Do men need postpartum support?

Men absolutely can a do suffer depression on becoming a parent. The problem is people dismiss it.

I agree with everyone saying make sure women get support first then think about men.

A man’s role after his partner has a baby is mainly to support the Mum anyway, so I slightly raise an eyebrow about support for the support.

That all said, I think the answer lies with men to support each other. If men’s friends made time for them to have a chat without having to he drinking or playing a sport that takes many hours that would be a help. Normalise men going for coffee together I think!

I mean the reason going for tea/ coffee to catch up is seen as a women’s activity is probably the fact it’s quick and doesn’t take up too much time!

I see this is more ideological than fan factual based for you. Nothing further to discuss then.

Perhaps more time and resources should be spent on telling couples just how truly awful births and the post natal period are before they become parents.

And yet here I am in a free country with the opinion that it is a load of bullshit so there you go

*edited to add that the NHS also believe that men can give birth and breastfeed so forgive me if I don’t believe everything they say

You know after going through all of these messages, and researching online what is available for fathers of newborns in dealing with the mental adjustments in being responsible for another human being, it was rather sad that the only things that were available was a program called TheDadPad by the NHS which offered a silicone sleep pad and a 38 page booklet that was washable, and nothing that had been introduced since 2019. No one considers the fact that everyone is trying to support the new mother and baby, and all of these resources are focused on them but nothing for him and his mental health. What about the pressure he faces of being the sole breadwinner, trying to help make sure that everything is working as well as can be expected by working outside the home and then coming home to help out as much as possible (and those husbands who do try but aren't trained how to). What's sadly lacking is that not everyone is trained to be proper parents, especially men. Until that happens, things are never going to change.

I think the problem is many men have their partners be their only sole source of emotional support. They cannot be vulnerable with their friends or family like women can. So when women can’t provide that as they’ve just had a baby and they need to prioritize baby and be looked after, the men have no one else to turn to so can get withdrawn or upset or angry etc.

In some circumstances, yes. Dh and I were both a mess after our youngest was born. Both ds and I had sepsis and dh was traumatised by what he had seen during the birth. He told me afterwards that he just kept thinking about how he was going to tell our other children that both me and the baby had died. Dh was sacked for taking too much time off work afterwards and 11 years later we are both still on anti depressants. Ds has what seems to be permanent disabilities, partly due to his birth and the aftermath.

I think it has to be both at once, not because I am thinking 'poor men,' but because a big part of the problem is that, for many women, their primary support system after birth is a man, and at the moment, that is not a system that is working. I know men who've tried bloody hard to say that something is badly wrong and who've been made to feel they are being overly dramatic and not masculine enough, because they are worried about their female partners. Or men try to talk about what's happened and there's a locker-room atmosphere of 'ho ho, how funny, women stuff, but ugh, don't talk about the icky bits!'

I know someone who was literally told, by the doctor who'd done his wife's c-section, that he should never tell her how bad it was because she would be traumatised. So she was terrified because she had flashbacks of memory of nearly dying, and no one was telling her what was true and what wasn't. And he felt as if he would be hurting her if he told her what had happened.

That sort of utter bullshit could be completely avoided if we stopped pretending childbirth is a secret woman issue no one should discuss openly.

Or we can acknowledge both.

Having a baby is a massive life change. And a lot of the time I think that even the most prepared and willing new father feels at a loss, and on the edge of things. I've seen it in my friends and relatives, and if I'm honest I was a bit like it with my husband. They want to help, but don't do whatever it is 'the right way' so feel that they're failing. Often the baby doesn't settle with dad and only wants mum, so again, the dad feels he's failed, and is marginalised.

Just as with mothers, you can go to all the NCT classes and read all the books, but it's still scary and you still feel at a loss.
So I don't think men should be ignored, and if they're struggling, they should have access to somewhere/someone where they can unload.

It was years after the traumatic birth of our first, before I realised how awful it had been for my DH to watch it all and feel so helpless. But after my brother in law had become a father, I heard them talking together, and my DH telling him that he had feared that he was losing me and the baby, and it was the most terrified he'd ever been. I doubt that anyone had ever asked him if he was okay.

I was an absolute mess physically and mentally after DD was born. My DH had to care for me and navigate how to be a full on default parent very quickly. Fortunately he had extended paternity leave but it has changed our relationship as I’ve been left with a neurological condition post partum. Our HV was very good as were a couple of midwives who came to see us and kept us on an enhanced support pathway but that all disappeared once DD turned 1 (for me and also by proxy DH). We’re muddling through and hopefully doing an OK job at raising our DD. DH attends Andy’s man’s club sporadically depending on if I’m ‘well’ and when he feels he needs support / safe space to vent without judgement.

Should we not get women sorted first before we worry about the poor men?

(And while I am on a roll, I went and gave evidence in Parliament about this subject with a whole lot of male partners, and it is absolutely gobsmackingly obvious that much of the shambles that happens around the postpartum period is rooted in toxic masculinity and a culture of expecting women to minimise what is happening to their bodies and their mental health, and men to collude in that.)

(NB, am the non-bio mum. Have done the 'dad' bit.)

What men need is education.

Not just a few NCT classes mostly focussed on other things.

They need education delivered consistently throughout school, as a compulsory part of PSHE, about the realities of what it is like to give birth and what the postpartum period can be like.

