desperately depressed

[lelarose]

21 weeks pregnant with first child, horribly depressed, chronic insomnia and full of fear. Partner away a lot, whenever we do spend time together I don't sleep and cry all the time and it all puts tremendous strain on our relationship (have considered splitting up even though I adore him). Can't enjoy pregnancy or even look forward to birth now. Even stupid things like choosing names now stress me out I'm so far gone.

Wanted to have a baby my whole life, feel now as if I must have made a huge mistake as will be a terrible mother as I'm too tired and unhappy to cope. Will have no support from family etc and be left alone a lot after baby is born. Been referred to psychiatrist, I keep the appointments but she doesn't help at all.

Dont know why I post on here as don't get many replies, I guess its just a relief to admit to strangers how I feel as only people Ive admitted this to in real life have no idea what to say or do so tend to just stay away.

Never felt so low in all my life. I try to bond with my unborn child but don't even know how to. All I do is feel guilty as I can't believe me being like this isn't affecting them already.

Can you try to let go of the idea that this is your only shot at motherhood? You don't know, you really don't.

Your dp can say that now, but once he has that little bundle he'll soon want another one and think how bad were those 9 months really. It's nature's way.

Of course there is a 50% chance of another boy and only you can decide what that means, but i think you are too quick to decide that this is your only chance.

I didn't go to any pre-natal classes, lela - too tense to be around happy pregnant women. When you are pregnant it feels like the pregnancy, the birth, the finding out of the sex at birth etc are such a big deal, but as you move on with your children, it's like comparing a wedding with a marriage - it's the gradual day to day stuff of being a mother that really brings joy. I used to feel sad that I couldn't have an innocent, joyful pregnancy, but ds is only 8mo and already that seems like a distant memory.

I'm not saying that it'll all just snap into place and be rosy - you have a hard road ahead of you, and lots of stuff to work through, but where you are right now is just one stop on the way, not your final destination.

My partner actually said that yesterday he said this will all be behind you soon and thats a wonderful thought.

I tell myself this wee boy is coming into my life to teach me what love really is, ie not just a set of imagined ideas, that your feelings can really surprise you etc.

I've had 2 major episodes of anxiety and depression before (neither as bad as this) and the mind is incredible at making you eventually forget trauma. Ironically one of these was based on the notion that I would never have children. I was full of regret for not trying harder to conceive when I was younger, and beat myself up for that a lot. Often have to remind myself that I'm not actually a psychic.

I am starting to wonder if I have some form of OCD (not that the label really matters)because this beating myself up obsessively whenever I make what I beleive to be a bad decision is a real recurring theme for me, I just cannot stop going over and over how wrong I've been and how I could have done it all differently until it becomes mentally unbearable.

Perhaps the one positive to come out of this is I've realised this is specifically what I need to get help with. I mean I'm sure motherhood is full of big decisions and I'm going to need to be able to cope with getting them wrong sometimes.

He sounds like he understands better than you think he does!

The other thing I thought you might try is to think of men you like, and just idly think of what it is you like about them, and picture how they came to be like that - they were wee boys and teenagers once too, and if you can identify with the finished adult (!) you may find some way of identifying with the younger child.

Anyway, I must sleep - dh in bloody Madrid, or all places, so it's just me and dcs this weekend. He got the time diff wrong (how hard can it be?) and rang just in time to wake ds at bedtime. And he is actually the cleverest person I know.

Hope you sleep a little bit better. There's a lot in your head at the moment, and it will take time to put it all in place. Celebrate the little victories.

I've been awake most of the night, woke myself up every time I dropped off feeling petrified.

I cant bring this child up i will be no good for it, I'll just be subjecting it to a mentally ill mother who cant bond with them and I know what thats like. I know I'm not my mother but I'm still very sick. I feel like I'm going to have to disappear after the birth, let my partner or sister have him or have him adopted. Babies need their mums but not a mum like me. It doesnt feel like this is my child I'm carrying, I feel no attachement to it whatsoever, nothing to look forward to and I cant cope.

