Category Archives: motherhood

Postpartum Voice of the Week: Label me and put me in a box

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I received the following via email yesterday. I read it as my son ate his lunch. I let it marinate overnight. This morning I decided I couldn’t keep it to myself. So I emailed the author and asked for permission to share her words with you, dear readers. Her words are powerful, descriptive, and captivating. Here’s a mom who had a glowing first pregnancy, birth, and postpartum. The second time around things did not go quite so well. Here is her story in her words.

 

This is my story.

 

Label me and put me in a box. Then tell me how to get out of it…

That is all I am asking

Please … PPD is killing me from the inside out…

Getting Pregnant, with my first little girl was easy; I got pregnant so quick I could not believe it. I had the most wonderful experience being pregnant with her. My hair was glowing; my face was rosy; I was able to exercise right up until her birth and only gained 23 pounds.

Carsen came into this world flawless and was absolutely beautiful. I felt that connection right off and was enamored by her. She was everything, she was my little mini me.

Eighteen months later we decided to try again. We knew we wanted one more whether it be a boy or girl. We couldn’t care less as long as she/he was healthy.

I was never thinking about Postpartum; it never crossed my mind. I just knew it was going to be just as easy as the first, no doubt.

Wow, was I wrong.

Started trying in December of 2007 and every month without fail I got my period up until June 2008. So me being a worrier thought the worst and went to my OBGYN.

She suggested I try fertility pills. So I tracked my cycle and tried it and I thought it had worked the first month but did not and I got my period again… By the middle of August I was exhausted from worrying and not being pregnant.

It was not until my mother told me “Janna you are so blessed, you had a wonderful pregnancy and you have a healthy daughter maybe that is what God intended for you.” It hit me and I just let it go and gave it to GOD. If I was never meant to have another child I was happy and blessed.

Then in November my period was late, but I was not even thinking about it; so on a whim I took a pregnancy test and It was positive. We were elated.

This was the beginning of my descent…

Because the election was going on, that was all that was on TV and I kept hearing about and seeing Sarah Palin’s son who had Down syndrome. Well my anxiety kicked in and I worried myself to death that the baby might have DS.

I had a CVS test done in January 2009. Everything came back normal and we found out early on we were having another little girl, we had already picked out name a year and a half ago; Marley after Bob Marley. What a relief…? No…

The next month I was upset because we were living in this little town home with no room. I spoke with my husband and we decided to put our home on the market in the worst economy since the 80’s.

I stressed myself out so much, because we could not sell our home yet we had to keep it so clean all the time and my poor sweet daughter could not play with her toys like she wanted because mommy was so scared she would run into the walls and make a mark.

We spent so much money on staging and getting the place fixed up to sell. We were still in new construction and competing with builder prices and being the smallest town home in the neighborhood was hell………

I would go to bed crying myself to sleep calling my mom and brother all the time… I did not realize how much stress I was putting on myself or my baby until I put myself into preterm labor.

I was in the hospital for six days in June of 2009……

My husband was another story.

We had been having problems since January of 09. I was dishonest with him on something and finally came clean and he was just being a jerk to me about going into pre term labor; saying I did it on purpose so he could not go to Bonnaroo (it’s a hippy thing). He went four days without speaking to me.

On top of everything else, I was gaining so much weight with her, I put on 50 pounds with her and began hating myself………daily I would look in the mirror and want to puke from the sight of my reflection………

I could not be on my feet for very long so I had to lie in the bed and watch hours of crap on TV ……… I was miserable and she was kicking me up in my rib cage so I was in pain as well…… I wanted her OUT OF ME……and during all of this we were having several showings on our home…

I look back now and think why didn’t we take this stupid thing off the market… Nevertheless, I was on a mission; I wanted out of that place.

After sitting for 45 days I was angry at my home; I was finding things to dislike about it everyday… I wanted out of that place and it was about to get worse.