Men need to understand the biological realities their female partners may experience. They need to understand how much physical strain pregnancy and labour put on the body. They need to read through the lists of posssible complications and possible lasting health issues. They need to know that a c section is major surgery. They need to know about lochia, and mastitis, and postpartum incontinence, and all the other nasty fluid-related things society has decided are far too yucky to talk about.

What men also need is a society that expects them to step up and makes them feel this is their responsibility. Not endless macho posturing about how quickly they got their wives to have sex again, or learned helplessness about how they just so happen to be not as good as their wives at changing nappies, or they just struggle to hear the baby cry at night, or they're just not as good with broken sleep as women are.

I do believe men can be emotionally traumatised by what they witness during a bad labour or a frightening time with a newborn, obviously - just as you might be traumatised if you saw your partner in a car accident that led to frightening surgery. And of course I understand that sleep deprivation is an absolute killer and men can find it incredibly rough too. Yes, it would be great if men got support with those things, and yes, I think it would be very good for men and women if there were more acceptance that men might need someone to talk to.

What must not happen, though, is for men's support system to be ... yet more unpaid women's work. And that seems to me to be what happens. It's eight years ago, and I am still frothing about a NHS leaflet I read on men's mental health postpartum, which included an anecdote about a wonderful, brave man who reached out and talked to his male friend about his struggles ... and the male friend sent his wife over to make him a cup of tea, and all was well in the world.

And yet, medical professionals have defined the meaning of post natal depression as including fathers so it doesn't really matter if you agree with them. They are going to diagnose it anyway.

Post natal doesn't mean after childbirth. That's what postpartum means. Post natal refers to the first six weeks of a babies life and can be used for topics that include the baby and the father. Postpartum refers to the period of recovery from childbirth and is specific to the mother.

Medical Definition

postnatal. adjective. post·na·tal (ˈ)pōst-ˈnāt-ᵊl. : occurring or being after birth. specifically : of or relating to an infant immediately after birth.

I actually think if women had better support it would help men too.

I had a lovely time postpartum with my first - good vaginal birth and quick recovery - really close to my baby and DH. Our relationship was really good, we were super close and loved up, regular sex etc.

With my second I had a traumatic birth that impacted me a lot (and no support). Me and DH's relationship was way worse and way more affected. He didn't have PTSD from the birth like I did, but it affected him way more as well because I was unhappy/not myself

One of the things I say to pregnant friends who ask is that even if they don’t feel they need the birth debrief they should check if their DH would like it. I didn’t realise how traumatised DH by the birth of DS1 (24 hour labour, they were trying to get a line in me for a crash section under GA when the Dr hauled him out) was until I was pregnant with DS2 and he started muttering about paying for additional support during the birth and would private be better. I’d been fine post birth (discharged 12 hours later with a healthy DS1 to the astonishment of the ward staff) so I’d moved on without much thought despite the midwife suggesting a debrief. He hadn’t been. He’d thought he was going to lose us both and was traumatised.

Maybe when women who actually have the baby get decent support we can think about men.

When a mother gives all her attention to a newborn baby, whether or not she’s well and / or having a good time, it’s not a personal little hobby but what the baby demands because it needs it. This is what babies do and how they develop - they extract constant physical and emotional attention in order to make a start on life: very frequent milk, lots of soothing, physical closeness, emotional and social input. If fathers don't like how little attention they get when the mother is occupied with all that, it’s not an “awww” situation as if she’d gone off with her friends. Through choice. His job also is to be a parent now and that means, at first, supporting the mother and accepting that the baby actually needs all this. It might be hard but it just is harder being a parent than pleasing yourself and it isn’t his wife who made it hard. Nature made it hard. It’s not a thing she has done to him, it’s a thing nature did to them both.

Really?? The NHS used to say that puberty blockers were safe and reversible until very recently. Post natal means after giving birth - whatever depression a man may experience after becoming a father is NOT postnatal depression because they didn't give birth. Postnatal depression is caused by a combination of biological, psychological, and social factors. It’s a reaction to the major physical, hormonal, and emotional changes that follow childbirth.
Depression experienced by men is reactive depression. They are different conditions and need different approaches.

Well the NHS says fathers are diagnosed with post natal depression. Post natal just means after birth. If they are depressed following the birth of their baby then that's what it is. It's not called post partum depression.

From NHS "Postnatal depression is a type of depression that many parents experience after having a baby.
It's a common problem, affecting more than 1 in every 10 women within a year of giving birth. It can also affect fathers and partners."

I think the NHS are more of an authority on who can and can't have PND than you.

I dunno, unless it's a particularly traumatic birth, or a partner experiencing post natal depression or psychosis i really don't think it takes that much of a toll on men 🤷‍♀️. My husband found his two weeks off with a new born relaxing. His sleep was barely disturbed as I was breast feeding, and he just spent two weeks lay on a sofa cuddling a baby. Apart from me having a sore vagina and feeling tired I was in a pretty good place mentally, so he didn't really have much stress, I think i would have felt pretty wound up if people tried checking in on his well being as he was having a lovely time. Tbh I think men should have more education on what women go through, I really don't think they need to be any specific paternity mental health support, if they are struggling it should just be covered under generic mental health services.

I can't have any sympathy though for men going a little while without sex or as much attention. That's just something they need to get over, not get specialist support for.