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.

men don’t currently get pregnant or give birth or become as seriously unwell as new mothers.

Men don’t currently get pregnant or give birth, but they do in fact become as seriously unwell as new mothers. And I’d argue potential in greater numbers, have you even seen the statistics on suicide and family homicides? Majority men and majority fathers.

The myth that it’s only mothers that get psychologically unwell is why more new fathers and more child victims of them continue to die.

Baby loss, miscarriage, stillbirth grief again both men and women experience that. But for the female the PND can be layered on top of the other grief, depression, adjustment crisis.

@Ohsugarhoneyicetea

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.

Where are you taking this definition of PND from - that all PND is specifically related to hormonal and physical effects of pregnancy, birth and lactation?

That isn't the definition used by the medical community who is assessing, diagnosing, and treating it.

Why do you think it’s a myth? Ask any psychiatrist.

Men don't get postnatal depression. This is a ridiculous conversation.

@sparepantsandtoothbrush I don't mind if the term is changed, and we call the reactive depression experienced by parents in the wake of having a child "post natal depression" and come up with something new for the one experienced by the birthing mother, but I still think they need to have separate terms as they're not the same thing and require different treatment.

www.reddit.com/r/AskPsychiatry/

Men are scared of fundamental change in their life, of responsibility, of "growing up". Women are influenced by hormones, maybe traumatic birth plus all the former. Does not feel fair or genuine to mix it all up.

If men can experience PND why are we limiting it to just them? Can grandmas experience it? Friends of a child whose just been born? Women take on the weight of childcare.

What about when the father isn't involved?

Having had both PND and situational depression I can assure you that they are completely different. What men are suffering from is situational depression if they want to call it something different to help raise awareness of mens vulnerability to it after becoming a dad fine but not PND as that just confuses the matter and causes these sorts of arguments and noone is helped but plenty of people will be harmed(mostly women) by conflating them and minimizing actual PND. This will also prevent men from paying attention to it especially since many people will just assume that this is more woke bs like pregnant "men"

@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.

Postnatal depression isn't just a new mum with depression though, extremely ignorant. Of course men can struggle after the birth of a child, but I agree it isn't PND and don't see the value in labelling it as such. Surely the support that is beneficial to a man differs to that which is beneficial to a new mother.

Well, what else do you call it when a man comes down with depression due to the birth or stillbirth of his child?

New/early parental depression for birth. Applicable to any parent for depression not related to having actually given birth. Stillbirth might be something like infant bereavement depression. More accurate and specific.

Another possibly salient point -- the article headline may say 'postnatal depression in men' but that might just be clumsy phrasing, or needing to keep wordcount down.

Nowhere in the article does anyone apply the term 'postnatal depression' directly to men. The wording is things like mental health, feelings of depression, depression after the birth of a child, depression in the postnatal period.

So just because the BBC News calls it PND once doesn't mean that any eventual screening programme for mental health in new fathers will be called PND.

So this may actually be a storm in a teacup.

i have not done any searches but i would be surprised if there are not academic studies out there which show that men go through hormonal changes whilst their wife is pregnant, when she gives birth and after the baby is born.
Not all men will do I guess because some men are particularly detached from some or all of the process but those who are not will have their own hormones affected in some way I am guessing, whether that is through anxiety as a result of the pregnancy or imminent new life, changes in their sex life due the pregnancy and birth etc .
Of course the hormone changes will be very different compared with those in a woman's body when she is growing a new person, but nonetheless, any man who is in some way engaged in the process after conception will have hormonal changes.

I say this as a woman and a mother myself.

@bubblesbubbles11

i have not done any searches but i would be surprised if there are not academic studies out there which show that men go through hormonal changes whilst their wife is pregnant, when she gives birth and after the baby is born. Not all men will do I guess because some men are particularly detached from some or all of the process but those who are not will have their own hormones affected in some way I am guessing, whether that is through anxiety as a result of the pregnancy or imminent new life, changes in their sex life due the pregnancy and birth etc . Of course the hormone changes will be very different compared with those in a woman's body when she is growing a new person, but nonetheless, any man who is in some way engaged in the process after conception will have hormonal changes.

I say this as a woman and a mother myself.

So you'd be surprised it there weren't any, but haven't linked any- useful input!

[quote EmpressCixi]@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.[/quote]
Really? Excluding father's? You think women are misogynistic for "gatekeeping" PND? so next will be cervical cancer effects men just as much as women as does ovarian cancer a hysterectomy will effect men more than women because why? He happens to be around? He might be forced to help a bit?

Excuse me while I hold the door to all these people erasing women

Canaloha
so sorry to disappoint.

Last time I looked I was not on commission to provide mumsnet readers with links?
and my post clearly starts "i have not done any searches"....

you are welcome to discount my thoughts as wrong if you want to - that is your choice

Men can get depression of course, after their wife/GF give birth, they can get it after losing their jobs, health declines, number of reasons.

