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.

Sorry.

Didn't mean to worry anyone, it never really occurs to me that I do. I feel like I just repat myself sometimes and you all must be so sick of hearing it.

Had better few days with dp but he is way again today working for at least 2 weeks.
I didn't have the heart to tell him I'd found ut we were having a boy. Just tell him I feel sure we will. He is a lovely man and I love him so much, but he would never understand how negative I feel about having a son.

When I saw my counsellor on Friday I told her I was sorry but still couldn't come to terms with things and she just sat there saying "It's a boy. It's a boy" over and over again. She said please stop thinking about how different you would be feeling if you were having a girl, which is right because I never was and its just another way of tormenting myself. Am still mentally torturing myself for finding out and having a breakdown as a result which means I now have the added paranoia of harming my baby with the drugs. It was a gamble that I lost really really badly.

On a positive note I got some homeopathic medication which I took on Friday and I do believe it helped pull me out of the suicidal feelings even if it is temporary (feel I could go back there any time now I'm alone again). Also I have had a couple of very brief but kind of happy dreams since then about my son and this has never happened before.

I have to get through this or I'm not going to be in a fit state to give birth to my child.

Lela you will get there.

Will you please keep posting whenever you want to? You don't need to post for our pleasure (although an occassional 'still here' would be appreciated )but we are not getting bored of you at all.

Hun I'm getting better now but the number of times I've been repeating myself on here and to friends in real life - the same pain over and over again....that's what we need sometimes and most of us know it...too well.

Am excited about your brief dreams - and your counsellor sounds good. There is definitely hope.

Thanks I don't feel too hopeful but that is depression I guess. I just cannot find anything positive about having a little boy and it pains me more than I can ever describe to say that. There is just nithing I look forward to about bringing one up past the baby stage.

I keep thinking about what that midwife/doula woman said about me having my baby adopted and it really tears me apart.

Lela, take heart in the positives: some good sleep, a good dream about your son, a great relationship with your counsellor.

Also what you said- that you fear bringing up a son past the baby stage- just imagine though, you will have spent so much time with your baby and you will have bonded and be ready and able to move on to toddler hood, boy hood and so on.

I wonder- can you go to where your DH is working, rent somewhere together for the couple of weeks he is away?

No thats not possible. To be honest I also haven't slept hardly well Friday night and I'm exhausted beyond belief. I wasn't going to go to work today but ended up dragging myself there as knew I wouldn;t sleep so whats the point of being off so I can crack myself up about the girl I'm never having all day.

It just kicks me in the teeth every morning when I wake up and haunts me til I sometimes sleep.

Phew!

Lela, you don't have to think of your boy beyond the baby stage. Just try to imagine cuddling a baby, how he'll smell, wee fat hands patting your face, crawling later and grabbing your leg saying mamamamamamamamamama (that's been ds today). Allow yourself to get to know this baby, this person, this wee boy as he is, right now, right when he's born. He's not the girl you hoped for, just as the children I have are not the baby I lost, and miss, but they are their own, splendid people. Just focus on the babyness - the snuggling, the hot little head in your arms, the fat wee feet and legs.

Please don't dwell on what lulu said - I was stunned that she said that, and can only think she was having a particularly odd day, as it's just a bizarre and inappropriate thing to have said. It just also felt wrong to have a bicker about it - it would do you and the thread no good, I thought.

Can you carry on taking the homeopathic stuff? And please, PLEASE post when you're at your lowest - drag yourself here and let us hold your hand through it. No-one is bored, no-one is fed up - we just want to get you through this.

You know something? You do love your baby, you care for him and want to protect him, and the thought of giving him away tears you apart - that's love. That's motherly love. YOu will love him in one particular way, which you and he forge together. You DO and WILL love your son. Keep telling yourself this, because it's true.

Thank you so much I've been awake since 4am, I'm meeting with my boss in less than an hour and I'm sitting here crying my eyes out with sheer exhaustion.

I would not give my baby up for adoption, but I can't guarantee that if raising a son is going to be as bleak as I imagine it I will survive their childhood. That is a terrible thing to say but its what i think about at 4am when I'm awake and desperate for any way out of this. I also get out of bed, get down on my knees and pray. That the scan was a mistake. Or that my feelings will dramatically change by the birth. Just that this will pass.

