Having a second baby after severe PPD

[Barkermum2024]

Mums out there who have had severe PPD with their first and then gone on to have another / considering another. How have you found it / how do you feel about it.

my baby is 6 months and I’m finally coming out the other side however I have had an incredibly hard time mentally while postpartum. This did result in a suicide attempt and a voluntary admission to a mother and baby unit for 5 weeks.

my husband feels we cannot have any more children due to the struggles however he does want more and so do I. As crazy as that might sound, I just have the feeling that I am not done having children and whenever I think that I might be one and done I get incredibly sad (not saying it’s wrong for others, it’s just not how I imagined my family)

Ask for some preconception advice from your perinatal team. Plenty and plenty of women have subsequent pregnancies after admissions and illnesses in previous pregnancies and either remain well, or are less unwell than last time. And even those who become unwell again - you know what support there is and how to access it and this makes recovery quicker.

Your only 6 months PP and you had an extremely hard time of it.

Why not give yourself more time to recover before even considering another child? It's a lot of pressure on you.

I dodnt experience any MH issues but another DC wasn't on my radar for at least 2 years

It’s a call for your support network and the father to make, given you’re up for it.

Give yourself more time to think, and even more to plan. You might be fine, but if you’re that sick again, care of both DC and you will be 100 per cent other people’s job.

I think it would be good for you to know what support would automatically be put in place and what you can ask for and when etc. i would contact the midwifery team to ask them. It would be good to know all the information before you and your DH have a think what would work best for you both. One of the biggest issues is that you don’t know how ill you are the first time until you’re very ill. So you don’t know to reach out for the support that can stop things from developing into a full episode or getting worse.
Rest and sleep is really important.

I'm only part way along my journey
I had a 10 week stay in a mother and baby unit it for ppd and ppp. I'm bipolar so I had a 50% chance of severe depression and/or psychosis.
I had perinatal MH team involvement from pregnancy until 12 months. I had extended midwife care and extra HV appointments. Unfortunately I still got mentally unwell but it was also a difficult time during the pandemic, my daughter had severe reflux and multiple allergies

It took 2 years to recover and I had bonding therapy which was brilliant. At 3 years pp we started to feel like a second might be doable so I contacted my consultant and had my medication changed to ones safe for conception which took 8 months during this time I had counselling with my HV to discuss managing my health alongside my daughters including a joint session with my partner. We decided to take the risk and try for a second. We came to the conclusion that the same might happen but we aren't the same and we learnt a lot during that year on what helped me as well as our daughter. I went on to have two miscarriages but I'm now 20 weeks pregnant and have an appointment in a couple of weeks to discuss the plan with the perinatal team.

At 6 months I was still acutely unwell and a second was so far from my mind but time and space and talking has helped me process everything and feel able to try again. It does mean I will have a 5 year age gap but I'm looking to the positives for that and hoping for the best!

Just imagine if your lovely existing child had to grow up without you if you became unwell again and this time succeeded. Or if your husband had to explain to her where mummy is while you are away for treatment for weeks and weeks.
You have done so well to beat this. But your priority must now be your child. She needs you healthy, alive and living with her!

I wouldn’t risk it personally. I developed depression after ds was born it took a couple of years to recover and I thought about suicide . No way would I risk that. (Ds was my third, no issues previously)