Women however can only get postnatal depression. Nothing to do with women being the weaker sex but there is absolutely no need to lump men in with it, they might go through some Hormonal when parenting but are we really going to pretend it's the same? Ffs. A relative of mine suffered terrible postpartum psychosis, thought creatures were trying to steal her baby and her family were in on it.

They can create their own if their like but it's hard enough to get support as a struggling new mum with PND let alone if men jumped on it. Mind you, with the way society works it might get taken a bit more seriously if men complained about it too. Sad really.

Yes I know postpartum psychosis and PND are not the same but the Hormonal changes through pregnancy can lead to both and it is really not the same and shouldn't be viewed as the same as what fathers can potentially go through.

www.rcpsych.ac.uk/mental-health/treatments-and-wellbeing/what-are-perinatal-mental-health-services some info about maternal mental health

I seen a page on facebook explode last night because of this topic.

MIND (UK leading charity in mental health) states

Doctors can only formally diagnose you with a perinatal mental health problem if you are pregnant or have given birth to a child in the past year

But if your partner is pregnant or recently gave birth, you may also experience mental health problems during this time. For example, some studies show that partners can experience depression or anxiety around the time of their child's birth

Now I know males mental health is real - especially after the birth of a child but it should be conflated just because it happens around the birth of a baby.

Women already struggle to admit and talk about PND. Its hounded women since time began. Women were routinely put in asylums, locked away, called looney, hysterical, mental, unloving, unnatural because they were suffering PND. Its very fucking hard to tell some one you don't love your brand new, pink and gorgeous smelling baby because you are unwell. The stigma for women around PND is still very real.

The services women have set up for this is dreadful. Once you get to the end of a very long waiting list, you might get offered a text counselling session with a councillor on line.

Which is fucking incredible actually because these women are seriously unwell and it can have life long effects for the new babys development.

Yet now men have PND too - well this new. Are we now going to have to share these already shite services with men too - how far down the list will that take women?

The NHS website doesnt even suggest childbirth is a trigger for PND. Not sure which melon thought they would forget to add that trigger. You know as PND comes after having a baby

The strain the female body goes under in labour is traumatic to the body and also the mental health of the mother. A massive drop in two vital hormones which can take SIX months to get back to normal levels. 1in 4 women develop anaemia through rapid blood loss in birth. Add in birth trauma or the mum being treated like shite by the midwives and doctors.

The body and the mind is exhausted physically and mentally because of pregnancy and child birth. This is PND

Men do not suffer PND, they suffer adjustment disorder, depression, anxiety, PTSD. it just so it happens at the same time a new baby has come along - but that doesnt mean its PND

We need to be really really careful about making PND inclusive of men because it waters down the shit services women already receive. It diminishes the traumatic event that some women labours are - events that women still get told to stop shouting' or "just get on with it", still laughed at ( The new TV program 'This is gonna hurt')

So no, im not going to sit up and take notice because all these men are now suddenly appearing with PND, I mean when was the last time women were talked about on the News about PND?

This thread highlights the internalised misogyny that so many women have towards themselves.

Yes we can claim PND as women only and triggered by giving birth and we should be demanding better services to help women with PND.

Yet we can also agree that men and partners can suffer depression around the time of the birth.

We are not in the same boat and it needs addressing separately.

Oh, and i agree that only women can get postnatal depression.

@user7643789

https://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.

True

Yanbu. Women obviously go through massive post-childbirth physical changes, which can affect the brain in different ways, including post-natal psychosis, post-natal anxiety, and post-natal depression. These are very serious conditions with physical causes. Men do not give birth and if they get clinically depressed after becoming a father that is a completed different (and far less serious, frankly) condition.

Insisting that both men and women get PND is just more erasure of women, and of women’s issues, and minimises the very serious physical trauma that happens to a woman during childbirth.

As my friend’s husband said an hour after she’d given birth: “You’re not the only one who’s tired, I am too.” 😐 🙄🤨🤬

@NightmareSlashDelightful

Another possibly salient point -- the article headline may say 'postnatal depression in men' but that might just be clumsy phrasing, or needing to keep wordcount down.

Nowhere in the article does anyone apply the term 'postnatal depression' directly to men. The wording is things like mental health, feelings of depression, depression after the birth of a child, depression in the postnatal period.

So just because the BBC News calls it PND once doesn't mean that any eventual screening programme for mental health in new fathers will be called PND.

So this may actually be a storm in a teacup.

I was on a group last night that had scores of women stating their husbands had PND and been officially diagnosed.

There are also many pages on twitter devoted to PND in men.

There is also an interesting article on Channel 5 twitter account where a dad is talking about his PND. Apparently after a while he started to get jealous and resent full of his new baby. PND robbed him of that special time with her...

This is really coming people. And I can see many many women being left to carry the burden of a new baby because the men have developed PND.