My friend who I admitted my depression to, the one who had really bad anxiety and PND text last night first time on ages saying even though she's not in touch she's thinking of me and asking how I am. Something just snapped and I text back saying no she is never in touch, I struggle every day and I'm exhausted. Her reply was that she was "stunned" by my response. Nearly laughed out loud. Have just had her on the phone banging on about I should remortgage my house in order to hire a fucking maternity nurse for a month (for 3 grand)after the birth as its the only thing she believes can help me.

She says she can't give me the "level of support I need", as she has 2 young children. Told her she has no idea what level of support that is, that the odd call from anyone JUST to say how are you would have been enough these last few months and that I have NEVER asked for anything else, in fact not even asked for that. We have been friends for over 25 years and she has often said how isolated she was in pregnancy and afterwards, despite having a supportive mother. I said I thought she may be the one person who understood this and she said its just too close to home. So I told her not to worry about it and ended the conversation.

I have also told me closest friend that I have been depressed for months and felt too ashamed to admit it. She has never responded or mentioned this.

Text my sister last night saying I'm frightened I'm not in a fit state to give birth. No response.

And so it goes on.

Hi Lela

I haven't posted for a while but read every day to see how you are. I don't know if I can add anything to the great advice others are giving you but I just want you to know that I too care and am thinking about you all the time.

I think it is so hard to accept that in times of crisis people don't hear or ignore your cries. I experienced the same thing when I was hospitalised as a teenager. All my friends basically ignored me and it hurt like hell. I was actually an inpatient for a year and could really have done with some support. Having said that, there were 2 people that stood by me and funnily I hadn't really been friends with them beforehand.

Looking back on it I can see that we were all young and they all had their own lives. And a year is a long time...It still hurts a bit but I can stand back from it now. I managed to get through without them and am stronger for it now.

I think what I'm trying to say is that being ill is such a test of friendship, and maybe like your old friend who says it's too close to home genuinely can't deal with it. This doesn't make her a bad person - just human. And sometimes we find new, stronger frienships when times are hard. Maybe what you need right now is all of us on MN - try and let go of feeling hurt by your RL friends. Things are often so very complicated and even when they don't go how we want there is often something else there to help us through.

I hope your day is improving.

Thank you. That means a lot to me. I don't hold it against my friend. I haven't the headspace or energy to be angry or bear grudges right now, I'm just trying to survive. I'm only talking about it because the counsellor and psychiatrist and ppl on here have all suggested I open up to ppl in real life.

I do however find it incredibly patronising to be told she can't offer me a level of support as if I'm asking her for professional help. I have asked her for absolutely nothing and I've been severely depressed for 7 months. I've never called and got upset, when I told her I was depressed it was because she'd called me one night when things were at their worst and I was barely functioning. I don't want therapy -what about just being my friend, I just can't be ignored all the time by people who know I'm ill anymore. Actually I can because I have no choice.

What I have realised is that depression in pregnancy is such a massive taboo- people who I would previously have trusted with my life refuse to even go there with me. The irony is that I fought tooth and nail with my dp when I first found out I was pregnant because he wanted us to move for when the baby was born to near his family (I don't know them well). I refused as I said I'd be totally isolated and needed the support of my sister and best friend as I have no other family. He now says (not in a cruel way) so where are they now? Neither of them are really taking anything to do with this. It's hard not to sound bitter when I say that but I'm not after sympathy or justifications as to why no one is being supportive (its entirely up to them, no one owes me anything), I'm just being honest. I now truly believe that if you haven't experienced depression on this kind of level you just can't understand how someone could get this low and be unable to snap out of it. I think thats whats got me with my friend as she knows what this is like with support, and yet still can't keep in touch with me when she knows I have no one around, as if I'm going to break down and beg her to move in with me or something. Jesus Christ.

Anyway, too exhausted to really cope with anything other than just being alive for the baby today.

Hey Lela, I am just able to post this now and then I am off for a couple of weeks.

You said this "just being alive for the baby today." In amongst your posts which are always eloquent and honest they often have these little gems. These little gems of hope and steadfastness, in the way that you are going to bear your burden and carry on despite everything else. I am amazed at your resilience and strength. I know you are hurting and in pain and I know that you feel like you are in a huge engulfing mess. Then you say something like that and I feel sure that you will come through this. Perhaps you don't feel that way now. I just had to draw your attention to these little glimmers and glances. See the small positives where you can.