I am seeing a new counsellor and a psychiatrist today Im so scared they just fob me off like everyone else. the house is in chaos and I look a total wreck and my dp is home tonight,, I want keep it together for him but I know I wont be able to. He has already said this has been the most stressful time of his life so far and now I'm so so so ,much worse.

Lela please please take a few deep breaths and calm down. You are in a panic over the baby's sex and you probably have ante-natal depression. No you are not your mother and there is abolutely no reason to even think that you will be a mentally ill mother who won't bond with her child. Even if you had an ongoing mental illness it is still very likely that you would bond and you would care. Most mums do. I've worked with women with very serious mental health problems and seen them be the most fabulous caring mums.

You are right now overreacting as a reasult of overthinking it for the entire nights. Things are not so bleak as you think. Honest.

Honest is also what you need to be with the people you are seeing today.

I will be but when I've tried before it just makes them try and get me to talk about something else because they have no idea what to do with me. I think the specific problem I have is so unusual they have no answers to suggest.

Sorry I know I'm being all hysterical I just cant seem to get past this. I want to be happy and love my baby so much and I dont i just feel like I've been given the wrong one.

I fantasise about having another scan and being told they made a mistake but I know that wont happen. What kind of mother thinks things like that.

Lela you are telling yourself that your problem is so unusual that they don't know what to do with you but this thread alone must have told you that you are not that unusual. And at the very least they will have come across women who have '''overreacted''' to a similar extent due to anxiety.

It is more likely that they do not realise/can't imagine that this is really the problem and also that you are being too brave/restrained when talking about it.

What kind of mother fantasises that the scan made a mistake? On top of my head I would guess at least several thousand a year. You are not wishing your child away, you just wish it was a girl. Gender is what gender is, your baby is a whole person regardless of gender. a good friend of mine has 4 ds'. ds3, received as a boy with great joy, carefuly named with his own boys names has known and said from when he was old enough to talk that he is a girl, looks pretty much like a girl now several years on and a girly future seems certain. Still the same beautiful little person that grew inside her, still the same child.

Time to stop kicking yourself so hard for feelings you haven't asked for.

Lela, I am sorry that you have had a crap night and it must make things much harder to deal with.

The way you feel is the way you feel and it is not shameful. I hope the new counsellor can be of help. Please be really honest with them and frank. Also, without wanting to sound impatient, please realise that them treating you and talking with you will be a process over time. You will need to build a relationship with them and build trust.

Can you go to the Drs and get some more tablets to help you sleep? Your DP will be home later wont he?

Hi Lela,

You've come so far, you were proud of yourself yesterday! You can be proud again today, you have realised that you have a habit of obsessing of what you perceive as a big mistake and finding it very difficult to move on. You are getting perspective. Try to let your DH bear some of the load you are carrying around, I'm sure he wants to and you have said it is hard keeping secrets.

Never mind the housework.

Everything is so bleak when you're tired. I remember the shittiest day I had when DS was about 4 months and I had hardly slept for a few nights, and DH was working loads. I decided that it was a just a day I had to survive, and if me and DS got to the end of it alive I had done fine. I just tried not to think too much. Someone started chatting to me in a toy shop and I think I nearly cried, but at times like those sometimes someone pops up who has a kind word of wisdom. I know I wasn't dealing with what you're dealing with, but just bear in mind that nothing is actually as bad as it looks when you're exhausted.

Take care.

Hi Lela,

Been reading this thread and willing you onwards. Just wanted to add my voice on a couple of things. I didn't identify with my DS while I was pregnant, didn't really feel a bond. He was planned but I just felt a bit terrified by the whole idea of motherhood once I was pregnant. I couldn't imagine myself as a mother and found the whole idea overwhelming.
I always thought I'd want a girl so we could have that mother-daughter bond and couldn't really imagine myself being the mother of a boy. But once he was here it was like I'd known him forever, when I saw him for the first time he was so familiar. He has shown me that the sex doesn't matter it's a mother-child bond. You love them because they're your child. And you love them like no other love. You think you love your DP? The love you have for your child will blow you away.
I can't say I felt an affinity with little boys or teenage boys either, but you don't with other children. How you feel about your own is different. And you meet them as a newborn and get to know the little boy/teenage boy they become. By the time they become the little boy you think you'd have no connection to, you love them with all your soul and they're your little boy.

