Is this pnd or just sadness of diagnosis?

[Mummabear1234567]

After the most amazing pregnancy and birth, I have given birth to a beautiful little girl (I have a 3 year old son too) and life just seemed so perfect. She went straight onto the boob however there were concerns that she was loosing so much weight in such a short period of time and I was told to top up with formula ….. I now just exclusively express.

At 3 weeks old we received the most devastating phone call telling us she has cystic fibrosis (cf)……reason for weight loss . It has been 11 weeks since this diagnosis and my whole world has turned upside down. So far we have had hospital appointments constantly, Hv is out every single week, 2 a&e trips with one admission and she’s already started a bunch of medications. I have accepted she has cf but I’m not coping (I don’t think I don’t even know )

I have gone from being this confident, happy , enthusiastic mum, wife, friend etc to an absolute shell of myself. I live every day worrying about her cf and dwell on life expectancy whilst trying to balance her meds and family life . I feel like an elephant is sitting on my chest every minute of the day and I cry and laugh at my life all at once. I’m exhausted from worrying and the anxiety is crippling. I now have almost no feelings of love towards my new baby and now my toddler ….. my toddler just irritates me (this makes me sad it’s all new feelings), I can’t stand my husband who is the most amazing and kind person and I don’t really ever want to leave my house but the thought of telling people how I feel gives me more anxiety than trying to get on with it. I can’t be bothered doing anything, I haven’t even bothered much with Christmas stuff this year when usually I’m all wrapped and excited by now. A couple of my friends commented saying i looked sad and they are here for me but I don’t want to be the person that is depressing. So my question is I suppose, is this possibly pnd? Or is this just my way of coping (or not coping) with this horrible diagnosis ? I should also mention that I lost my dad very suddenly two years ago however I felt I coped ok with that and just got on with it …..this situation is on a whole different level and has brought back emotions from that. I actually can’t believe that this is what my life is right and I’m so sad and angry. Sorry for venting . I know I can call the dr and get tablets but I don’t think that will fix me?

I didn't want to read and run. It sounds like something you need to speak to your health visitor about. Is there any support groups for cf on here or anywhere else. Might be a good place to start to see if others felt the same.

Congratulations on the arrival of your lovely girl. The diagnosis must be a shock and very very hard to process, especially in the hormonal and exhausting haze of having just given birth. It actually sounds to me like your are dealing brilliantly with such hard circumstances. All your feelings are completely understandable.

I'm sure others will be along soon with more detailed and knowledgeable advice. I want to say though, please talk to your partner, your friends, the health visitors and maybe your GP about how you feel. You will get love and support and you'll feel differently as soon as you start to share. Who knows if you'll use medication to get through this period, if you do I hope it really helps. Anything that helps, grab it! You will get through this challenging time. You sound like a lovely person and a great mother. Lots of love and support to you.

I'm sorry to hear you're going through this, it sounds incredibly worrying and upsetting.

I don't have any particularly relevant experience, I'm more posting to offer a hand-hold and a bump, in the hopes someone with more experience spots your post. But I would suggest two things:

1. Go and talk to your GP, don't think of it as going to get pills, but as going to find out what support they can offer - it may be you need some pills, it may not be. But they're best placed to answer that question.

2. Look for CF support groups - start by posting another message on MN with a title like 'CF diagnosis support required' either on one of the children's health boards or one of the high traffic boards like Chat (I don't know how high traffic children's health is) and hopefully you can find some other MN'ers who know what you're going through and are able to help