No Enchanted Post Box

It’s a sad night tonight. I haven’t been able to fall asleep. Something has been niggling at me in the back of my mind, pressing forward, trying to come to the forefront of my consciousness. It couldn’t shake loose, so I watched Grey’s Anatomy online, which is a surefire way to make me cry. There’s something about crying, even over something completely unrelated, that stills my mind and causes things to rise to the surface that I never expected or saw coming. Things I thought I had made peace with long ago.

Laying here in bed while I type away, my son is sleeping swaddled on my chest. His little snuffling breath is music to my ears. His little twitches and sighs bring a smile to my lips. The smell that only new babies have overwhelms my senses. These things I treasure, imprint on my memory and tuck away in my heart. It’s moments like these that will tide me through teething, melt downs, and sleepless nights. It’s these memories that will be my lifeline through the struggle that is 2. And what I’ve heard about 3 and 4 and 5 and… Well, you get the picture.

What I’m feeling sad about, grieving a bit in my heart is that I don’t have this of my daughter. I have no little snuffling breath memories, no memory of how her head smells. The cooing. The eye contact. Nothing. I feel so cheated, so angry at times over it.

I’m mad at myself for not accepting that I needed help before she was almost half a year old. I want to go back in time and shake that version of me by the shoulders and shout in her face to get help. “You need to set aside your baggage about anti depressants!!!” I can picture myself saying. “You need to hold Aaron’s hand, call Sherry and tell her you want to take her up on her offer for a prescription. If you don’t, you will come to regret it!”

But I can’t. I can’t go back in time. I can’t write a letter to myself and put it in an enchanted post box to send it to my past self. All I can do is acknowledge my loss, accept it and move forward.

I use to think that moving forward was a continuous process. Now I view it as two steps forward and one step back to reflect. Then you take a great big sigh and take two more steps forward. Sometimes more than two. Sometimes it’s five or twelve. I’ve learned I can’t beat myself up about this step back to reflect and try to accept. That will only force me to step back further.

It feels more peaceful now that I’ve cried. My mind isn’t nearly as noisy as it was a few hours earlier. My heart is still sad, but in a much calmer way. I just want to snuggle my baby boy, shed a few more tears over what I’ve lost of his sister, and tuck away even more little bits of him in my heart as my baby.

Ponderings about the postpartum period

A few months ago, I wrote about my postpartum depression struggles and how they impacted my life. Now that birth is creeping every closer to being reality, the idea of postpartum depression is weighing heavily on my mind. Will I be able to identify it this time? Will I have the strength to reach out for help? Will I even suffer from PPD this time around?

I’ve finally sat down and listed out the things that will help me prevent and/or deal with PPD. On a personal level, I’ve found that if I put things “out there” where I know others will read, I’m more likely to stick to the plan instead of deviating from the set path.

I am already on a therapeutic dosage of Zoloft and actually have been since half way through the 1st trimester. Very low dosage in the grand scheme of things, but it’s enough to keep me mentally stable while still experiencing the normal emotional ups and downs of pregnancy. There’s something about the way my body’s chemistry changed this pregnancy that caused me to have almost debilitating anxiety issues that mimicked PPD so closely, I knew I needed help if I wanted to even have a fighting chance during the postpartum period.

A friend of mine has offered to keep tabs on me and drop by my house on occasion without calling before hand (not during nap time, though!) to make sure I’m *really* doing okay. It’s one thing to put on a happy face when on the phone or emailing or even getting together on a regular basis with friends. It’s something quite different to force a facade when someone caring just shows up on your doorstep.

I have the phone numbers of a few friends who are regular night owls or insomniacs and are regularly up around 2am. I found that 2am was the hardest time for me and they have graciously offered to hold my hand over the phone if I have a melt down.

On Tuesdays, I will be making a point of leaving the house. Every Tuesday, no exceptions unless the snow is so bad that Aaron feels it’s unsafe since I don’t trust my judgment based on my past experiences. In our town, there are a lot of kid friendly things to do on Tuesdays. There is a nursing mother’s group that meets just across the street from us, our church has brunch and fellowship for moms with childcare provided, and the local Borders bookstore has story time.

