Feeling low

[birdie33]

I'm feeling very down at the moment. Various things. I have a dc11 and a baby. The dc11 is getting to the the age where he doesn't want to know me and he's just on screens all the time whereas the baby is incredibly clingy. I struggle to do things with them both.

I have very little family support. Lost my dad a few years ago and since then I've been thinking a lot about family and life. There really is only me, dh, my dc and my mum. Mum has her own life and doesn't offer much help in the way of the dc so I rarely get a break. But aside from that I just feel sad a lot of the time when I see people in big families having meals out or holidaying together. No siblings, cousins, aunts or uncles in our family and it scares me in some ways in case anything ever happened to me there'd be nobody for dc.

I hate the way I look after having baby. My hair is disgusting, my body has changed, I can't get rid of the baby weight. I'm also suffering from anxiety and even the smallest things like family days out send me into a bit of a panic.

Dh is supportive but a bit of a stick in the mud. Has to be cajoled into doing anything other than sitting in his arm chair. My career is non existent and I don't have the mental capacity to think about retraining. Im trying to enjoy maternity leave but I feel very lonely a lot of the time and I think to give me too much time to dwell on all these things.

Sorry this is a jumbled rant. Just wondered if others have been in a similar rut and how you improved things.

I felt along the lines of this at one point, lost my Dad also which definitely made my mood decline more. After being in a rut for a while and hating every second I decided to write a list of every single thing that was getting me down. Figured out the ones I had the power to change versus the ones I didn't. And one by one I started to work on each one of them. It wasn't an overnight thing there was too much to change. But here I am now much happier, weight loss, looking better, receiving comments about looking better, feeling a million times better. Also, the learning to accept the things I couldn't change was a massive thing for me. Try to work on things one by one and remember to go easy on yourself.

Sorry your feeling like this OP.

The hair loss is rubbish isn’t it. Is there any chance you could be anaemic? That can make the hair loss worse and make you feel generally run down. I would ask for a blood test. And it might be worth talking to your GP anyway about your anxiety.

Also are you on any hormonal contraception? Only mentioning because after my DS was born I had the implant and it really affected my mood. Felt like a weight was lifted as soon as I had it out.

I found maternity leave very lonely too. At least it’s an opportunity to do lots of long walks with the pram - good way to loose weight and being out in the fresh air can lift your mood… unless it’s raining of course.

Hope you get some other good advice too and you make a good plan to move forward.