Post natal depression-plz help me to hopefully help others

[Lottie27029]

Hi ladies
A little info about myself I am 23yrs old I have a little boy called Tom who is nearly 11months now.

I have silently been struggling with depression for the last couple of years. T was not planned and I wanted to go through with the pregnancy and my dp wasn't so sure he used the financial card and he didn't feel he was mature enough to be a father. I gave him the option after it had sunk in that even if he didn't want this child I did and I would do it with or without him. He stuck by me and as the pregnancy progressed and my bump began to grow and we had the scans my excitement began to grow and amazingly so did his and even more so when we found out we were having a Boy.

Skip forward to my labour my waters broke 40+5 and were a horrid colour (meconium)sp) So I had to be sped up quickly by pitocin IV I had a 13hr horrendous painful scary labour also any painkiller I could get my hands on and I also had an epidural. When T was born he was
6lb 14oz he had ingested some meconium and wasnt breathing properly so after a short cuddle he was taken to SCBU. After delivering my placenta I hemorreaged and lost nearly 2.5pints of blood so had lots of doctors jabbing me with clotting drugs etc and I had a 3rd degree tear to top it off OUCH! So had to go to theatre to be stitched up. I wasn't allowed to then visit T until I could transfer myself from bed to wheelchair well after 5 epidural top ups I was pretty numb and even with all my strength I was still like bambi

Yep, I know how you feel, you have flash backs, your gutted by not having the natural calm birth that everyone was selling you, you feel a great lose at the disappointment. I had two rubbish births, and with the second I wanted to have the full proper experience yet - typical had to be induced which failed then ARM and to my shock he went into shock and ended up with another section (crash) so missed the whole thing - sooo gutted.

What your feeling is totally natural and is post birth trauma which is dealt with on many sites.

Coming home is hard too - not only have you this alien but an operation and a badly damaged body. You don't feel that euphoric feeling that the lucky mums have. You just want to crawl under a shell.

The trouble is not many HVs are good at this, monitoring your mental welbeing and friends/family just come out with 'well at least heres here now healthy' you want to shout, no actually I'm suffering!!!!

Many mums have also have horrific births so dont feel your alone in what your feeling. But, honestly you've had time to grieve this terrible situation and now you have to accept what happened and think ahead. I am sure the hospital did their best and followed all protocol - unfortunately our bodies can let us down but in many ways our bodies do us good. I am blessed with two extremely healthy and happy but mad boys even with their rubbish entry to this world they have made up with brilliant health and happiness.

A number of things you can do: You need to go back to work or college, you are lucky that you are young you have loads to look forward to. You need a hobby or focus so that you can re-train your mind to push this to the back and have something enjoyable to push to the front. Go to the gym, get fit, build a great life but not dwell so much on this terrible birth.

Hope this helps!

PS..I am not a believer in popping ADs either. ADs have their place but you need to get some kind of counselling to help you. Having been on various Ads in the past its no help, it blankets the problem and before you know it your increasing the dose and it comes with side effects.

There must of been a reason for your depression pre baby and addressing this with cognitive therapy is better than reaching for the pills. Sadly GPs are too quick to prescribe but its not always the best route.

So I didn't get to see him and wen I did he was incubated and looked so fragile and small. I tried to express my colostrum to syringe for him but had great difficulty and even breast feeding wasn't happening and the scuba nurses put a lot of pressure on me I felt a failure and in the end he had to start formula. 4days later we were both out of hospital but into the scary work of parenting on our own. Tom never slept for 9 weeks he cried and cried I was told it was colic time n time again by doc but it turned out after a day of 8hrs solid screaming I rang the local children's centre and they sent out a nurse wat a life saver she was!! He was dairy intolerant within 48hrs of being on neocate lcp he was a changed baby the crying stopped and the smiling and laughing began but the night sleeping never happened and then more screaming began T was diagnosed with a hernia in his groin and had to have an op to close the hole in his bowel. So we thought now he was sorted we may get the sleep thing sorted but no.... I say we but I mean I , I alone for the last 10 months have suffered sleepless nights and crying wakings up to 6 times, wen T turned 9 months I went back to work wat a relief finally some adult conversation !! My dp works very long hrs and still doesn't seem to fully understand the word parent. I was a carer for people with learning disabilities I worked there 4 years I grew up there I had the best boss, great friends/colleagues and amazing tenants. Over the last 10 months my body and mins have gone from sky high to down low happy sad but me being me put a brave face on...how wrong was I to do that. 3 weeks ago I had a severe post natal depression breakdown I couldn't cope anymore, my life had changed so much my body my personality my relationship everything!! We were in financial difficulty and even now I am still disgusted with what I did and stole some money that wasn't mine to take. In the end I confessed to my boss who tried to keep it under raps but legally couldn't so I immediately lost my job my last 4yrs of life almost. Most of my 'friends' apart from the people who rly know had I hav Bremen 'well' I wouldn't of ever even contemplates doing something so horrendous. Which seems to be only a few. My family now know how much I have been suffering I was cautioned by the police and now probably can't do the job I love anymore.
I feel at total rock bottom my do doesn't 'understand' my own mum has m.s so can only limited ly help with Tom dp mum works so no breaks for me. I cracked complete meltdown!!

Anyway that's my quick version (haha) of my last 1.5yrs
I have decided to write a book whilst I recover in the hope that should I be lucky enough to have it go public I hope it may help others understand the pnd monster and what u can think and feel it won't be all doom and gloom and lighthearted wen appropriate and funny.

Thanks for reading ... If u get this far feel free to pm me if u want anything to stay private.

I want this book to aid my recovery
The only way is up from now

Sorry ladies I hadn't finished my post b4 ur replies!!! But thanks anyway. :-) I am under a gp on new antidepressants (Prozac) from setraline.
Hoping for counselling too but we shall see, I have let my guard totally down now Xx

I think your book will help others, and you, very much - i could draw some paralells with what you spoke about, not all as we are very different people but the one thing that stood out for me was the trauma of the birth (and obviously the worrying time afterwards). I found my very normal, if not slightly difficult birth extremely traumatic and it flashed back alot. I can think about it logically now, but not then, it really upset me. I did go on to develop PND and now suffer from anxiety - my PND was not picked up by HCP and i feel that this is why i have never fully recovered, it became ingrained.

I would definately be insterested in the book, and you write well, i never usually get through the epic posts that people post but yours was easy to read.

I think the more people that speak out, the more people will recognise this illness before its too late.

I really think you need counselling btw as you clearly need to process the birth experience and what happened afterwards, i feel if i had the opportunity to do that i would have recovered much quicker. Push for the counselling, i think it will be good for you x

Thank u for ur lively reply, I am on a waiting list so suddenly felt that writing a book could be my own form of getting it all out and letting others know pnd is not a taboo subject and doesn't mean ur not a great mum. I believe depression is when u have been strong for too long.
Thanks for the quick replies :-) Xx