To say post natal depression is limited to women?

[user7643789]

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-60319568

I do believe men can experience depression at any stage in life but as they cannot give birth they don't experience the hormonal and physical response.

It definitely can happen in men and it isn't always a hormonally or physical I've given birth root cause. It's a massive change in someone's life and whilst rare, can be experienced by men. Maybe it needs a new title but the experience of feeling depressed after the birth of a new child isn't limited to women

Why does raising awareness mean "men get this too"

YABUaybe it needs a new title but depression specific to the birth of someone's child is a shared thing. And men are shown to also go through hormonal changes.
It's rarely the having given birth that causes the depressions, it's the introduction of the baby.

Only women suffer PND, men and women can suffer other forms of depression.

Well, what else do you call it when a man comes down with depression due to the birth or stillbirth of his child? Just plain old depression? If so, then why isn’t it also plain old depression when a woman comes down with depression due to the birth or stillbirth of her child?

It seems to me that if we have a special name for depression caused by the birth or stillbirth of a parent’s child, we should use it equally for mothers and fathers. Or we just drop the “post natal” and it’s all plain old depression which can be caused by suicide, death, job loss, relationship breakup, financial issues, nothing, terminal illness, life changing injury, head injury, etc etc etc.

To be fair, the article's quite clear about differentiating the hormonal and physical triggers which are exclusive to women and the wider psychological and sociological ones, which can be experienced by both sexes.

I think it's a perfectly reasonable thing to screen for/raise awareness of, personally.

Anything that might stop people killing themselves is worth a shot IMO.

Also if we raise awareness of this there's less suicides and also as a family unit Mothers would benefit too. My DH experienced this (whatever you want to label it) and it wasn't until 18 months after did either of us realise he needed help or to watch out for his mood too. If it had more awareness on this issue then my life as a new mother would have been eased by my DH having access to help.

For the same reason that the infanticide laws in England and Wales are different for men and women (ie women who have given birth in the last twelve months), the effects of pregnancy and birth etc. The most serious psychiatric illnesses of all are postnatal. Men don’t give birth. It’s completely different.

Post natal depression is different though I've been depressed on and off throughout my entire life post natal depression was way WAY different for me and yes men can get depressed because they have had a baby but why not call it by a different name? Why shove the two together? It's like calling it genital cancer when men and women have different genitals

@Hadalifeonce

Only women suffer PND, men and women can suffer other forms of depression.

Postnatal literally means the period after childbirth so of course men can suffer from it

@Ylfa

For the same reason that the infanticide laws in England and Wales are different for men and women (ie women who have given birth in the last twelve months), the effects of pregnancy and birth etc. The most serious psychiatric illnesses of all are postnatal. Men don’t give birth. It’s completely different.

I think you are confusing post partum psychosis with PND. PND doesn’t cause infanticide.

@EmpressCixi

Well, what else do you call it when a man comes down with depression due to the birth or stillbirth of his child? Just plain old depression? If so, then why isn’t it also plain old depression when a woman comes down with depression due to the birth or stillbirth of her child?

It seems to me that if we have a special name for depression caused by the birth or stillbirth of a parent’s child, we should use it equally for mothers and fathers. Or we just drop the “post natal” and it’s all plain old depression which can be caused by suicide, death, job loss, relationship breakup, financial issues, nothing, terminal illness, life changing injury, head injury, etc etc etc.

Yes because women deserve ZERO acknowledgement of the hormone changes and physical effects of giving birth. We’re never allowed anything away from men 🙄

I think they can personally. It’s a massive change for both women and men. Men don’t have the physical side effects sure but they still have to deal with a baby crying around the rock, waking them up every other hour. It isn’t easy for most men (except the ones who aren’t involved or go hide in another bedroom obviously). Postnatal just means after birth so isn’t exclusive to women.

Yes because women deserve ZERO acknowledgement of the hormone changes and physical effects of giving birth. We’re never allowed anything away from men

Are you saying a woman with depression is more important than a man with depression? Who gives a toss what it's called or caused by, depression is depression and should be treated as so

@Theunamedcat

Post natal depression is different though I've been depressed on and off throughout my entire life post natal depression was way WAY different for me and yes men can get depressed because they have had a baby but why not call it by a different name? Why shove the two together? It's like calling it genital cancer when men and women have different genitals

Why would you suggest for a name?

