I spent a long time convincing my partner that we were ready to have a baby, I've wanted to be a mummy for years. In December 2014, after over 8 years together and 3 in our own home, we both finally agreed it was the right time. So when the test was positive in March 2015 I was elated. I knew that having a baby was hard work and I wasn't going into it unprepared. Everything was ready for bubs arrival in November 2015.
I wasn't worried about the birth, I figured it would hurt a fair bit but pain doesn't worry me and I hadn't got a strict birthing plan. However I wasn't anticipating I would lose enough blood to require two units of blood transfused and three nights on the maternity high dependency unit. It was a dramatic shock to the system that left me anaemic and feeling totally drained for months. Additionally though having haemorrhaged caused delays in getting my milk supply so breastfeeding was challenging especially with a very hungry baby and that in turn resulted in some unattractive hysterical moments on my part. But that was the "baby blues". Fortunately for me I had my partner at home for a fortnight and then my mum came to help for a fortnight too.
In my exhausted state I quickly learnt that I had a baby that didn't want to sleep. From mid November until Christmas I never once slept in my bed, I was down on the sofa trying to get him to sleep all night and day. This lack of sleep was taking its toll. But that's all it was to me, 'a lack of sleep', causing me to spend hours during the night crying. Or having to wake my partner up at a horrendous hour on a work night saying 'take him before I have a total meltdown'.
Don't get me wrong, despite his refusal to sleep, I love my son with all my heart. I would want to cry as soon as he woke me up but as soon as I saw his little face, his smile, heard his giggle, my heart would melt. I felt so grateful to have him in my life. We did baby groups together, baby massage was a fave. We made sure we went to weighings every fortnight. We did everything together, went everywhere together, my little monkey refused to take a bottle so we couldn't spend any time apart even if we had wanted to. But I didn't want to, I had many offers of help, I think being a bit of a perfectionist, I didn't want anyone else doing my job. It was all consuming and exhausting though.
At 16 weeks I put him in his own room and he started to sleep for short periods, without needing to be in my arms! It was a miracle but I was still only getting 2/3 hours of broken sleep in a twenty four hour period. It was more than I had been getting. However, I was finding that every time he woke me up I would spend a very long time getting back to sleep. 'This constant lack of sleep had obviously made me an insomniac'. I would then get myself incredibly worked up, counting down the minutes until he was likely to wake again, stressing that I didn't get to sleep soon he'd be up again and I'd be going through the whole process again before I even got 30 seconds of sleep. When I did sleep I suffered recurring nightmares, one was dropping my son onto gravel and the other involved terrorists firing guns outside my house.
This was my battle repeatedly every night.
Then when I wasn't awake in bed, I was awake downstairs looking at my untidy, not clean enough house. Getting angry that I'm such a useless stay at home mum. My house is such a mess, what must people think. I'm on maternity leave and I can do nothing more than feed, change and play with my son. I also lost the ability to find the right words, my partner was getting frustrated by how long it took me to get a sentence out. I felt stupid, my memory was poor. 'My house is a mess, I'm a total mess'. Additionally I found no matter how early my son woke me, we still couldn't get out if the house for hours. As the months past I could only think 'how am I going to manage back at work. Cooking, cleaning, raising my son and working, if I can't even manage the first 3 things with all this work free time'. And how on earth am I going to get my son to nursery and myself to work by 8.30!!! As it got nearer to returning to work this became an increasing anxiety.
I stopped going out as much, it was too much of an effort. And going out presented all sorts if problems, like having to make myself look reasonable, finding places to subtly breastfeed and finding some clothing that hid my awful, hideous jelly belly. Going out also added all sorts of anxieties like having to park my car 'where is there to park?! Will it be easy to park?! 'What if I mess up my parking and it embarrassingly takes several attempts?!' If any of these concerns became reality then I would burst into tears. I even feared going into my back garden to clean out my rabbits hutch and leaving my son in his play pen. One morning I was panicking whilst I was out there, that he might be suffocating on his V cushion, even though he's a strong lad and could easily roll and sit up. It was a completely irrational anxiety. I literally had no confidence and it was all too stressful.
