Post natal depression- Were you truly mentally strong/healthy before you had your baby?

[seasonsreasons]

This has been running around in my mind for a while. Its a hard one to answer because unless we addressed whether we were emotionally stable prior to having kids, we could run the risk of assuming we were, when in reality, we weren't.

And if that were the case and we had spent our entire lives pre kids in denial, just staying afloat, believing we were fine, then a massive event such as having kids would surely bring an existing depression to the forefront. Not only because of the hormones/neurological changes but also because we never had the emotional coping skills in the first place. It's just that we never needed them to this degree before.

What I'm considering is whether its possible for post natal depression to be, rather than a spontaneous event, an existing depression exaccerbated by a massive change, (which in this case is childbirth but may equally have happened after a traumatic accident or bereavement).

I am not saying post natal depression doesnt exist, only wondering whether this is a plausible theory. I would very much appreciate thoughts from anyone, whether they have suffered post natal depression or a depression unlinked to the birth of their child which occured after childbirth. Or even those who simply feel that having children forced them to address areas where they were emotionally weak. Thanks

i had it with first 2 children.before 1st id never suffered from depression of any kind.the 2nd was worse than 1st.but with 3rd i was prepared and tried hard to fight it off.i danced around frontroom like a looney daily,walked everytime my mind began to wander and prepared hv by telling her prior to birth i would be banging her door down with first tear.with first two i felt that any treatment made me 'unable to cope'which obviously it didnt but at time i couldnt see that.

Seasons - I had it after the birth of dd who is now nearly 5. I am now 37 weeks pregnant with my 2nd baby and am seriously worried that it's going to strike me down again. It's for that reason that it took me nearly 4 years to consider having another child. To be brutally honest I am having this baby for dd's and dh's sake, and given the choice I really was totally indifferent about having another baby, principally due to the PND.

I can honestly say, I never suffered from any form of depression before having dd. Even though I went through some pretty trying times that could have triggered it (dh was in the army and was away a lot), it was not something that crossed my mind or happened. I think a lot of my problems stemmed from the fact that I used to be very active and fit, so even when dh was away I could throw myself into activities like swimming, cycling, gym etc. that made me look and feel good. Obviously being pregnant and having small babies/children puts a stop to that, or at least you cannot participate to the same intensity. I felt totally trapped once dd was born and could not look forward to a single thing. I am hoping and praying I do not have the same intense response this time - at least I know the signs now and will immediately seek help, medicinal or otherwise, if I start to suffer again.

I don't know if that helps....

Kitty, what was the worst part of the pnd for you?

Emmy, was it the fact that you were not able to get out and do the things you wanted to that brought on the pnd?

Seasons - I think it certainly contributed to a huge degree. And breast feeding didn't help either, in that it was just another thing that tied me to dd and kept me from being able to re-claim my body. I breast fed for 3 months, and only really started to feel better once I stopped. It's very hard though as you beat yourself up about being a good mummy and doing all the right things for the baby, even if they are not necessarily the right things for you. I felt terribly guilty about giving up b'fing, but at the same time knew I needed to do it for my sanity! Once I stopped it meant I was able to leave dd with my MIL for a few hours once a week and go to the gym or whatever, and have some totally selfish 'me' time. It also meant that the weight I put on during the pregnancy started to come off finally and I just felt better about myself, more confident and more like the old me.

Funny, reading this back makes me sound very self-obsessed, which I'm not!

the worst part was feeling i was a crap parent and that if i admitted to feeling so low and unable to cope theyd take my children away.also that some people didnt believe i was ill,pull your socks up and all that.i was good at pretending everything was fine as i didnt want others seing how bad a parent i was.thats why with number 3 i told hv i wouldnt wait to see if i got pnd,id be straight on phone as i didnt want to hide again.

I was extremely mentally stong and healthy before my children were born.

When life threw things at me, I threw 'em right back with a smile on my face. I am generally a positive person anyway, to the extent friends would ask how I coped so well with everything.

With my first child i had terrible seperation anxiety, couldn't leave him with anyone for fear of something happening etc., and this brought on a time of relatively mild PND. I recognised it and had help and dealt with it.

I've had another child and since having them both and them now being older, I still consider myself a positive person but the 'black cloud' hovers occasionally whereas it never did before.

In my experience PND is definitely a "spontaneous" event, not an existing one.

Thanks for sharing your experiences. I will be offline for a while but will be thinking about your replies as I am trying to figure out where I was 'at' emotionlly when i had my first. No pnd diagnosis but i felt very isolated and lonely.

seasonsreasons are you ok?can i ask why you wanted to know all this?