You're doing really well. Keep going
x

Wow you all must be geting so sick of me by now and yet you still keep in touch its just amazing. Today was intensely stressful, but I went for help and was honest and thats the most important thing.

I saw a counsellor this morning and before I found the nerve to explain how I really felt she said I can just feel this indescribable pain coming from you please try and tell me what it is. So I did and i thought she was actually going to cry herself. She said its like you are trapped in a room with no doors and no windows.

I also saw a new psychiatrist who was about a billion times more helpful than the last one. He ACTUALLY listened to me, and guess what said its not the first time hes heard of women feeling like this and that its not necessarily a bad thing I found out now instead of later as he said I would probably have been this bad either way if its how I feel. So I feel bit better bout trying to protect my baby.

He said the intense pain I'm in is part of me processing it and something I have to do but also prescribed me anti depressants because he thought the risk to me right now is worse than the risk to the baby. I am very reluctant to take them but also admit I cant go on thinking I'll have to get my baby adopted so will try. Just worried they take about 2 weeks or so to kick in.

To be honest I dont think I'd have had the nerve to tell the truth if all of you hadnt made me feel less of a terrible freak for how I feel so I thank you all from the bottom of my heart. This is the first time in my life I've ever had problems I cant admit to my friends in rl you see.

takingtheplunge what you say about the feelings you have for your son is wonderful and I'm praying (literally everyday) that I will maybe be the same one day. I just cant see it right now, but then I didnt see any of this coming either so who really knows eh.

Still very down , very frightend but at least I'm trying. Going to try and make myself look a bit more human for when dp gets home and try and focus on my felings for him just for tonight. Thank you all so much again you are helping me immensely.

Hi Lela I've only had time to read bits of your thread and hope I haven't got the wrong end of the stick - so ignore if this is irrelevant to you! - but I have an experience to do with baby gender that may be of some small help or comfort to you I hope.
I've always had a problem dealing with other females in any kind of 'intense' relationship and have issues with my mother. I had an older sister who bullied me a lot. So maybe it's to do with that, and I think of women as emotionally complicated. Also I'm not a girlie type of girl. I've always loved little boys and thought they're cuter and run around and get muddy and shout whilst little girls mince around saying 'I don't want to get my fairy shoes dirty' in a whiney voice (bear with me - this is going somewhere!). Anyway, I always kind of assumed I would have a boy. When I was pregnant with DD I didn't find out the gender (on DP's wishes, mainly) but EVERYONE said 'oh you're carrying like a boy' etc. etc. (old wives tales basically).
Anyway after a long and difficult birth the baby popped out and I'm so embarrassed to admit I looked down and said 'oh it's a boy' in front of a theatre full of medical staff! . I think I saw the cord or something.
In the first weeks after the birth I remember feeling jealous of DP's attachment to DD and him saying to her that she was his 'best girl' which he used to say to me .
Anyway, the upshot is I have been totally honest with telling people that I wanted a boy (I say it in lowered tones now she is 6 months in case she understands) but of course I love her, and maybe I will learn more and grow as a person by having a daughter as it will challenge me. Also, I see more than anything that she is a person first and foremost, and a gender after that.
This may not help you at all so excuse my waffling but I wish you all the best it sounds like you're doing a great job at getting yourself together (even though it may not feel like it) - just remember, where there is life there is hope. x

BTW Lela I have had the 'my child will have to be adopted' thoughts (not recently, thankfully). And I didn't really feel any bond with the 'bump' before my baby was born, I didn't know you were supposed to?!