It took me a long while to realise that those "baby blues" were going on much longer than they should be. So being a health professional I used my knowledge to try and overcome these episodes of low mood. I knew exercise can be very effective so I walked, I walked every day, I walked everywhere (no parking required). I also started doing #100happydays on Facebook. I really felt it was working, it got me out every day (for the sole reason that I didn't want my life to look dull to all my Facebook friends so I organised something to do everyday that I could then post later). I got some negative comments from "friends" regarding having to see a post and probably a photo of my son on their news feed every day. Despite that, I completed the 100 days and I genuinely enjoyed getting out. I want to make it clear that I have had many great days and incredibly enjoyable moments since my son was born.
After my #100happydays ended I stopped going out as often. I was getting more emotional again, the fear of going out returned. I went into McDonald's with my partner on two occasions, the lack of pram space and struggling to find a table, whilst my partner purchased our food, ended with my becoming publicly hysterical and eating my eat in McDonald's off a tray sat on a wall in the cold whilst sobbing uncontrollably onto my partners shoulder.
Why was I feeling like this?! 'I have the most gorgeous, well behaved, healthy little boy in the world. I have a supportive partner and family, I have no reason to be feeling so down in the dumps. Many people would do anything to be in my situation. Apart from a chronic lack of sleep, my situation is perfect. My son is perfect and I love him so much'. He still cheers me up and makes me laugh regularly.
At 9 months old my son fell whilst I was getting him out of his highchair and landed head first on the solid kitchen floor. I had to take him to A&E. I was officially the WORST mum in the world. I felt unbelievable guilt and was so angry with myself. I felt I deserved something horrible for causing this pain to my son. I started getting the awful feeling that my son would not be in my life forever and that filled me with excessive fear. Then my trepidation heightened when a week later we were back in A&E as he had a raging temperature and was severely projectile vomiting and going drowsy. It was so upsetting and stressful, I was thinking the worst. It turned out to be a horrible viral tonsillitis but it could have been so much worse. The virus caused over a week of diarrhoea which was truly exhausting for both of us. I was back and forth to the GP to make sure that after all the sickness and diarrhoea he wasn't getting dehydrated. But all this, in some ways, was a blessing in disguise. The GP we saw picked up on my low mood and after seeing us the 2nd time, requested I return on my own. She made me see that all these feelings I've had for over 9 months are not normal. She diagnosed me with Postnatal Depression.
I was started on antidepressants and my GP re-referred me to the health visitors who have since organised "talking therapy" to go alongside the medication and the nursery nurse to improve my son's sleep.
At 10 and half months old he's finally gone from waking 5 or 6 times a night to sleeping through!!! Sleep combined with antidepressants, talking and a few work related days have made me feel almost myself. I've spent Wednesdays with my mum for a little while now and more recently my partner, mother, mother in law and my sister have all been looking after my little one to allow me some time to go to work, clean the house, attend netball training or just rest which has been a great help. I shouldn't have refused their offers of help before now. It's still early days, I have some difficult days still, and for fear of causing an awkward, gloomy conversation, I've told very few people I have postnatal depression but I am getting there.
Why didn't I ask for help? Why didn't I tell anyone how I was feeling? Why did I make out I was doing well this whole time? Why was I trying to do it all? Why am I embarrassed by my diagnosis?
Because that's me, I never ask for help, I needed someone else to tell me how I was feeling wasn't "normal". Admitting that I was not coping or accepting offers of help from my family made me feel like I was failing as a mother.
I am one of a number of people who go through their own experience of postnatal depression (10% of all new mums). As I go through my therapy, I aim to keep a blog record of my participation in treatment, continue documenting my own personal journey with postnatal depression.
Some links that may be of interest.
I had a black dog, his name was depression
Pre and postnatal depression advice and support PANDAS
Local free counselling
How to help your partner when she has PND
NHS Postnatal Depression
High functioning postpartum depression
No comments:
Post a Comment