Let me start out by saying that if you have experienced or witnessed someone experience depression in your life, you know how debilitating it can be. This post is about baby blues and postpartum depression. Both of which I experienced and truly wish someone talked to me more about it. I wish someone would have prepared me for these emotions rather than tell me to "get sleep now before the baby comes" because let's be honest, that piece of advice does not even make any sense. I mean, we don't accumulate sleep for later.
Here is how I remember my mental health spiral: I was discharged from Kaiser within 24 hours of my birth. When my husband and I got home, he had to go back down to get some more things from the car and I put our baby in his bassinet next to our bed. There is no exaggeration when I tell you that the moment I placed my baby down and I slipped my hands from underneath him, this overwhelming feeling came over me and completely took over. The tears came down and I could not stop, even when my husband came into the room and just held me, I could not stop. Even when he assured me that it was all going to be okay, that we were going to be okay and that the baby was going to be okay, I could not stop.
The crying continued every time my baby cried, every time he did not latch and I had to get a formula bottle because my milk had not come in yet and I was unsure if hand expressing colostrum was enough even though I read everywhere that it was. As a new mom, I felt like everything I did was wrong. That something was wrong with me, that is why my baby is crying, that is why he is not latching.
I began to google everything. Literally! My google searches would go from, "is it normal for a newborn to have the hiccups?" to "Is it normal to feel disconnected after giving birth?" to "Is it normal to mourn your past life after giving birth?". If I can go back to accumulate all my google searches, I think I would see very clearly that I was on track for postpartum depression. Whenever I researched baby blues or postpartum depression, there was always a common theme that looked like this:
Baby Blues: lasts about two weeks after birth and includes crying usually for no apparent reason, feeling overwhelmed and irritability.
Postpartum Depression: lasts longer than two weeks after birth and includes feeling sad and hopeless, withdrawal from family and friends, and lack of interest.
At two months postpartum as I write this now, I can confidently tell you that I have postpartum depression and it is unlike anything I have ever experienced. My provider at my postpartum checkup waived my concerns away for postpartum depression by saying, "your baby blues are lasting longer because of your initial anxiety, give it another week".
I now find myself asking if I was predisposed to postpartum depression given my anxiety but I do not think I will ever truly know. All I know is that postpartum depression is real and it sucks. I also am confident that being isolated since 5 months pregnant due to COVID-19 did not help my mental health one bit. Interestingly, I found myself becoming more engaged on social media to continue to be connected to friends which actually helped me during pregnancy. Ironically, it created a lot more damage during my postpartum recovery but that was mainly due to me over analyzing every comment, like or lack of or story view and internalizing everything.
I can't tell you that I am 100% back to myself. But I can assure you that there are ways to lessen the burden. Therapy is a huge outlet for me, I highly encourage it especially if the therapist is trained specifically in postpartum. Journaling is a great way to get the thoughts in order or see how ridiculous they are once they are written down. Speaking to family and my partner. Family did not always understand but a blessing in disguise was that with postpartum depression, I do not give a fuck. Sorry but I don't. The overwhelming emotions take over and I find myself educating those family members that I usually shy away from or back down because I don't want to get into an argument.
Hang in there mamas. We will get through it. COVID or not.
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