I've had several Postpartum Progress readers contact me in the last few months about the topic of breastfeeding-related feelings ofdepression. These moms feel just fine all the time EXCEPT right when they're about to breastfeed or are breastfeeding. This is a condition I must admit I hadn't heard of, but after a preponderance of emails about it, I thought I should look into it more. It doesn't surprise me that women who have this experience would worry that it is related to postpartum depression.

Kathleen Kendall-Tackett was kind enough to point me in the right direction by telling me about Dysphoric Milk Ejection Reflex, also called D-MER. According to D-MER.org, Dysphoric Milk Ejection Reflex is a newly recognized condition affecting lactating women which causes a surge of negative emotions to occur just before milk release. These emotions usually don't last more than a few minutes. They explain that D-MER is not postpartum depression, nor is it a postpartum mood disorder.

Moms with D-MERoften experience a hollow feeling or emotional churning in the stomach, and a feeling of dread, guilt, anxiety or anger prior to letdown. They state that a key experience of D-MER is that the mom feels fine except right before her milk starts to flow, with the feeling lasting only as much as 2 minutes, though some moms with closely spaced letdowns may have these feelings throughout the nursing period.

For more stories on D-MER, click the link. Also, here are some resources for those of who you experience this:

Photo credit: © Vladislav Gansovski – Fotolia