It is a shame that your friends have not "been there" for you. I am disappointed for you, but if it worth anything at all I am here for you. I know there are other MNs who are too. I am always thinking of you and I will be here after the birth too.

Like I say, I am away for about 2 weeks, and I doubt I will be able to post. But take heart that you will be in my thoughts.
xx

Thanks, you have been here from the start thatsnotmymonkey and been an amazing support to me. Enjoy your holiday.

Over the last couple of days the someone has told me that if they were pregnant they wouldn't find out the sex as they would probably feel "suicidal" if they found out they were having a boy- based on how they behave (she works with kids, as did I for several years and I'm afraid I'm not able to disagree with this). Then yesterday someone else (the only person I've met in rl who had prenatal depression) told me that she was absolutely terrified during their whole pregnancy that they would have a boy and that they would literally have left it in the hospital if they had. Of course, she had a girl.

Eventually,a day after I text her my sister (who never has her phone off and checks it religiously) text back saying I don't know what to say, you'll be fine. I replied that whilst I completely understand and respect that she has her own problems, I have severe depression, chronic insomnia, am scared I will have to go into a psychiatric unit and no one will listen to or even contact me. That was yesterday lunchtime and I've had no response whatsoever. I genuinely feel now like I'm living in the twilight zone- I can see and hear the outside world but they can't see or hear me, I am trapped in this black hole again, slowly suffocating to death. sorry if that sounds dramatic but I need to be honest somewhere, I am so scared and alone.

I do stay alive for the baby, because I do want to die sometimes but I can't harm them them. I've done enough harm to them already and will always have to live with that now. I'm not contacting the psychiatric people because they don't help- they tell me to reach out for help in RL, I do and am rejected ignored or told to seek professional help. Its like from all sides I just get well we're not dealing with you, but someone's got to- but the truth is no one does. I'm nothing.

I'm not one for self pity I find it quite repulsive but this is honestly the situation I find myself in.

Just so your post dosent go unanswered for a while ,i wanted to say,that you spoke to 1 person who said if she had a boy she would be suicidal.lelarose there are millions of us who dont think like she does.Im afraid i cant really give you any advice but i really hope that you eventually find yourself content with your little son.personally i think a baby is a blessing whatever the sex,but i understand that not everyone is able to think like this.What is it about having a boy that scares you ?

I'm sorry if that last post sounded offensive in any way, and I agree any child is a blessing which is why i feel so terrible about my negativity about having a boy.

What scares me? That I will always look at my child and wish they had been a girl and this may damage them in some way even though I never want them to be aware of it, that the massive desire to have a daughter will never leave me and I will put myself through another pregnancy in order to risk feeling like this again, that I will not be able to take pleasure in their upbringing, that we will not have the same bond that I might have had with a daughter, that they may inherit stuff from the male members of my family who are mentally ill/ violent/alcoholic/ loathe their mother and wish to punish her for every mistake she ever made(my sister and I were badly treated by her too but have moved on and forgiven, tried to still care for her, they have not). That the decsion I took to find out their sex before they were born and the resulting stress and use of medication has already damaged them. That I will have post natal depression. I could go on and on.

Lelarose,you seem to have so many concerns.But i have posted before and said this, although you are so against having a boy,it is clear that amongst all your self doubts you will indeed be a very loving mum.Even in your despair you are really thinking about your baby and how you dont want to damage him in any way.It may take you a while but believe me you will come to love your son dearly.i really wish you all the best for the future and hope all the dark clouds will soon be rolled away for you.

Thanks both of you for your kind words.

Beertricks that means the world to me to hear you say that, I hope and pray I will be the same when he is here. I find it so hard to beleive a boy can have the sort of personality I want my child to have, but you give me a bit of faith. When did you start to feel ok about him being a boy?

I just wish I'd left it well alone and never found out the sex now, but then, yet again today someone says "oh you're definately having a boy" so in reality how long could I have had all that sort of stuff said to me and not got so anxious I had to find out.