Post natal depression is specific to the mother who gives birth. If the father develops depression subsequently, surely that is a reactive depression. Not the same thing at all.

Yes because women deserve ZERO acknowledgement of the hormone changes and physical effects of giving birth. We’re never allowed anything away from men

If a woman experiences PND symptoms and goes to a doctor after giving birth, the fact that they have physically recently given birth will be taken into account and factored into diagnosis and treatment. That's the acknowledgement.

Fucks sakes face facts a LOT of the care and responsibilities of raising a child in the early days is on the woman they literally grow a whole human being ideally breastfeeding said human being waking up in the night to feed and change the human being and are basically ontap food and care providers yes men can get depressed but let's not pretend that the vast majority are caring 24/7 for a baby and the physical effects of that are going to exacerbate any hormonal changes which can lead to depression

What do you call it for a woman who adopts a new born. They are a mother but haven't gone through the hormonal or physical experience either.

The experience of having a new born, sleep deprivation, stress of the responsibility of being a new parent, life changes etc can lead to depression at higher rates than at other times for any parent - that is post natal depression.

For how long after birth would a mother's depression still be considered to be hormonally driven by the birth? When does it also change to 'reactive'?

I believe the research shows that there is a subtype of post partum depression that is hormone sensitive and therefore only experienced by birth mothers but that there are many other subtypes of PPD that mothers and fathers experience that do not have the hormonal factors.

@Naunet
Yes because women deserve ZERO acknowledgement of the hormone changes and physical effects of giving birth. We’re never allowed anything away from men 🙄

So, excluding fathers is how we acknowledge the hormones and physical changes to mothers? I do not understand this mentality.

To my mind actually, the existence of post natal depression as a “special” depression is a direct result of the early days of psychiatry when all psychiatric illness in women was linked back to their uterus, and thus women were also considered the weaker sex mentally than men because men do not have a irksome uterus to drive them mad.

That’s the history behind why we even have PND called PND instead of just falling under “depression” umbrella which affects men and women both for a long list of causes and reasons.

Clinging on to it, is clinging on to the exclusivity of PND for women is clinging to a misogynistic label and thinking that it means something good. It doesn’t. We know men can get post birth/still birth depression (literally post natal depression). So why pretend we are still the weaker sex and only we can get this illness? Unless you believe the misogyny that invented it as a woman only affliction in the first place, it makes no sense at all.

I think unless you've experienced the intensity of PND it's hard to understand why this situation is so emotive for women. IMO, both men and women can experience reactive depression after the birth of a baby, and it can be incredibly hard - but only the person who has given birth can experience the kind of depression that can be triggered by the physical and hormonal changes you get after you have a baby. It feels completely different to reactive depression (I've had both), and the treatment is, by necessity, different, and as such it needs a different term.

After a woman has given birth she is vulnerable to more severe mental illnesses than other adults in the general population. Not just postnatal depression or psychosis, but a whole range of psychiatric conditions. These are associated with pregnancy and birth, men don’t currently get pregnant or give birth or become as seriously unwell as new mothers.

@peachgreen

I think unless you've experienced the intensity of PND it's hard to understand why this situation is so emotive for women. IMO, both men and women can experience reactive depression after the birth of a baby, and it can be incredibly hard - but only the person who has given birth can experience the kind of depression that can be triggered by the physical and hormonal changes you get after you have a baby. It feels completely different to reactive depression (I've had both), and the treatment is, by necessity, different, and as such it needs a different term.

I've had PND twice. Once after the birth of my DD and once after a still birth. Yes it's emotive and probably the two worst times of my life, but the fact still stands than post natal means "after birth" and can affect men too

Men can have depression after becoming a father but no they can't have PND they have had no hormone or bodily change and haven't given birth.

Of course men cannot experience post natal depression. It is specifically related to the changes (hormone, thyroid and immune system fluctuations and dysregulation) your body undergo through gestation, birth and lactation. All things men cannot do. New parent depression, for sure, both and men and women experience that.