Finally on July 16th Marley was born, healthy but had two birthmarks at the time both on her leg… It bothered me but not too much then.

Came home from the hospital and was on a high; however she cried all the time and we knew she cried way more than our first born. At first it was ok…… tried to breast feed plus take care of a 3 year old…… some women can; I cannot……I was not made to be super mom…… We barely slept, I was up every 2-3 hours pumping and feeding, and during the day Marley would not take naps and she cried incessantly………

Finally in August the doctors told us she had Colic. I pumped until September of 09 and finally let my boobs dry up……very painful and hard to do…

Still during all of this I was showing the house and handling a colicky baby and 3 year old… I would sit at home with Marley and stare at the walls because I was too afraid to go anywhere because she had this horrible cry that would not stop.

I was embarrassed by her for crying and she had developed two strawberries; one on top of her head and one on her forehead for all to see…

I could not stand them, did not take pictures of her. I was worried people were staring at it and also I was irritated when people would ask me what it was and say “ I hope it goes away….”

I hated it… Then I decided I wanted to start losing the 50 pounds I had put on while I was pregnant so I had a brilliant idea of starting on Phenteremine and also cutting my Zoloft in half because I felt I did not need it………

Realizing I just gave birth less than 2 months prior… BIG MISTAKE…

At that point I knew something was different with me emotionally. I was yelling at the pharmacists and crying for no reason, trying to compare myself to all the moms who looked great right after giving birth, and hating myself and my body…

By the end of September we finally got an offer on our house… crappy offer, but we accepted and it was SOLD; funny thing was that I was not happy about it…

I knew I was going further down emotionally… I started to not want to be around Marley as much… Her strawberry on her forehead was getting bigger and I hated it and did not like the way she looked… how horrible for a mother to have those feelings.

On top of all this, she did not stop crying she cried all of July, August, September and October… it was painful and draining… I did not feel close to her at all and was regretting even having another baby at that time.

I felt lost and lonely… My husband told me I was a horrible mother and that I couldn’t care less about both our children; I felt like I was being kicked while down for the count, my own husband was against me.

He could not understand the pain inside of me. I wanted to get in my car and drive to somewhere till the road ended and never turn back… I was scared to be left alone with both kids, I started having horrible, painful thoughts in my head, I knew they were wrong but they wouldn’t stop.

I was having continuous anxiety attacks, my primary doctor upped my dose of Zoloft and my therapist was nice but I don’t think she got the pain I was in.

Friends and Family started to notice that I was crying from the drop of a hat and just staring off into space for no reason… I could not sleep … Thank God I had Ambien at the time because I would have been committed and not voluntarily… And to top it all off I was the maid of honor for my best friend’s wedding in October… I was running on empty…

Oct 24th 2009, My best friend got married, I looked like an overweight smurf…it was horrific. I did not smile or even try to help my best friend get ready, I could not concentrate, I knew I was at the top of the hill and after that wedding I fell and fell hard.

Driving home from the wedding I had my first anxiety attack… I felt like my skin was turning inside out. Thoughts encompassed me. I was actually on the verge of insanity (at least I thought)… what the hell was wrong with me?

I walked in the door and my husband was like “What is wrong with you?” I tore my 300.00 bridesmaid dress off and threw it in the trash…… I could not sit down, I was sweating, I was crying, I was shaking. I was confused; I didn’t know what was going on with me. My husband was just sitting there watching me pace back and forth with this disgusted look on his face.

That night I took an Ambien, I fell asleep but at 1.00am I woke up in a sheer panic… I could not sleep; my heart was beating out of my chest… Fears of my children were surfacing all around… I walked up and down the stairs, Marley started crying and I started to hate her for that… why does she always need something!!!!!!! It was consuming me.

I was irritated all the time, I had no patience what so ever; feared everything. Feared something bad would happen; what if I dropped her, what if I got in a wreck and she was in the car, what if I lost control? It was the scariest feeling in the world. Where did it come from?

