Anxiety with a newborn

[kayleighistyping]

I have a beautiful baby girl who is almost four months old...

For years now I have suffered with depression and anxiety and never bothered with meds as I always went through periods of managing it myself until around three years ago when it began to take over my life.

My depression really got worse when I got pregnant, I began to get worried and anxious even though I was still of course excited about meeting the little life growing inside of me. I found myself getting worse and worse over the nine months of pregnancy.

When I brought my daughter home from hospital I tried to breastfeed and it really upset me when I realised it wasn't going to happen. I had a lot of the baby blues and honestly it never passed I just got better at dealing with it.

Now I love my daughter so much but I feel like she is draining the life out of me, I know that it is all part of being a parent and I should not complain but some days I feel so low in mood I cannot bare the thought of another day being a mum.

I feel like a selfish, failure of a parent and her dad is so good with her sometimes I get jealous because she seems to be happier around him.

He hasn't worked much since she was born and is going back to work this week I'm so nervous about him being away all day and having to deal with her on my own she can be a handful she is also teething at the moment.

I don't know why I feel so hopeless, is this post natal depression? Is there something else wrong with me? I don't know... All I know is that being a parent is more difficult than I ever imagined and I need to know there are other people out there who have felt the way I do right now and got through it.

I just want to be a better mum and person

You sound like you've got a classic combination of absolute exhaustion, concern about looking after your DD on your own and a previous history of anxiety to deal with. I would definitely recommend talking this through with your health visitor or your GP, as yes, you might have PND, but equally you might just be feeling low due to lack of sleep and worrying about your partner going back to work.

This bit of parenting is so hard on you physically (the sleep deprivation is REALLY taking its toll by about 3-6 months) and it often has a knock on effect mentally, so please don't feel bad about what you're going through. You need to make a GP appointment tomorrow (tell the receptionist you feel you might have PND) and if you can, take your DD to see the Health visitor at the nearest weighing clinic tomorrow and have a chat about how you're feeling. It really helps to talk it through and they will be able to recommend lots of help for you hopefully.

Yes you might have PND and it's definitely worth talking to your GP, but I also think the feelings of guilt, exhaustion and not being good enough are ones every mum experiences. I remember DH telling me once to get an early night and he would look after the baby, and all I could think was that a break wouldn't help as I would still have to get up tomorrow and do it all over again. I feel like quite a number of people I talked to online shared my feelings, but it was never something that other mums in my "real" life seemed to talk about. One mum in particular put pic after pic of her DS on Instagram at the newborn stage and it just seemed to me that she was living the polar opposite life to me - all coffees and walks and mini-breaks with this compliant, sleepy baby. But talking to her recently (a year on) she admitted to feeling just the same and putting a brave face on things. It is bloody exhausting having a baby and it does change your life completely. It took me a while to "mourn" my pre-baby life and accept my new normal. I'm definitely not saying you don't have PND (you might) but you are certainly not alone. The more you speak about your feelings to others, the more support you'll find.