I think my husband is suffering from post-natal depression. Don’t know what to do

[CoffeeChocolateWine]

My husband and I had our third DC 10 months ago. Our other DC are aged 10 and 6 so a fairly big gap. The decision to have our third child was made by both of us but it was initially my idea and was something we discussed on and off for about 2 years.

Anyway, at about six months pregnant he started to get cold feet about it all and about six weeks before I gave birth he told me that he’d changed his mind, didn’t want another baby and if he could turn back time he would undo it. It was obviously very upsetting at that time as I really could have done with his support but deep down I hoped he’d feel differently once the baby was born.

He didn’t. In the first six months he made next to no effort to bond with her, we had a lot of arguments, he went away a lot with work, started drinking too much and i was often left on my own trying to hold everything together.

Now he is trying to make more of an effort to bond with our baby and I think he does love her but he says he feels trapped by the restrictions of having a baby again, he’s very envious of friends who no longer have these ties, he drinks and goes out for ‘escapism’ and often lies to me about it, he tells me that he loves our baby but she doesn’t enhance his life in any way, and he blames me entirely for putting him in this position because I was the one who wanted another baby. He claims he only did it to make me happy and he says he thought I would resent him if he said no. I distinctly remember at the time I told him that if it wasn’t what he wanted he only had to tell me and it would be conversation over because I firmly believe that if one person doesn’t want a baby you don’t have a baby. I told him that numerous times but he only said things like he thought it would be lovely to have another DC, if it’s what I wanted he would be up for it (admittedly now I realise I should have read more into this at the time, but I thought he meant it because we both knew I would be doing most of the childcare).

I don’t know what to do. Sometimes I feel like our marriage is over if he feels like this about his child as I do not want her growing up in a toxic environment where she is not loved as much as the other two. We have started marriage counselling but I don’t think it will help with his negative feelings towards his child. I am suffering with depression and spend most of my days crying because I feel like my beautiful family is falling apart. My oldest DC has been asking questions about why we have been arguing (we don’t argue in front of our DC, it’s usually after they are in bed but it seems that he’s not asleep and can hear us), why I’m crying so frequently and why his friends parents split up so he’s obviously worried. My 6yo has been misbehaving in school and has also been noticeably more withdrawn than usual...this prompted her teacher to ask me whether everything was ok at home, and our baby has developed severe separation anxiety and I can’t help but wonder if it’s because she know Mummy is very unhappy. I’m just so angry with him for putting us through this. But I also know it’s completely out of character. We’ve been together for 14 years and he’s always been this ray of positivity, proactive, always laughing and doing things, the most devoted Dad so I can’t help wondering if he’s in the grips of depression. I don’t know what to do. I feel utterly helpless and like I’m watching my family fall apart

I’m sorry it’s such a long post. I was unsure of whether to put this in relationships or mental health, but whenever I post in relationships I just get a barrage of ‘LTB’ so I was hoping I might get a different perspective if I posted here.

Can anyone help me to help my husband? Any words of advice?

Hopeful bump?!

I know it’s easy for me to say, but I’d give him an ultimatum, and I’d mean it - get properly on board or get out. Fine if that means individual counselling for him to supplement the marriage counselling, and a trip to the GP, but no more indulgent wallowing.

PS: also think about posting in Relationships. Partly for traffic, partly because it’s not at all clear that your H has a mental health issue at this point.

Yes ask for this to be moved. I had similar with DH accidentally pregnant though and he expected me to have a termination. He was like a bear for a time, I told him in front of our GP if I had to choose between a grumpy old man and a beautiful baby, he would lose.

I think he would be depressed whether you had had the baby or not. Certainly depression can be triggered by a life change, perhaps he has realised that he is getting older, has many many responsiblities that he doesn't feel he can cope with, but that might have been the case whether you had two or three children. Who is to say whether something else might have triggered the depression - job, health, feeling low self esteem for some past historical reason...all I'm saying is that he is selling you the story that the baby is the cause of his depression and you are to BLAME.

When you really aren't.

The baby is a fact, and a lovely fact at that, and I cannot see how you be charged with the fault of having a third baby. Maybe you could have got pregnant entirely by accident and didn;t want a termination, would he be blaming you then. It is actually outrageous.

Okay so it is not your responsibility. It is his responsibility as it is his depression, and he needs to go to the GP and seek help for himself, anti depressants, counselling, therapy or else decide that you are no longer a partnership.

