My foray with Post Natal Depression.

{Ben three hours new}

Out with the placenta, in with the Dolly Parton boobs. When your hormones change, flood in, it may catch you. I'm not talking the endorphins, they're the happy hormones. No, the despair, the dread, the frustration, the lonliness. Thoughts of what have I done?

Other times the little black cloud rolls in slowly. One little grey wisp at a time. Sneaky. Harder to notice, unobservant to the gradual changes. After all becoming a mother (for the first time or the eighth time) comes with a suitcase of upheaval. When life is already trying to find it's new axis, the seemingly smaller problems fly under the rated. In the beginning the little thoughts don't rate on the priority scale. 

Post Natal Depression.

This week is Antenatal & Postnatal Depression Week. Statistics show 1 in 7 women are diagnosed with Post Natal Depression. I believe the numbers are greater than that. How many women just keep going, even when they know their real self is hiding somewhere. Lost in all the mist.

That was me.

After Ben was born, & I've written about Ben's first year before, it was so far from how I imagined life would be. Our baby was not the happy, content little boy I imagined during pregnancy.

{A very familiar sight}

He cried. He was so hard to get to sleep. He screamed. When he did sleep, he didn't sleep for long at all.

There was already so many changes during that time - leaving full time work to stay home full time, Doug changed employment which also meant a change in working hours from a flexible shift roster to a Monday to Friday working week, plus work was now further away too. He left earlier & was home later. All of a sudden I was home by myself with Ben from 6am to 6pm. Add in Ben's aversion to sleeping & constant crying, I became an ideal candidate for PND.

Initially I tried to convince everyone around me that I was fine. I was coping & happy. It was easy to know all the right things to say to the community health nurse when she would ask how I was, how my moods were. The new mothers survey - occasionally I felt a little sad [tick box] but over all I was happy [tick box] at least that was what my manipulated answers indicated. I was still convincing myself that I was fine, I wasn't ready to think that I wasn't coping. To admit failure. I didn't open up to anyone about how I was really feeling. Not to myself, not to Doug, which is silly but true. That is what post natal depression did - it changed me. I fought internally against myself all the time. Every thought became a battle. Sometimes I would be desperate for help, for someone to really see the conflict inside my mind. But when asked how I really was, the mask came on. I was my own worst enemy.

I felt bad that Ben cried. A lot. Doug didn't do well with all the crying too, & after spending a long day at work & then driving home in peak hour traffic, I wanted to have it all together for Doug once he was home. Instead of a hot dinner, I had to pass over a screaming baby, because I just needed half an hour without grasping for ways to calm our baby. Again, silly but true. It changed my normal rational thoughts into something else altogether.
It was me who really wanted to start our family, my maternal clock was chiming loudly, while Doug was happy wait another few years, so when life wasn't perfect, I took all the problems on myself. Thinking I was the one who signed up for this, not Doug. My thinking was skewed (screwed). I felt guilty, accountable, for everything that was wrong with our baby, though none of it was my fault. This was the depression, the little dark voice telling me I had made my bed, now I had to lay in it. 

Slowly I began to lose myself. The way I was feeling, I thought it was just a new mum thing.

When I thought of post natal depression images of women not being able to get out of bed came to mind. Constantly crying. Ignoring their baby or wanting as little as possible to do with him. Failing to bond. Crouched in a corner or against a wall. Shutting out the world & everyone in it.

I didn't have problems getting out of bed each day. I didn't cry without good reason or desperation. I loved Ben & interacted with him (though at times it was with a forced smile. A happy mask because I didn't want to scar our child with buried memories of an expressionless Mum gently shaking a rattle in front of him) I only sat against a wall when I was listening to Ben cry while taking a break from trying to rock him to sleep. I went to our local mothers group. We went for walks & family dinners.

I didn't have post natal depression - according to my thoughts of what post natal depression looked like.

But I did.

I knew I did, but I was in denial. I thought it would go away as Ben got older, got easier.

Maybe it would have, maybe not. I honestly can't say if I could have continued on the way I was feeling, without reaching for help.

My GP was great, we started a treatment plan for Ben's reflux, which was quite severe & a root cause for many issues we were having. I started taking anti depressants, along with regular visits to track & document my depression & Ben's reflux. I was advised that there may not be any noticeable differences for up to three weeks, so when within four days of commencing anti depressant medication I felt great, coinciding with Ben being a little more settled than usual as we got a handle on his reflux, I thought to myself 'Ha, I don't have depression, it's just when Ben has a bad day, it's hard. It's not me after all.'