The same friend who has offered to stop by the house has also offered for me to come to her house in the morning on Thursdays so her daughter and Ella can play and I can have some adult conversation with someone else holding Miles.

Aaron is very supportive of me taking a few hours once a week to get out of the house with just Miles as a break from reality, so to speak. I think Panera’s will be our haunt of choice. Last Saturday was my last day of work and I didn’t realize how much I looked forward to getting out of the house and having no child responsibilities until it was no long an option! One of the key items missing from my last postpartum period was taking time to be just me and meet my own emotional needs. I’m hoping that by having a predeclared day and time to do my own thing will help meet my own personal needs.

And of course, this time I have so many more supportive friends that don’t just live in my computer. They are available for face to face gatherings and have experienced similar struggles. Having online resources and connections is important for me and is one of the few things that pulled me through last time. However, real life interaction is even more important and I am so thankful I have that available this time.

Having written that all out helps me feel like life will be manageable this time. I won’t drown. I won’t loose a chunk of my children’s life again. I will enjoy the early days of my son’s life and cherish watching my daughter become the big sister I know she will be.

The Elephant In The Room

There’s a topic in our society that we simply don’t talk about because it’s uncomfortable. A few gathered here or there may discuss it but as a general rule, things are swept under the rug. Out of sight, out of mind. It’s not a happy issue to discuss but most women you know have probably struggled with it to some extent. Some have done small skirmishes; others have had to wage war. Others are still fighting.

This practice is a huge disservice to those around us who are struggling with the very issues no one wants to talk about. It’s not just random strangers on the street, either. It could be our mother, sister, or friend who is emotionally crying out for help but doesn’t know how to ask for it or that help is even available. Some are too ashamed of what is going on and others are afraid of being labeled and thought less of for what they are going through.

What I’m bringing out from under the rug, discussing in the daylight, is postpartum depression.

I’m not a medical professional, a counselor, or a therapist. I’m simply a mom who has been through some very dark times and want to share my story in the hopes that it will help others.

A lot of people assume that postpartum depression happens only to those who have a form of birth trauma, a newborn spending time in the NICU, or breastfeeding struggles. I can assure you that while those situations certainly have the potential of setting the stage for postpartum depression, my birth experience was simply amazing. It was empowering and the single most amazing experience of my life. I had no intervention, no trauma, and a very healthy daughter who took to breastfeeding like a fish does to water.

About three weeks after Ella’s birth, I began to experience severe anxiety. My primary fear was that she had stopped breathing in her sleep, so I started staying awake most of the night to make sure she was okay. This progressed to not being able to set her down on the floor while I used the bathroom.

Things got worse. Not only was I severely sleep deprived, but I began to have horrible mental images of Aaron (my husband) getting into a car accident and leaving me a widow with a newborn. My mind would obsess over the details of how I would manage life after he was gone. I couldn’t bring myself to leave the house because what if I got in a car accident? It was the dead of winter in the Midwest and even taking myself outside was not an option. I began to keep the blinds closed all day throughout the house because I would break down in tears when I’d see a mom drive past with her kids in the car because I so desperately wanted to get out but was too afraid to go.

Reading this in black and white seems pretty obvious what was going on. You have to remember that this crept up so slowly and snuck into my life that I didn’t even realize what was going on. I even thought it was okay and normal and I didn’t want to worry my husband or friends with something that was “obviously not an issue”.

What made me realize that things were out of control and beyond any sense of normal was one night, about 4 months after Ella’s birth, I got out of bed at 2:48 am. For about an hour, I sat on the living room couch, sobbing and thinking how much better off my husband and child would be if I wasn’t in their lives. I was horrible at being a mom, horrible at being a wife, horrible at even just being Dallas Ann. I began to imagine getting into my car and driving off the bridge into the river. I got so far as to put my shoes on to leave when I stopped myself. Still sobbing, I peeled my shoes off and went back to bed.

