According to a Reuters article on May 25, "Postpartum maternal depressive symptoms may be associated with insecure attachment style and infantile colic, according to results of a study published in the May issue of the Archives of Diseases in Childhood."

In a study conducted in Turkey, mothers whose infants had infantile colic had a significantly higher mean Edinburgh Postpartum Depression Scale score than mothers of infants without colic. (In English, I assume that means they suffered from some level of postpartum mood disorder.)

"A larger number of mothers had insecure attachment style when their infants had infantile colic compared to the mothers whose infants did not have infantile colic … That finding was statistically significant."

I looked up "insecure attachment style" and found out it refers to "parents of insecure children [who] tend to be less responsive to their children’s signs of distress. These parents are unavailable either physically, psychologically, or emotionally and tend to be insensitive or unpredictable in their response to attachment needs." I don’t know if I met that definition, but I’m sure I wasn’t completely available to my son psychologically, and I know that he had terrible problems with colic.

"The authors note that screening, early diagnosis, and treatment of postpartum depression may improve both the mother’s and the infant’s health. They call for further studies to determine the effect of treatment of maternal depression on the occurrence of infantile colic."

Yet another reason to get treated right way at the first signs of postpartum mood disorder. What a vicious cycle that PPD may lead to colic, which I can tell you from my own experience can, in turn, worsen PPD.