A columnist from the Daily Mail newspaper in the United Kingdom wrote a nice piece about her antenatal depression, also known as depression during pregnancy.
Since depression during pregnancy is not something I get the chance to write about as much (not that I don’t want to), I wanted to link to it and share some of it here. This is part of how Lucy Taylor described her experience:
“I desperately wanted to feel overjoyed and excited. Probably because I have read too many magazines over the years and looked at too many pictures of pregnant celebrities, I had dreamily imagined that pregnancy would be a nine-month-long bliss-fest.
I had assumed that the moment I conceived I would be strolling around Mothercare, gazing lovingly at all the cute newborn stuff. Instead, what I felt was that my life was coming to an end. I felt as if the woman I’d known for nearly 40 years – the free, independent, risk-taking, fun-loving, adventurous woman – was dying.
Of course, I then felt full of guilt and self-loathing for having such thoughts. I even began to worry that my negative thoughts would cause another miscarriage or some birth defect.
I remember once reading about a pregnant woman who said she felt as if she’d been hijacked; that there was a tiny terrorist wreaking havoc inside her. This rang true for me. But because the pressure to sound upbeat while pregnant is immense, I found it difficult to share these complex feelings.
Although my partner was comforting and supportive, part of me wondered if he thought it was just the raging hormones that were making me so emotional. I didn’t want to keep complaining to him, but I was still secretly struggling.
There were days when I couldn’t stop crying and all I wanted to do was stay in bed.”
For those of you who’ve been through depression during pregnancy, does her description ring true or was it different for you? Please share.
Photo credit: © Bianca de Blok – Fotolia
I had depression during my second pregnancy, and it was awful. i could barely get out of bed most days, and the days when i had any energy, i cleaned obsessively. i felt terrible for my older son, he had to play by himself in the hallway most days so he could see me laying in bed while he played. it was a very dark time for me, and i don't wish it on any woman. i didn't talk to anyone about it, because she's right–a depressed pregnant woman is such an oxymoron that i thought people wouldn't be able to handle it, and i didn't want to make people uncomfortable. my husband noticed that i was more emotional than usual, but i'm not sure if even he realized how very bad it was.
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For me it was a complete numbness to just about everything. I wasn’t crying or unhappy, I just didn’t care about much. I didn’t realize what was happening because I just didn’t care. I felt sick to my stomach through the entire pregnancy, so my cooking, food tv, and exercise hobbies were out the window. I read tons of books about birth and all the crazy things that can happen, (but not about babies), and lost touch with other activities that were a part of who I was. I watched a lot of TV as my husband continued his active lifestyle. As I’m sure you can guess, postpartum depression didn’t waste any time taking hold of me. When I came home from the hospital with the baby, I looked around the house and said, wow, we’ve been living in this filthy house! I think that was partly the antenatal fog wearing off, and partly the postpartum depression giving me negative self talk. I’m lucky because I was able to bond with and nurse my daughter even through the roughest time in my life. I realize now that a lot of our daily habits make up a sense of self even when they don’t seem very significant. It is the practice of being Me, to paraphrase Flylady. I let all of those daily habits go and it really gave depression a stronghold on me because I had no foundation of normalcy to stick to when the baby came. My baby is nearly 3 and I’m recovering, although I think that my family has decided we don’t ever want to go there again so we won’t be having any more children. That makes me horribly sad, even though it’s the right decision for us.