What came and took all my confidence away from me and made me so frightened of being alone with my children or not being fit enough to be their mom, of feeling extreme guilt because I felt as if I would never ever get out of this box I was shoved into.

I was in sheer panic, I felt ashamed for feeling this way, I felt alone and afraid because my husband was not understanding at all. I had no one, absolutely no one who understood and that was the scariest thing.

I finally plucked up the courage to call my mother in law and all I said was “I can’t do it, something is wrong with me, I need help.” It was the hardest thing I have ever done. I had to openly admit that I was incapable of being a mom.

I was having such bad anxiety that I could not do anything, and the more the anxiety the worse my derealization got. The derealization is another story in itself. I could not go anywhere or be seen by anyone other than family members. It was debilitating. My sister in law came over to help me for the rest of the week.

My husband was still very much a cause of my anxiety because of his lack of concern or compassion. I could not go to work; I could not function… It took everything I had to get up; not because I was not getting enough sleep but because I was so scared and my anxiety was through the roof.

I tried to find help by searching the internet and seeing what was out there and it scared the hell out of me… The internet can be more of an enemy than a friend… Time was actually standing still.

I felt like I was finally feeling a little better and getting stronger but knew deep down I was still scared to be alone with the children, not because I would hurt them but because I felt as if I was incompetent as a mother and I would never be able to be a great mom and raise them like I saw other people do.

I was seeing a therapist but she did not have children and did not truly understand how I felt… I felt lost and alone in this big city…

I woke up each morning welcomed with fear and anxiety. My mom who was 6 hours away could only do so much over the phone… I was getting worse and worse…

I did not feel this medication was helping me. The anxiety was getting to be too much and I was falling into a depression…

I felt ashamed; I prayed to GOD every two seconds to help me through the minute, the hour, the day, and the week, “Please Lord let me get through this… I will not be able to live anymore if I have to continue to feel and think this way……”

I have never in my life thought about suicide, but I was thinking that if I cannot escape this than why even exist… I could just take a bottle of my sleeping pills and make all this pain go away… My daughters would be better off without me, everyone would be better off…

Of course looking back now I know that was selfish and horrible, but when you are at such a low point in your life; let’s just say I understand.

Your mind is the most powerful thing and it can play such horrible tricks on you.

December 3rd I was admitted to hospital for Postpartum Depression and Anxiety.

I have actually for the first time in my life reached the absolute bottom. No light exists, I feel like a pariah…I don’t belong but I do belong. I need help and I am getting help. I requested to stay longer so I could attend every group therapy session and all the classes. If I was here than damnit I was going to give it all I got, no matter how hard it is…

I have made a recovery.

I still have my moments of anxiety, and I lost my confidence during all of this… I used to be able to do anything and now some things just scare me… but with the help of the best psychiatrist in the world and my wonderful therapist I am a million times better than I was back in December of 2009.

My PPD started in September-October 2009 and it took me until Feb-March 2010 to start feeling like myself again…

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Just Talkin’ Tuesday: The High Toll of Postpartum Mood & Anxiety Disorders

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Original photo "DSC07197" by poodlerat @flickr.com

#PPDChat tonight got me thinking about the toll of Postpartum Mood & Anxiety Disorders.

A mom with a PMAD is Ground Zero. Her immediate family is in the blast zone, at highest risk for developing their own mood disorders, depression, or other accompanying issues. Extended family is just outsize the blast zone and quite often bowled down as they absorb the shock which reverberates as she flails for survival.

As Mom recovers, Dad may sink into his own dark pit, unaware of what is happening, unwilling to admit his own demons in the dark. Why? Because Dad is the rock, the hinge on which the moon is hung. His family needs him. Depression is a sign of weakness. It does not happen to real men.

Oh, but it does.

Just as Mom has cleared her last hurdle, Dad sinks even further away. He is angry. Frustrated. Hopeless. Lost.

