This is my story...
After about a week of coming home with a newborn last year, the "Baby Blues" visited me. I had read about it, but I didn't give it too much thought. It seemed like a normal thing that would come and go quickly. When it hit me, I didn't even really recognize it. I knew I felt defeated most of the time, but I thought that was just the territory that came with being a new mom and trying to juggle all my new and old responsibilities at once.
Fast forward a few weeks. Those Blues lingered.
Now fast forward a few months. Things were getting worse. It could no longer be chalked up to "just the Baby Blues". I was crying a lot. I was not the happy person I used to be. I felt like a failure at everything, but especially in my roles as a mother and a wife. If I wasn't succeeding in those areas, I felt like my life had become pointless. God had blessed me with these roles and I was letting Him (and everyone else) down because I couldn't stop crying long enough to take care of business.
Sure, having a baby can be hard on most women, both mentally and physically, but this was different. The smallest thing would go wrong - for instance, I couldn't get Noah to burp during his feedings, and I would become impatient, angry, discouraged, and would shut down. I'd lock myself away in the bathroom and cry for hours. I couldn't understand why everything was such an obstacle and why I was feeling so conflicted ALL. THE. TIME.
I wasn't eating.
I wasn't smiling or laughing.
I wasn't bonding with my child.
I was just going through the motions.
I was withdrawn from everyone around me.
I was tired. Constantly tired.
I never left the house.
I felt guilty.
I felt ashamed.
I was scared of what people would think if I told them how I felt.
I was lashing out at my husband.
I blamed myself every time something didn't go as planned.
I was beyond overwhelmed.
I felt hopeless, like it would never get better.
I wasn't enjoying any part of motherhood like I had expected to. This was not how I pictured our first months with our brand new baby. But, I put on a smile and a show when I needed to. Only a few people could see through the act and knew what was really going on with me. I was suffering from postpartum depression and needed some help. My parents tried, on multiple occasions, to talk to me about it and get me to call my doctor. I refused. "I was stronger than that!" In my mind, it would have been weak of me to cry to my doctor about not being able to handle motherhood... but in reality, that was not the problem at all. Even after reading this website about ten different times and checking off nearly EVERY single symptom, I kept telling myself things would get better. "Just give me a few more weeks. I'll be fine soon". I said that to my family about a zillion times and I am sure they were so fed up with me.
Unfortunately, that time never came. Aside from myself, everyone around me was suffering because of this dark cloud that was hanging over me. Noah didn't have the mom he deserved, Josh didn't have the wife he deserved, and my family was worried sick about me. I was aware of all that, and it only added to my stress level. I felt guilty, as if it were something I should be able to control. I was literally sad about being sad, if you can make sense of that.
I didn't want to be on medication. I've always been of the mindset that you shouldn't need any type of drugs to make you happy. What I didn't understand was that something hormonal, dangerously hormonal, was going on inside my body and it wasn't anything I could change on my own. One sweet friend's words stuck with me, and probably gave me that little push I needed to contact my doctor. She said, "the Bible talks about medicine, it is a gift from God for us!" I came to terms with the fact that it was silly of me to suffer instead of taking advantage of available resources that could help get me past this. There should never be any shame in asking for help when you truly need it. It doesn't make us "weak". We are only human.
I finally made that phone call when Noah was around 5 months old. The nurse could hear the fear in my voice and got me in to see the doctor right away. It was the single hardest thing I've ever done. It took so much bravery for me to step into that room and be 100% vulnerable and transparent with my doctor about what I was feeling. But afterwards, things only went up and a weight was lifted. My medication helped me almost immediately and I felt like my old self within days. I can't tell you how good it felt to no longer cry every day. Or how it felt to genuinely smile again. Or how it felt to enjoy my son and not see him as a chore. Now, about 9 months later, I'm prescription-free and feeling like the super awesome mom I knew I could and would be. Sure, we still have bad days like everyone else, but nothing like before. All I needed was a chemical "reset". I wasn't damaged, I wasn't a bad person. I was a mom who endured a terrible side effect of childbirth, by no fault of her own.
Although I'm apprehensive about telling my story, I do feel lucky that I actually can share it. I know when God brings us through a situation like this, He wants us to talk about it and help others who are facing the same kind of circumstances. We've all heard the heart-wrenching stories on the news about the awful things PPD drives some women to do. While I personally never had thoughts of hurting myself or Noah, I did feel during that time that he would've been better off without me as his mother. There were times I mumbled to God in that fog of depression, and asked Him to just please just take me away from all this. It hurts to even type that because it is NOT who I am. I love life and I have always had such an excitement for the future. PPD changes you in ways you never thought possible. It robs you of one of the most precious times in your life and steals your joy. I'm mad at that. Still. I'll never get those days back with Noah that PPD stole from us.
Thinking back, I just wish I had known how common PPD is. It's obviously not something women want to freely discuss with the world. We quietly go to our doctor, get treatment (or just deal with it), and never speak of it again. We're ashamed. I totally get that. But if we don't start telling our girlfriends about it - they can feel really alone and scared when it happens to them. I remember thinking, "all the new moms I know are so happy and make everything look so effortless!" What is wrong with me?! I guess I just wasn't meant to be a mom". That was so far from the truth. I WAS meant to be this little boy's mother and the only thing holding me back was the grip of postpartum depression and the lies it was telling me. I am positive it is one of Satan's favorite illnesses.
As moms, we want to keep it together.
We want people to think we've got it all figured out.
We don't want anyone to know we have bad days.
We want to be Supermom.
Stop.
It's just not realistic.
Other women are watching you and trying to measure up to that false expectation of perfection.
Once I recognized and admitted I was struggling, I reached out to a few of my fellow mom friends about it. I was shocked at how many of them experienced the exact same things I went through. I thought I was a single, isolated, rare case. Not even! And the crazier thing, more recently, other moms in an online group I'm part of were struggling, too. When I read their posts, it was like I had written it myself, just months prior. The things they were saying were exactly the things I had felt, thought, and said myself. PPD is so easily recognizable from the outside looking in. But when you're in it, you can't see past your nose. You feel as if you're drowning deeper and deeper by the day.
The point I want to get across the most is this....please talk to someone if you're having the feelings I've described - even if they aren't related to pregnancy at all. You'll be surprised at the relief you feel just by talking to a neutral, unbiased person who maybe isn't a member of your family or your day-to-day contacts. Depression is scary and you shouldn't fight it alone. Talk to me if you need someone. I've been there. And I can promise you there is a light at the end of this awful tunnel you're stuck in. You just have to take that first step.
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