Male postnatal depression

[Foxysoxy01]

Just caught a bit of This Morning with my coffee and they are talking about male postnatal depression.

Now I understand it is a massive change to both parents with a new baby and can quite believe that it could cause stress and worry, even depression for the non birthing partner but why would it have to be postnatal depression which feels more female and is a term used for women who have given birth?

The thing I have an issue with (maybe I'm an unreasonable cynical cow) does it not seem another thing that men have to take away from women?
It feels a little bit like taking away a real horrible issue that women who have given birth sometimes face and making it all about men again and how very hard they have it.

My AIBU is I'm I being a real in empathetic bitch or is this just another case of men having to take over women's experiences and issues? Or is it just a word I'm getting hung up on and technically it is actually correct that they may have postnatal depression?

Ella you asked why it is if PND is purely hormonal, some women don't get it with each pregnancy

It's not purely hormonal at all. It is inextricable bound up in it though.

I know it isn't purely hormonal and have said so above.

@messyjessy17 that’s a ridiculous comparison. It’s depression after the birth of a child, genitalia doesn’t bloody come into it.

I’m starting to think feminism isn’t about equality at all, its starting to look a lot like a a we-hate-men movement.

We've come a long way in psychiatry in the last 100 years, and we are now capable of seeing that there is a massive difference between the Clinical Depression, the Depression Component of Bipolar Disorder, and PTSD, as the route of the depression at a physiological and psychological level is very different for each.

So failing to separate Post Natal/Partum Depression (as a significantly hormonal associated disorder in women) from a adjustment based depressive events in males (and adoptive mothers) is taking a huge step backwards.

Saying they are different and naming them accordingly doesn't make one less than the other, same as Bipolar is no more or less worthy of recognition/ research and treatment than Clinical Depression.

Very wise words

Agree with ery again

Exactly how many people have said they are feminist on this thread?

It’s depression after the birth of a child, genitalia doesn’t bloody come into it

It's depression after giving birth to a child, and genitals come into that. But more important its the hormones. Men don't do it, men don't get it.

Go ask 100 people in the street if men can get PND and they will look you at as if you have gone mad. This is something everyone knows, in real life. It's only on MN where people have to argue that blue is red that would even dream of discussing it.

Do you also think that men can get postpartum psychosis?

Go ask 100 people in the street if men can get PND and they will look you at as if you have gone mad

This is the bit

So if my husband had said this and got this reaction he would have received no help...and i would have received no help in dealing with it

If it was more widely known IF he was depressed he could receive help and i would recognise the problem

So if my husband had said this and got this reaction he would have received no help...and i would have received no help in dealing with it

If he had gone to a medical professional and said he was depressed after the birth of his child he would have received help. You don't need a false and unhelpful label, if anything using that false label would have hindered him more.

I think that everything I'd like to say has been said by others.

I can't get my head around some women hating men so much that they feel men are somehow muscling in on depression.

@messyjessy17

I assume you can read and live in the UK. Men can get PND.
Until you write medical journals, your opinion on who can suffer from a disease is worthless.

Do you understand the difference between postnatal and postpartum yet?

Do you understand the difference between postnatal and postpartum yet?

You don't, since they are used interchangeably. One is more an americanism, one is UK. If you are under the mistaken apprehension that postnatal means after birth for people who didn't give birth, you are very wrong.

Nobody hates men, the fact that you think thats what it is about shows how little you understand.

Men do not get postpartum/postnatal depression. Men do get depressed after they have a baby.
What bit of that is so difficult?

(and I am a medical professional. Are you?)

messy

You are missing my point

If dh had said to his mates 'i think i have PND' they would laugh at him because 'it only happens to women' he wouldnt have gone to the dr

If it was parental depression or it was more widely known that man might get PND he would have been happier going to the dr

I am actually agreeing with you that a better term is needed , as i have said all the way through the thread

Haha. Sure you are.

Pretending you are, I hope not in the UK as you have such a differing opinion to the NHS. If you are in the UK, I hope not in private health care as I'd hate to come across you.

Oh, maybe you mean 'health care professional' in a similar strain to anyone working in Law is a lawyer.

You determination to separate men and women is baffling and can't do you any good professionally or personally. You seem to see this as erosion of women's ... umm ... something.

Whilst not the nastiest on the thread, you're perhaps more confusing. You're just about moderate enough to be worrying whereas the most awful posts can be written off as written by nutters who use the hashtag #whitemaletears

If dh had said to his mates 'i think i have PND' they would laugh at him because 'it only happens to women' he wouldnt have gone to the dr

Yes, they would. Which is precisely why you should be agreeing with me how stupid it is to tell men they can get PND, when they can't.

If he knew that men getting depression after a baby was a thing that happens, and that it is just as important but not the same as PND, he would be in a better position. We do not need it to be more widely know that men can get PND, because they can't. We do need much more acknowledgement of male depression after becoming a parent.

You want the same thing as I do. So get on board and stop saying men can have a condition they can't have, and talk instead and raise awareness of what they do have.

Those insisting men can get pnd don't care about your husband and his depression, they just want to win a stupid argument that makes no sense at all.

You determination to separate men and women is baffling

biology separates men and women. You may have fallen for the fashionable notion that sex is mutable and unimportant, but it matters very much to medicine. If you find it baffling that men and women have different medical needs, you really should go read a biology book and leave the talking to those who have the basics down already.

(I said medical professional, btw not HCP)

messy

I have said throughout the thread that there should be another term for men

Like paternal depression

Great, so you agree with me. Like most people

I worked in Boots one summer. Behind the pharmacy counter. I get the feeling we're equally qualified.

Unfashionably, I believe that sex plays an important role in us both physically and mentally. I'm glad we agree there.

Why do you think most people agree with you? What are you basing this on?

Im actually done here messy

I have been saying all through the thread that although education would be good a term especially for men would be best

I have agreed with the vast majority of posters saying that a new term would be appropriate and the PND shouldnt be used

You are now arguing with people that are agreeing with you and have done through most of the thread

No rufus, I'm not.

you said: If it was parental depression or it was more widely known that man might get PND he would have been happier going to the dr

you said men might get pnd. I am telling you that they will not. And then you are saying you agree, so why did you say they can get it?

I worked in Boots one summer. Behind the pharmacy counter. I get the feeling we're equally qualified

not unless you studied for 8 years to get your job in Boots.
Nice sense of self importance there though.

I think there needs to be a different term to describe depression caused by hormonal changes, and a term to describe depression caused by the changes in life after a child is born.

I think there needs to be a different term to describe depression caused by hormonal changes, and a term to describe depression caused by the changes in life after a child is born

Postnatal depression is very often a complex mix of the two, so it's not really that simple. It can't be unravelled, how much of it is a reactive depression and how much is chemically based. Postnatal depression covers both.
For fathers we know it is different though.

Fair point. So a different term to describe fathers depression. A specific term for fathers may be useful anyway, as I am sure there will be specific issues that fathers are more likely to have than mothers.

Absolutely brasty