Mom questions her own recovery as Dad lashes out. He is incapable of giving her space in which to grow. Incapable of recognizing her growth, her recovery.

Anger quickly eclipses any rejoicing.

Stress and angst fill the air of the home, adversely affecting their children, their lives, their relationships with friends, families, resulting in isolation.

Their marriage spirals downward. Their children act out.

Their lives fall apart.

Granted, the above does not happen to every PMAD family. But a PMAD affects so much more than just Mom. It truly affects the whole family. My PMAD’s damn near destroyed my own marriage. My husband self-medicated after our second daughter. That did not fall out until after the birth of our third child. What a spectacular fall out it was though. I nearly walked away. Instead, just as with my PMAD, I chose to turn and fight. Fortunately, so did my husband. We were supported by members of our church, our Pastor, and family members as we fought savagely to save our marriage. I wanted to give up several times. So did my husband. We have shared this with each other and in doing so, moved to a new level of communication and trust. It has been a long, bumpy road.

One worth traveling.

While I would not want to do it again, I would not change a thing about my past six years of hell. For they have hewn me into a strong woman, a strong Christian, a strong wife, and a strong Mother. I can finally say I am blessed. God saw me through my storm. I know there are more storms brewing out there. I’m okay with that. Bring it. I am ready to tell those storms just how big my God is these days.

However; if there was one thing I would like to toss out the window it would be the exposure to anger, arguing, and stress for the kids.

I did not choose to have a PMAD. But they certainly don’t deserve to suffer from the ripples set in motion from my experience. I think this is one of the biggest things I struggle with as a remnant of my PMADs. The anger, guilt, rage over their exposure at such young ages to such a harsh environment. Sure, it could have been worse. But they certainly didn’t do anything to deserve it. Neither did I, but they truly are the innocents in all of this. And for that, I am remorseful. Resentful even that my PMAD’s stole their infancy and my enjoyment of their infancies from me. If I could toss one thing in a toll booth bucket and be forever done with it, it would be my remorse and resent over what my PMAD’s did to my kids. I wonder every time they misbehave if it is because I was depressed. Do my daughters have ADHD because I was depressed? What about my son? Are my daughters resentful that he and I have a stronger bond because I didn’t have a PMAD with him? Will they be able to rightfully accuse me of having a favorite? How will I explain myself down the road?

It’s enough to make you blink back tears and choke back anger all at the same time. Nauseating, really.

SO. As I take a deep breath and choke back some of that anger and blink back tears, what remnant or part of your PMAD do you wish you could just toss away and be done with forever? Get it off your chest.

Let’s get to Just Talkin’ this Tuesday.

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Just Talking Tuesday: Depression, Super Glue, and Bonding

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All too often we are shown over and over and over again those scenes in movies where a mother, who has just given birth, lies in bed in beautiful nightgown complete with a bed jacket. Her hair is perfectly coiffed as she is handed her baby. She instantly knows how to hold this perfectly quiet and peaceful infant. Her face softens as she oooohs and ahhhs as the camera goes all vaseline and fuzzy while sappy music swells in the background.

I don’t know how your births went, but mine were nothing like that. My hair was everything but perfectly coifed, I was wearing a frumpy hospital gown, and I had no clue what to do with this squirming thing now in my arms who was screaming at me like some sort of pissed off Banshee. The second time around, I knew what to do with the little one but she could not cooperate because she was physically unable to do so. The third time around went much much better despite the persistent lack of perfectly coiffed hair and no sappy music.

No one tells new mothers at their baby showers just how hard birth and those first few weeks will be on us. It’s all fun and games, cute frilly or frocky clothes in blue, pink, or some other pastel. Even if we do know what to expect, depression can still slam into us after birth. It is not something we choose. Not something we can turn off at the drop of a hat or just because you want us to be happy again. It takes time to heal.