Lelarose, I'm glad the counsellor and psychiatrist were sympathetic and helpful. Sorry I haven't posted much - I could only really suggest the anti-depressants, due to my experience but I'm so glad there have been some wonderful people on here giving their support. I hope it has been of some comfort to you and that you can relax a little this weekend with your partner. Lots of people are thinking of you. Take care.

I'm really glad that the counsellor and psych appts seem to have gone so well. Sounds like you might've found the right 'fit' with these people. Well done you for opening up to them and letting them in....brilliant!

I had PND after DS (hadn't bonded with my bump at all) and would regularly tell my DH and DM that I was going to leave and they could bring him up as I was totally rubbish, he deserved better. I even mentioned adoption as I thought he would genuinely get a better deal with someone who had yearned for a child.
Even two months ago when I was really down due to some chronic pain, I sat sobbing on my bed telling my mum that I had planned on leaving - I was thinking of which clothes to take, where I would go, which bloody bag to pack everything into, who would do which jobs to make sure DS and the household was ok - because I was absolutely sure that my mum, dad, DH, DS (everyone really) all deserved a better daughter, wife and mother and that they would be better off without me there. I promise you that even though you feel like you aren't best for your child - you are.

Oh, good, lela - so glad the people you saw today were able to properly hear you, and that you were able to properly speak. The processing pain makes a lot of sense to me - there is just so much in your head right now.

You do know that people are sticking with you because you really are very likeable and interesting and brave and honest, don't you? You have the capacity to be a really amazing mother, but you need to take the time and space to take care of yourself.

You mention protecting your baby an awful lot, did you know that? There is a very strong maternal instinct in you, I think, that is keeping you fighting hard.

Take the ads. They will take time to kick in, but they will help - they'll just give you some breathing space to process what you need to, and to eat and sleep and start to heal. And keep posting - no-one is in the slightest bit sick of you.

I think the ADs are a good idea too...and I know 2 weeks seems long. I've just started on Citalopram and they told me 2 weeks too...but honestly I felt a difference after just a few days. And the feeling like you're going to be a crap mum...almost every night since my DS2 was born (he's now almost 2) I've hugged him before putting him into his cot and thought 'I'm going to try and be a better mum/I wish I was a better mum/I'm sorry I'm crap'....since the ADs, you know what I think 'Goodnight...love you!'...and that's it. I'm sure ADs aren't the be all and end all...but they can be really very good at curbing those negative thoughts. Hope you find the same...

Maybe we won't hear from you for a day or two while your DH is home, hope you make the most of it.

We won't get sick of you, dafty. We think you're brave, you're getting stronger, it's okay if some days it seems like you're going backwards and one day it's all going to be fine.

Lela,

I am so happy for you, and so pleased that you have spoken with some professionals who are actually hearing what you are saying. That must be such a relief.

Well done to you. We are not sick of you, not bored of you. Just immensely proud how you keep moving forward, how honest you are, how you want to get better and are trying to every day.

I will keep checking the thread, but I hope you have a good weekend with your DP. You really deserve it. x

I'm no use right now but please keep posting- i will keep reading

I'm so glad the professionals were more helpful today :-)
you and your gorgeous boy ARE going to be ok. I know you can't see it at the moment and it's not going to be overnight but you will get there x

I've just been reading through all your amazing messages since friday and they have really moved me, thank you all so much.
Have talked to dp and I think he now understands that I am quite ill rather than just unhappy. However I have decided not to tell him the reason that has triggered this or how bad I have actually got because it just wouldnt do any good and I know how much it would stress and upset him to hear. He already doesn't know what to do for me.

Forcing myself to take the antidepressants which is very difficult as so scared they harm the baby but after refusing them for months I now feel like I need just to be able to function again, as no one is going to pick me off the floor everday and I dont want to end up in a psychiatric ward.

I would like to say I feel better about the whole gender thing but I dont just the pain is dulled into a kind of morbid depression rather than constant fear- oh dear how bad does that sound.

Thanks all for your continued support I wish I could change the bloody record and come back on here saying I feel ok about all of this I really do. Hope you are all ok.