Has anyone here had postnatal depression?
I gave birth 8 days ago to my second, a daughter. With my first i never had any depression, i felt great before, during and after his birth.
My daughter had to spend the first 5 days in hospital. She has a little problem with her bum and will need surgery. Anyway when i got home with her eveything was fine, my fiance still had 2 days off work (he could only take a week) and we were coping fine. Our son is only 15 months old. However on monday when he went back to work and i was left with the 2 kids, everything changed. It wasnt that bad on monday i guess, because my son went to sleep before my fiance left for work and didnt wake up until about 9.30 when i just put him in bed with me and we went back to sleep.
However yesterday my son was awake and so was my daughter, i was breastfeeding her and i knew my son was getting tired. He came over for a cuddle to put him to sleep (he falls asleep on me) but i couldnt give him a cuddle because i was busy with my daughter. He just looked at me with a really sad look on his face, looked down at my daughter and started crying and going ‘mum mum mum’. It just broke my heart. I havnt spent much time at all with my son since the brith of my daughter, we had to spend the 5 days in hospital and i saw him maybe for an hour each day and since i have been home i have had hardly any time with him because im always busy with her. I feel like i want some time just me and my son, how things used to be. However i know that is unreasonable because my daughter needs me and cant be away from me for more than maybe 30 minutes in case she needs to feed or something.
I have told my fiance how im feeling and he just said to me “how do you think i feel then, having to go to work for 12 hours everyday” and i was crying when he left for work today and he just kept saying “stop it lish, i cant leave when your like this, i dont know what your cying for”. Then i txt him later once he calmed down saying that i think i might have postnatal depression and he txt back “maybe ya not depressed babe. just all mixed up emotions now we have 2 kids. been a hellish 2 weeks. you will come right. we can go to doctor in a few weeks if not better”.
I know i should go to the doctors and mention it to my midwife but i feel so embarrassed about it. I feel like i need to just suck it up and pull myself together and just get on with things and it will/should go away. I have been depressed before, when i had a miscarriage. I didnt know it at the time and i never got any help with it, i ate ALL the time, i would eat a whole tub of ice cream, a family block of chocolate and a pack of biscuits all in one day and id be having fast food (kfc, mc donalds, burger king etc) 4 or 5 times a week. Needless to say i put on a lot of weight, i think it was about 30kg (65lbs). I am having those urges to eat crappy food again (chocolate and sweets) but i have not given into them yet.
Do you think i have postnatal depression? and anyone who has had depression, what were your symptoms? Did you get medical help or not? Did the doctor prescribe something to help or just tell you ways to manage? Can you take the medication while breastfeeding? and any other tips or info you think would be helpful
Tagged with: Anyone • Depression • here • Postnatal
Filed under: Postnatal Depression
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You sound like you’ve been through a lot. I would talk to your doctor. That’s what they are there for. They may put you on meds or send you to talk to someone professionally. I know it had to be hard for you to even mention it to your fiancé and that took courage. He may not realize how hard it was for you to do that.
I had the baby blues pretty bad after I had my daughter and the first couple of days my hubby went back to work were hard. He was very understanding though and supportive. I cried a lot for no reason at all. The baby blues are from your pregnancy hormones dropping very quickly after you give birth. I felt fine the first several days and then all of a sudden BAM!! I mean, I’d see someone on TV fall and bump their knee and I’d start crying, made absolutely no sense! But sometimes you need help. Your doctor will know if you need help or just need time.
Best of luck sweetie!
omg im going through the exact same thing lol be strong n YES talk to Your doc i have an apt tomorrow it will be hard but i rather get help now than later
don’t be embarrassed things like this happen. i don’t know you personally but what would make me proud of you is to see someone and talk it out, they could give you ideas of ways to make your life and time with your two children much more manageable and ways to pick your mood back up to be happy again.
well the difference between a doctor is they can prescribe medication and a therapist teaches you ways to handle and cope with stress and depression without medication but if you need it they usually work with doctors to help you. btw you just sound depressed form the weight gain and seeing your sons sad face. try and find help before you fall too deep into depression there is such thing as hitting rock bottom you’ve been depressed before I’m pretty sure you know what rock bottom looks like i have PTSD and I’m Bipolar.