One of the biggest things depression or a mood disorder affects is a mother’s ability to bond with her infant. The best way to describe this feeling to someone who did not have a problem bonding with their infant is this:

Let’s say you hate cats. You don’t know why but you do. You visit a home with a cat. Said cat decides that YOU are a brand new BFF and relies on you for everything. Meows at you constantly, purrs, wraps itself around your legs, curls up on your lap, and wants you to pet it every second you are there. This interferes with your ability to have an adult conversation with the friend you came to visit. Suddenly your thoughts are sliced in half, then in quarters. You’re distracted, frustrated, your blood pressure rises, you may even begin to itch or manifest physical symptoms as you try to detangle yourself from the cat.

The difference between someone who hates cats and a mom who is depressed and doesn’t bond with her child is that somewhere, deep inside, that woman LOVES her child. She does. Even if she is not showing it, she does. She wants to bond to that child and is desperate to try anything.

Motherhood is something we add to our sense of selves though, not something which should overtake our sense of self. We should not superglue the baby to ourselves and miss out on life because we are a Mother. There needs to be a balance, a sense of old and new. It is a hard line to walk. A hard line to find. An almost invisible line to find if you are a mother with a Postpartum Mood & Anxiety Disorder. But it’s there. You just have to be patient and wait for it to slowly reveal itself.

I struggled with bonding with our first two daughters. Our first because I had not a clue what to do with her, even apologized to her at 7 days old because I did not know how to talk to her. Our second because she was physically separated from me at less than 24 hours old and sent to a NICU in another city over an hour away. I would later find myself wailing that I wanted to leave her at the hospital. We did not bond until she was nearly three years old and back at the same hospital in which she spent time in the NICU.

I bonded well with my third though but I did not struggle with Postpartum OCD or Depression that time around. We had all the warm fuzzies and after a few weeks if you listened closely enough, you could hear sappy music in the background.

I know my issues with depression and OCD interfered in my ability to bond with my babies. But today, I try so hard not too look back and be sad. Instead I try my best to bond in the here and now because that’s what matters. I cannot change the past. I can only work to improve the present and make the future even better. (Believe me, it’s taken me almost 6 years to be able to say that!)

Did your PMAD affect your bonding? How? What was your experience?

Let’s get to just talking.

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The Great Divide: Researchers, Clinicians, Medical Professionals, Peer Support Advocates, Struggling Patients

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All across the globe, there are Researchers dedicating their lives to exploring all aspects of Postpartum Mood Disorders. Many of these researchers work in clinics, some are purely academic, and others review the research of others and present a compilation to conclude results.

Clinicians (for our purposes here) are trained in a variety of professions from therapists to psychiatrists to psychologists. These are the professionals on the front line. Some may be trained specifically in Postpartum Mood & Anxiety Disorders while others may be largely unware of the nuances of these conditions.

Medical Professionals often see Postpartum Women prior to a Clinician is involved. These are General Pracitioners, Family Practice doctors, Pediatricians, Obstetricians, Midwives in some areas, ER doctors, nurses, etc. These professionals again, may or may not have additional specific training in Postpartum Mood & Anxiety Disorders yet it is highly unlikely they are familiar at all with the nuances involved.

Peer Support Advocates are in the trenches. These may be made up of survivors, passionate and informed Clinicians, nurses, pediatricians, IBCLC’s, doulas, and a number of other people various walks of life. They become Peer Support Advocates for various reasons but largely due to personal experience from either a lived experience or the experience of a loved one.

Struggling Patients are in the thick of a Postpartum Mood & Anxiety Disorder, often navigating the system for the very first time. Many of them have never had a mental illness before giving birth or pregnancy. They are not familiar with their rights, the issue of medication, diagnosis, follow-through, or where to turn for help. They are filled with guilt, shame, and fear. These families and patients are often afraid to speak up and reach out for help. But their voices are increasing. Yet they are still echoing into an empty cavern as they scream out for the help they so desperately need.