Really you cannot support him, you need the support yourself, you have a new baby and two other children who need you. I'm am not surprised you are angry and the clearer you are that you are not at fault, the easier it will be to draw the line that this is HIS PROBLEM to seek help for.

Was he a third child, or perhaps he was supplanted by a third child. Perhaps his mother didn't pay him enough attention at a vital point in his life. All things to come to terms with in counselling, but not YOUR PROBLEM. You cannot counsel him about himself. He needs to do it.

Maybe his mother expected him to look after her or support her when he was too young to be given that responsiblity and it is now traumatic overload of some kind, maybe his father stopped being involved at this point, at his age. Negative patterns often cause a lot of misery, we reenact our worst nightmares.

As pp said you can't help him...he can seek help.
You have yourself and three dc to look put for . You cannot fix him.
Ask him to leave.for two weeks.
He uses that time to get himself help and decide if he stays willingly or goes.
You don't need this man sucking away the joy of your beautiful baby and upsetting your older dc.
Tell school what is going on and ask for support for you.

Hi, we're moving this thread over to our Relationships topic at the OP's request.

Thanks all. I’ve asked for this to be moved to Relationships but as I said previously I just thought I might get a different perspective by posting here.

Interesting points made and I appreciate it. He is the oldest of 3 children and the third child was an unplanned pregnancy when he was 15. He has told me previously that he doesn’t remember his Dad being hugely involved or around much at that time. And his Dad has recently told him that he had difficulty adapting to having a third child which wasn’t very helpful from my perspective as he has now taken that as validation for his feelings and now thinks that what he is feeling is ‘normal’.

I will encourage him to go and speak to his GP.

It does sound like he could be depressed - would he go to the doctors? Also the fact that this is similar to his own childhood experience is very telling.

Ultimately though he should decide whether he is on board and if not leave as you cant continue with this family life environment. He should be glad he has 3 lovely children!

Counselling for him? CBT? Pick one who is an expert in PTSD and post natal depression. It’s worth a try.

If he is going out drinking it doesn't sound as if the baby is in fact restricting his life. Poor you, doing everything and having to hold everyone together emotionally as well. I hope he's not robbing your joy in your lovely baby. I agree it is time to put pressure on him to get treatment if it is a mental health issue.

Thank you. Yes I have told him that although marriage counselling will help us with some of the difficulties we are having and is helping us communicate better, I don’t think it will help with these negative feelings he has towards our baby or me and he should think about individual counselling for that. It just all adds up to be eye-wateringly expensive at a time where I’m not really working which is hard.

@Daisypie, he absolutely is robbing me of my baby joy and that isn’t helping matters because it is making me feel very angry, bitter and resentful towards him in addition to everything else that is going on. She hasn’t even been a high maintenance baby...very happy, laid back and adaptable and I wouldn’t say she’s restricted us much at all. We’ve been abroad with her, had a holiday, go for days out. But in the past few months I have become very depressed by everything that going on and I haven’t been going out with her, we’ve just been at home and I cry a lot when I’m on my own with her. I try to engage with her but my family problems are all consuming at the moment and I just cry. And now she has become more anxious, cries whenever someone tries to cuddle her and has terrible separation anxiety. I can’t help but think it’s interlinked and that makes me even more angry with my husband

If he is going out drinking it doesn’t sounds as if the baby is in fact restricting his life
Well yes. Another bone of contention because it’s getting to the point where I feel he’s using it as an excuse and taking the piss now. He puts it all down to his need for ‘escapism’ but he never seems to consider the fact that it makes my life more difficult and that I might in fact need a bit of time out myself.

As I say I struggle because the bitter resentful side of me thinks he’s being a selfish, inconsiderate prick and I should think about separating from him, and the other side of me know that this is so out of character from the man I’ve known and loved for 14 years, that he’s clearly struggling with his life right now and needs my help and support. But he’s bringing us all down too

@justasking111, what happened with you and your husband in the end? Did he come round? Are you still together?

The baby is off to university in September. He came to love him very much. The worries were being tied down and financial. In my case once baby was a toddler and could interact with daddy the bond was formed. There was the odd grumble over the years, still is. He knew that I was serious so could stay or leave.

This sounds really tough. In many ways, the only thing you can do is work on your own emotional well-being and try to get support wherever you can. I am sure you are doing a great job with your DC.

Sorry I've just realised I put this on the wrong thread. This is the first time I've gone on a forum