I'm so frustrated with myself for having a (please god) healthy child with someone I love, which I never took for granted, this should be my dream come true but I spoil it every day by thinking oh god please give me a girl. It's so spoilt and selfish and horrible and it taints every good thing about this. Depression is horrific, I pray to god my child doesn't inherit this from me.

Lela, you've no idea whether you would have spiraled into anxiety without the scan. Sometimes facts, however unwelcome, are better to deal with than the unknown.

You're not being spoilt and selfish, but I do think you're going to have to find the strength to face up to where you are and what you're going to do. I feel really brutal saying this, but a mistake on a scan is so unlikely if they say it's a boy - it's easier to miss something than see something that isn't there, iyswim?

So, as your counsellor said, lela, it's a boy. The baby you're carrying is your son. His Y chromosome comes from the man you love, but he isn't, and can't be, the girl you dreamed of. So you need to find a way (and I don't say this lightly, I know it's hard) to accept this new future, this new picture, to face both your fear and your disappointment, look at them squarely and accept them. Yes, with a sigh and tears, and ups and downs, but you have come through so much, and there is so much joy that awaits you with your new family, your new start, if you can just find a way to let it happen. Like BeerTricks (such a fab name!) says - stay for a day. And then another.

And if you find something that makes you smile, then grab it. Sometimes I think that anxiety and depression can make people shy away from anything good in the unwanted future, as it's almost "disloyal" to all you'd dreamed of - but it's not. It's finding a way to live and be.

Lela,

I'm sorry the support in RL is not able to give you much comfort at the moment. I think the others have given you lots of wise words and stories from people who've felt similar things like BeerTricks's are hopefully able to give you a little potential light at the end of the tunnel. Your worst fears about potentially not bonding with him and this negatively impacting him. I think if you gave yourself some space in your head just to see how things go rather than crucifying yourself over and over with anxiety and sadness over what might not happen. Maybe that just feels impossible to do. But just because your mother was not so great at bonding with her sons, doesn't mean you will too. In fact, probably the opposite. You're aware of it and yes, whilst this little boy is not the little girl you dreamt of, he is yours...made by you and fiercely protected by you even now.

I know the scan was right.

But when I'm totally alone, I haven't slept, I'm scared and exhausted and I feel like I can't even bear to be in my own skin I tell myself that tiny miracles are sometimes possible in this life. Just so I can keep on going.

hi lela
sorry, i haven't read this entire thread but i wanted to say i felt pretty much like you do now during my 1st pregnancy, i have a history of depression but this was bad! i also itched like mad (not the liver diagnosis, just itching rashes everywhere) i ended up taking piriton (prescribed by gp) to help ease the itching and it miraculously helped me sleep at night. so thats an option! i also took it during my 2nd pregnancy just to help me sleep and both my children came out totally fine!

the hospital offered me on tap counselling throughout my pregnancy and as soon as my baby was born the depression lifted. i don't know how or why but i felt great and all the awful thoughts went and were replaced by incredible love for this tiny baby! i then went on to meet lots of new mums and a few of them developed pnd and i was thankful that i felt the way i did before baby arrived rather than after so be strong.

keep your chin up honey, it will get better really it will and judging by the size of this thread we're all rooting for you.

Oh thank you so much I need to hear that right now I'm having a terrrible evening. I need to believe I won't be like this when the baby is born but I'm just so scared.

I need my mum (not my mum she is a broken down alcoholic but some kind of mum)I need someone to look after me. The only person I ever had was my sister. I've told her I'm not coping tonight I'm having the wost feelings and shes ignoring me.

Hi Lela - still here, still thinking of you and still not thinking you are a bad person!

When things were very dark for me I discovered that the people there to lean on were not automatically the people I would have expected. New-ish friends stood by me 24/7, a very old friend became 'current' and close again, a very close friend, like a sister, just couldn't cope with my pain and I stopped telling her about it as it upset her too much.

I'm so sorry no one is there for you in real life...but we are still here.

I can't go through this anymore I know its pathetic but I'm just not able to be alone like this anymore and I have no choice when dp is away.

I don't know what to do or where to go. I'm too frightened of hospital but when it gets bad like this I just cant cope

You are not alone,there are many of us out here in cyber world willing to talk to you.If there is no-one in RL you can turn to, someone will be here at least.