Peer Support Advocates often are the first to hear the cry of the struggling patients. We work with them to find knowledgeable support in their locale. While the possibility of connecting these patients with knowledgeable or compassionate care is increasing, often times, we find ourselves up against a brick wall riddled with barriers to treatment. The biggest barrier is lack of knowledgeable local referrals. Primary referral in many areas is often to an uninformed or untrained Medical Professional.

An uninformed Medical Professional may do more harm than good with a Postpartum patient. He or she may erroneously take the DSM guidelines to heart, refusing to acknowledge a Postpartum Mood Disorder if the patient had her baby more than four weeks prior to presenting with symptoms. Nevermind that the APA itself admonishes the usage of the DSM in such a manner. If the non-mental health trained Medical Professional is informed, then the patient may find herself ushered higher up the ladder into the office of a professional Clinician trained to deal with psychiatric illness and disorders.

Clinicians are not always trained in Postpartum Mood & Anxiety Disorders. Therefore, it’s important for the patient to know what questions to ask when making an appointment with a specialist in the psychiatric field when seeking help for a PMAD. Questions like “Have you been trained in Perinatal Mood Disorders?” or “By whom have you been trained?” or “How long has it been since you were trained?” or “What is your approach to treating PMADs?” are all excellent questions someone who has been trained in Perinatal Mood Disorders would be comfortable in answering. A good clinician will answer honestly that he/she has not been trained but is willing to learn. He/She should offer her viewpoint on treatment and not force you into accepting their way or the highway. A good (and informed) clinician will also keep up with the latest research regarding PMADs.

Researchers are often not in the field with patients. On rare occasion they are clinicians themselves. Many are academic researchers. These researchers study everything from epidmeology to treatment to type of Perintal Mood Disorder, to risk factors, to contributing factors, birth trauma, etc. The issue with Researchers comes in when their research is manipulated, funded by Pharmaceutical companies, involves retro-data, a small data group, or a limited field in which some factors are not viable simply because the size of the group or source of the group is inherently flawed or for some other various reason. This is not to say that all research should be thrown out the window. It shouldn’t be at all. BUT it is important to be able to distill the research with a keen eye and apply some common sense to the outcome.

This is where Clinicians, Medical Professionals, and Peer Suppport Advocates come into play. Anyone trained or in contact with experts in the field of Perinatal Mood Disorders will be able to help you recover. Even those not well-trained but well-meaning and open-minded will be able to help you. If your Clinician, Medical Professional and Peer Support Advocate is willing to help formulate (or find) help which fits your personal lifestyle and belief system, your chances of recovery increase. But if you have a Clinician, Medical Professional or Peer Support Advocate who is closed off to certain avenues of treatment due to a certain aspect of your own life such as breastfeeding, other children, pregnancy, etc, then you may want to continue looking for help elsewhere.

In light of the new guidelines in the DSM-5 which will keep the Postpartun Depression Identifier at 4 weeks, we need to work to get those involved in care for Postpartum Women struggling with disorders talking with each other instead of at each other or indirectly with each other via research, peer support survivors, and trainers, etc. But how do we do this?

How do we get the researcher to share with the Clinician their goals, interests, and conclusions? How do we then get the Clincian to spark interest in the Medical non-specialist Practioner to learn about Perinatal Mood & Anxiety Disorders? Then how do we plug in the Peer Advocate and the patient? How do we open the discussion between Professional, Peer Advocate, and patient? How do we keep the communication going once it’s started? What will it take? How many more tragedies must we endure before everyone involved is ready to talk and on the same page?

Enough is enough. We need to stop talking at each other, around each other, to each other and instead talk WITH each other. Until we do, innocent women, children, and families will continue to struggle, suffer, and possibly even die. I am not willing to let that happen. Are you?

Speak up. Say something. EVERY Word makes a difference. Every.Word.