I never suffered with depression before having children.
After DS1 was born I was very tearful for the first 3 months, but I think it was the whole shock of having a very colicky baby & the pressure it put on my life & relationship. The HV was concerned I may have PND, but I don't think I did, I think I was just exhausted & stressed!
With DS2 I suffered with depression both during the pregnancy & after the birth.
It was a very unplanned pregnancy & H was not coming round to the idea, so I had little support.
I couldn't bring myself to consider termination, but could not come to terms with the pregnancy & went through it almost in a state of denial, not announcing it until it was really noticable & trying to hide my bump under my coat whenever I went out.
I didn't talk to anyone about it because I felt awful for feeling so bad that I was feeling like this at what should be a happy time. Looking back I really wished I had tried to seek help during the pregnancy.
H wouldn't step foot in the delivery room on the day DS2 was born & showed no emotion when he first saw his new son.
I was transfered from the hospital I gave birth in to a birthing centre because he wanted to keep us in hospital as long as possible.
When I came home I was in a terrible state. I felt I had messed everything up & couldn't bond with my baby.
I would burst into tears randomly & not know why. It was an awful time.
I confided in my HV, who provided me with lots of support & got me onto ADs & into counselling.
I gradually began to feel a bit better & started to bond with DS2. H was also now accepting his baby.

I haven't suffered with depression like that since, but will panic when my stress levels rise to an unhealthy level, as I fear that depression is coming back, even though it has now been four years.

I think it's perfectly plausible that existing depression can recur post-natally, but I would because I think that's what's happened to me
I've suffered from depression on and off since I was 17, and it started again in the New Year (DS born in November) but from what other people have said about PND, I don't have 'classic' PND, if there is such a thing.
I've now come round to the fact that my depression is part of me and I'm learning to live with it rather than expecting to be cured. But I don't think this is the same for everyone - it often only happens the once.
My previous major bout of depression (mid 2003 to early 2005) was so bad that when I was planning to get pregnant, I wondered how sensible it was for me to even have children. I'm glad I did though, if anything I think it's helping. I love DS so much I want to be well for him, and so far I think I'm doing a good job.
Hope you're OK yourself seasons?

Message withdrawn

Thankyou for telling me your experiences. My kids are in bed now so I've got time to tell you mine.

With the benefit of hindsight i can see that although my ds, now 3, was always clean, fed and warm, there was a sense of fear I felt in being a mum that stood in the way of me being able to relax and enjoy him.

Initially I blamed this on the birth, (inept midwife, em c-section in which, because they'd let me push for too long, he had to be pushed back up the birth canal and i heamorraged). I blamed it on my isolation, (no baby group, no family or at least none that I could rely on). And my relationship with ds's father at that time was pretty shaky so sometimes I attributed it to that.

Then last year i had dd. We had moved by this time so i had family and friends around me and I managed a VBAC so that was great. But still i felt this distance between me and the baby and my ds. When she was 5 weeks old, my partner and i split up.. and a strange thing happened. It was like the clouds lifted and I suddenly 'saw' my kids. I felt joy and I realised that I had never felt this emotion in my whole life. The relationship ending had given me the space, well forced me, to face my fear of loss. This fear was also the reason i had dared not get too close to my kids. It may have been perpetuated by post natal hormones, but I'm sure it was instilled as a child by my father who often withdrew love as a means of control, by my mother who was emotionally cold and angry and by the fact that i went to boarding school where all my fears were compounded. (I thought I had not been good enough for them to 'keep' me) Once I managed to rationalise their actions, (they had tough upbringings, they were just passing on what was done to them) I was able to connect with my partner at a deeper level, as nothing was getting in the way, and we got back together.

I wonder if I had been diagnosed with PND, whether I'd ever have hit the rock bottom that I needed to hit in order to face my past and move on. I have beaten depression, I mean I can have a bad day or week, but I can move on. I am no longer at the mercy of my emotions.

I hope this reads ok, I am a bit tired and emotional today (but in a manageable way )

I think that what you say makes a lot of sense to me.i had never felt depressed as such before children but had the most terrible pmt-see my thread titled PMT HELL.
i didn't have the best of childhoods,had serious issues with my parents-my mother was manic depressive and i was sexually abused by a family member.my first pregnancy(boy) went well,no pnd afterwards.
with my second(dd was concieved a month after a miscarriage)i felt VERY depressed during pregnancy.i just blamed circumstances at the time-the m/c plus we had to move house 3 times whilst pregnant,we had money problems and my relatioship with my parents had hit one of our usual lows.looking back now though(my depression has never gone away almost four years down the line) i feel it was creeping up over the years-even during my childhood and it just took the pregnancy to bring it out.

talking to my midwife after pnd was diagnosed she said that over the years she had observed that pnd was present more after a girl possibly due to different hormones perhaps thats why i didnt get it with my first pregnancy.don't know how true this is though??

I was talking to my DP about this the other day - I said that I'd always had very occasional bouts of mild depression and having a baby had brought it to the surface and made it worse. But he pointed out (and I think he's right) that I have suffered with depression in the past more than I'm currently remembering - I used to think that there was no point in my life and having a baby would be the answer to all my problems (not realising that it would be a huge upheaval and actually make me feel worse for some time!).

Yes iwouldgoouttonight, thats the thing I'm thinking, how many people are depressed before kids, albeit mildly, and dont realise it because they've been that way for so long.