The next morning, I called my midwife and she saw me that afternoon. Until my appointment, I searched online, trying to find something to explain what was going on. This website is, by far, the one that helped me the most. After I finally admitted to myself that there was a problem, I took the quiz, printed it out, and took it in with me to my midwife appointment. I was at a total and complete loss as to how to even begin talking about this, so I simply handed her the printed quiz and let that do the talking for me.

One of the few pictures I remember taking.

To this day, I don’t remember the first 5 months of my daughter’s life. There are a few, brief moments glimmering in my mind that I cling to. For the most part, I look back through her baby pictures and can’t remember a single moment that I captured. It breaks my heart.

The thing I credit to maintaining my emotional bond with Ella is breastfeeding. We simply could not afford formula and I had such an abundance of milk that I could feed a small nation. Breastfeeding forced me to make eye contact with her, converse with her, and interact. If we had the finances to use formula, I can promise you that I would have put her in the swing, propped the bottle, and ignored the entire world.

I didn’t enjoy breastfeeding one bit until my postpartum depression began to lift at around 5 or 6 months when my antidepressants began to rebalance the chemicals in my brain. Even after that, breastfeeding was never something I found totally enjoyable but at least it was tolerable and a neutral experience for me.

Yes, I am scared of experiencing postpartum depression again after Miles is born. At times, I’m terrified at the prospect. Then I have to remind myself that I now have local “mommy friends” who I’ve shared this experience with and they’ve offered to be support me. Aaron now knows what to watch for, what questions to ask, and what to do. My beloved midwife told me at my appointment this week that she will simply not allow it to happen again. I have relationships, safety networks, and plans in place for after the birth of my son. Even if I do hit rough patches, I know – No, I believe that it will never be as bad as it was after Ella was born.

Through this experience, I have discovered a number of in person resources that may be available in your community. There is an abundance of online support groups that are just a Google search away, but I found I needed face to face support.

Le Leche League – Even though the group is dedicated to breastfeeding, all the LLL leaders I have ever spoken to are dedicated to the whole mother. They see more than just a milk machine, I promise. 🙂

Contact the hospital you gave birth at. If you had a homebirth, call a hospital that seems to be the most baby or mother friendly. Ask to speak with their lactation consultant.  One of our local hospitals provides weekly support groups for moms who are struggling with postpartum depression, a free counselor who specializes in grief and postpartum depression, and a monthly “get out of the house” get together at the local mall where all the moms walk around with their babies as a group. I’m sure that if my random Midwest town has these resources, yours will have something.

Check out Attachment Parenting International . HERE is where you will find a listing of all their groups. This will provide you with play groups, parenting support, and a reason to get out of the house. It is because of my local API group that I began to find other women who were willing to share their experiences with me and I discovered I was not alone, a freak of nature, or a horrible mother because of suffering from postpartum depression.

If you live in the United States, there should be a WIC program (Women, Infants, and Children) in your area. They will have information about low cost or sliding scale fee services that can provide you and your family counseling and support to help you get through this season of your life.

If none of these resources are available to you, my favorite place online to get support is at the Mothering.com message boards. Scroll down and you’ll find their postpartum depression forum that is full of women who have been where you are now or are in the same place. It is full of compassion and open arms.

As a final thought, if you are struggling with postpartum depression or know someone who is, please remember that it is NOT your fault. It is not God punishing you. It is an actual medical condition that can be changed. If you and your health care provider decide that being on antidepressants are necessary, please don’t feel like a failure. I struggled with a lot of emotional baggage regarding depression medication.

What finally helped me feel comfortable using the medication is that this is simply a season in my life. I’m not going to be dependent on this drug for the rest of my life. If I’m trying to bake a cake, I can’t do it with just sugar. I need a whole list of ingredients and if you leave one out, it’s not going to turn out well. My anti depression medication is one of those ingredients. I need other elements to help me through this period in addition to the medication, but I need it all to have a whole and healthy Dallas Ann in the end.