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Is Postpartum Depression a series of mini-episodes or thoughts vs. something major?

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Tonight, before I broke Twitter and received a 503 error message, I received the above question in my Direct Message inbox.

It caught me off guard.

140 characters did not provide nearly enough space in which to respond.

Why she felt she had to DM the question also caught me off guard. Why not just ask in public? It’s not an intensely private question and certainly not one (obviously) I mind answering in public.

A series of mini-episodes or thoughts – hrm.

Let’s see.

My first brush with Postpartum involved OCD, which yes, involves thoughts. Rushing thoughts that liked to run through my head like crazy streakers intent on tackling me to the pavement. I had to either duck or face plant the cement. (FYI, Cement? Tastes like rubber glue. Also makes really dangerous shoes, I hear.)

That OCD fed into depression during pregnancy. THAT was fun. But it didn’t involve those fun face-planting thoughts. Just day after day of darkness with the weight of a blue whale latched to my ankle that I couldn’t shake. Darkness that kept me from eating, playing with my toddler, interacting with my husband, participating in life. Darkness which overtook my life faster than I could outrun it. Darkness that swallowed me whole with a vengeance.

Then my daughter was born with a birth defect. The face-planters returned with a vengeance and brought their friends, P,T, S, and D. Together, they hooked up with Party City and threw one helluva party in my head. I got lost in the fog. Very, very, very lost.

If I could have escaped the darkness, the fog, the insanity, by just changing my next “series” of thoughts, I would have done so in a heartbeat. If that’s the way it really is, then someone should have clued me in a long time ago. Someone should clue in all those suffering moms out there right now. Or give the moms to come a heads up. Hey – if you just DECIDE to be happy with your next thought, guess what? YOU WILL BE!

There’s power in positive thinking. While there may be, it certainly isn’t a quick fix. It takes time to heal from Postpartum Mood Disorders or any mental illness for that matter. Some may never heal as the root of their illness may be biological or something they have to live with for the rest of their lives. There is recovering and there is coping. I coped while I journeyed toward recovery. But I most certainly did not jump from mini-episode to mini-episode or from thought to thought (okay, so maybe the thought thing but underneath the thoughts there was a deeper issue at hand causing those thoughts to emerge from the depths of hell and torment me.)

I believe for some Postpartum Mood Disorders are a major event in life, one which forever alters the course of any life left to live. My own brushes with PMD’s have been a very important part of who I am today. As I journeyed on the road to recovery, (by the way, someone should really repave that road. The bumps? Atrocious!) I held on to life with every fiber of my being. It took everything I had most days NOT to drive my car into on-coming traffic. I did not – (obviously) because I had kids to care for  – kids who love me, trust me, and look forward to spending time with me each and every day.  But to be honest, there were days way back when where my kids? Weren’t really a reason to stick around. To be that far gone is scary. To not care if you see your kids grow up – to not have them as a reason to stick around – wow. (These days I am madly in love with my kids and wouldn’t dare think about leaving them in forever terms on purpose!)

Ultimately though, life IS a series of thoughts. Sometimes these thoughts get stuck in the lows. Some days, they get stuck in the clouds. And sometimes? There’s a traffic jam. And that’s an event. Sure, sometimes a traffic jam clears up on it’s own. But other times? Other times we need professional help to get it all cleared up. We don’t hesitate to accept the help of professionals to clear up the traffic, right? So why would we hesitate to accept the help of professionals when our brain has a traffic jam? Doesn’t make sense, does it?

Bottom line though – it’s your Postpartum Mood Disorder to define as it fits you, your lifestyle, your perception. You may feel that your PMD is a series of mini-episodes or thoughts. It ultimately doesn’t matter how anyone else defines Postpartum Mood Disorders as we all bring our own stories and baggage to the plate.

What are your thoughts? ARE Postpartum Mood Disorders just a series of events or thoughts? Or are they something major? What was it for you?

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