Without seeking medical advice first, I stopped taking the anti depressants. Two days later I crashed emotionally. I was back to how I felt two weeks earlier. Flat, unenthusiastic, sad, at times desperate. For what I can't specify. Perhaps desperate to feel like 'me' again. Desperate not to feel useless when our baby cried & I couldn't calm him. Desperate not to be stuck how I was feeling.

While I was back in my grey mist, Ben was still more settled & sleeping a lot easier. So it wasn't Ben. It was me as well. That was the moment I accepted I did have post natal depression.

Immediately I started taking the medication again & when we went back to the GP a few days later I told him everything that had happened. It was a relief, to find 'me' again. All those martyr thoughts evaporated, if Ben was crying I knew it wasn't because it was something I was or was not doing, I didn't get so tangled up in obsessing over nap times. I let go of the happy mask I was clinging to as a life line & let every one in. After four or five months, with Ben's reflux as good as it was going to get without invasive treatment, I slowly weaned off the anti depressants. 

{In the post birth bliss, before the getting lost in the grey mist of depression}

That was ten years ago. The emotions I felt during those horrible months still haunt me, settle over me like a heavy cloak when I think back to those heavy months. My heart beat picks up, the dread in my chest returns, the itchy nose that preludes the tears. The feeling of precariously teetering on an emotional ledge. It wasn't until I was out the fog of depression that I could clearly see exactly how bad I really was, how much I had ignored the little warning signs & over looked all the persistent, small negative thoughts. 

After that hellish & displacing experience I swore that if & when we had another baby I would would never go back to that lost version of myself again. I would seek help the moment I thought it was more than the 'three day blues' or lasted longer than a week.

In the weeks & months after Rianan was born both Doug & I kept a very observant eye on how I was feeling, how I reacted, how present I felt, & also following the births of Jack, Blake, Will & Clay. Thankfully it was a one off, because while at times I have felt sad in the post natal months, it was never anything close to that depressed fog that slowly absorbed who I was.

If you think that maybe, just maybe, you don't feel like who you are, if there are some dark clouds hanging around that can't be shaken off, or wonder that maybe you might have antenatal or post natal depression - please speak to someone.
Your doctor, your husband, partner, friend, mum, community health nurse, strangers on a parenting forum, anyone.

Because that grey fog, it really, really sucks.

Places to reach out for help

http://www.panda.org.au/vic-pnd-directory

http://www.blackdoginstitute.org.au/public/depression/inpregnancypostnatal/resourceslinksreading.cfm

http://www.beyondblue.org.au/resources/for-me/pregnancy-and-early-parenthood

http://www.beatbabyblues.com.au/links.aspx



**This is just my side of our story with post natal depression. I haven't touched on how my depression affected Doug. How much he took on & tried to help, even when I wouldn't let him. That's another post for another day.

Our debut into parenthood

I found our first year of parenthood the hardest year we have been through in the whole time we have have been parents. Including this last year where along with looking after five children under nine years of age, I was also pregnant with our sixth child. Or the last four months, where we have been parenting six children aged from newborn up to nine years old.

That first year just about broke me. 

The first two weeks of life as a family of three were fine, well as fine as learning to be first time parents can be in amongst the visitors, the broken sleep & cracked nipples as we tried to get a handle on breastfeeding - something which does not just miraculously happen naturally, but takes an under-estimated amount of effort & perseverance. Then Ben woke up out of that newborn sleepiness. He cried, he screamed, he grizzled, then he would cry inconsolably some more. All day long. The only reprieve we got was from midnight until 3am. Those few hours were the only hours he would usually sleep soundly. Other than the rare 20 minute stints on my shoulder where he would cry himself into exhaustion. 

I've never forgotten how hard, how arduous, how distressing & emotional those days were.

It was a very rude shock. During Ben's pregnancy I had ideals of how our days would go, how laid back & happy our baby was sure to be, given my own optimistic & easy going personality. Oh the ignorance.

