was generally withdrawn. I thought I was going crazy. My father was concerned enough to call the hospital where I delivered and asked if anyone could help me adjust. They sent a visiting nurse who did a developmental screening on my daughter and just talked about infant care in general. It was the most horrible time of my life. I never really got “well”…I went on to develop panic attacks in my 20’s and eventually learned I had OCD and depression. I’m doing better, but wow what a ride. Back in the 70’s PPD was unheard of….sounds like there’s still a long way to go. You hang in there new moms…