I would be home with this red-faced, distressed little baby, who I spent hour upon endless hour pacing up & down our hallway, looping through the lounge room, patting, rubbing, cuddling, feeding, burping, changing, trying my best to comfort & console. Waiting for 7pm when Doug would be home from work, so I could pass Ben over his Dad, in the desperate hopes that he could get our little baby to settle, or by some impossible miracle, sleep. Even if Doug couldn't calm Ben any more than I could, I just needed someone to take him & give me a break. I needed one hour to myself to not feel like a failure to our son, & to Doug. I felt that as Ben's Mother, I should be able to calm him, to settle him or at the very least know what was wrong. I had no answers.

At seven weeks old I took Ben to our doctor for a snuffly nose & for help. I was certain that something wasn't right, no baby should cry as much, as often, as hysterically as Ben did. I was sent away with the advice that he's just a new baby & it's probably colic. If he's no better at twelve weeks old then to come back. In the weeks that followed there was no improvement. Our next appointment coincided with Ben's first cold. Again we were sent away & told to come back once Ben had recovered from his cold and was four months old.

I never went back. Instead, we had been referred via our child & youth health nurse to Torrens House, a facility where parents experiencing extreme sleep & settling issues could stay for 2 nights & 3 days, with one on one, hands-on help & advice from specialised nurses. Although we never resolved our issues completely whilst there, they were still a glimmer of light in what was a very dark tunnel. It was discovered & confirmed that Ben had severe reflux, GORD (gastro-oesophageal reflux disease) which the following week, after our time in Torrens House, was officially diagnosed via a pediatrician. It came as no shock to myself, or to Doug, that I also had developed post-natal depression. 

Both Ben & I started treatment, Ben for his reflux & myself for depression. This was a big step in the right direction. I felt more like my normal self & able to cope much better. When hearing Ben start to cry, instead of feeling nauseous, tense & anxious, I could stay calm & have a little faith in myself as a Mum that I could give Ben what he needed most, comfort. It still took us a few more months to get Ben's reflux under control & ease his symptoms, but there were small improvements each month. A baby began to emerge who I had thought we would never see.

By ten months old we had a much happier & relaxed little baby. But those months of pain for Ben had instilled an aversion, more likely a fear, to lying down & had many 'bad' sleep habits. Ben had associated his cot, the pram, the car, any attempts at settling to sleep with pain (as the acid from his stomach would burn it's way up his oesophagus). 

We eventually got there, especially when we transitioned Ben into a 'big boy' bed from his cot. Starting fresh with a new sleeping environment gave us all the opportunity to break any old habits & routines that Ben associated negatively with.

By the time Ben was twenty months old, we had welcomed Rianan into our family. I was under no illusions this time as to how life may, or may not be. Especially with two under two.

I figured we would just take each day as it came & get through as best as we could. If it turned out that Rianan also suffered with reflux I now had a wealth of knowledge & experience that I never had with Ben. I was adamant that we would not have a repeat of what we went through in that first year with Ben. I also made a promise to myself that the moment I felt myself slipping into the dark struggles of post natal depression I would seek help straight away. I never wanted to go though that again, pretending I was okay when I knew deep down I wasn't. 

As it turned out, Rianan was the complete opposite of how Ben was as a baby. We still had the normal crying moments, but instead of being inconsolable, she could be comforted. Instead of struggling to get her to sleep, & stay asleep, often she would naturally doze off herself, sometimes while lying on the playmat, or reclining in the bouncer while watching Ben play with his cars at her feet. I remember the amazement at how normal Rianan was, & how much we missed out on with the struggles Ben, Doug & I went through. 

Since that hellish first year, each time we have been expecting another little minion to add to our family, I have never taken for granted or expected to have a smooth transition. I figure if I go in expecting that this new little person may be unsettled, may cry more than expected, will need lots of cuddles & help to fall asleep, then I won't be as completely blind sided as I was in that first year. 

So to those who are pacing the hallways, & looping through their lounge rooms, walking those desperate hours with a crying, inconsolable baby, hang in there. It does get better, it's just going to take a little time. That little scrunched up, tearful face will grow, habits will change, dependence will be exchanged for independence.

Our little red-faced, inconsolable, screaming baby grew into a toddler who didn't cry every waking moment, who could fall asleep in his own bed. Now that little toddler has grown into a happy, easy going, independent nine year old who to look at, would never know or imagine the struggles he went through in that first year. 

What a debut into parenthood. It may not have been an easy ride, but it was worth it