This is from a mom out there who shared her postpartum depression story with me, and I thought you'd want to read it. I highlighted my favorite sentence, since it is so descriptive about how many of us feel while we're experiencing postpartum mood disorders. Many of you will recognize yourselves in her:

I found this website the other day. I too have had a hard time talking to anybody about this. I have 3 very young childen (ages range from 3 months to 3.5 yrs). I was diagnosed early thanks to the pediatrician who insisted I go see my dr for PPD. I reluctantly went and now am ever so grateful because while I am not 100% yet I feel soooo much better than I did 3 months ago today. I was put on Paxil and at first I did not get any better. It turns out that the dosage was too little for me so I had to double it. I can tell you that getting help for this disease has been the hardest thing I have ever done. I had to admit to myself and others that I no longer had control of my feelings and actions on a regular basis. At first I was ashamed. I did not want to admit that at any point I could sink to such lows that I did not feel I would ever get back up again. I used to lay on the living room floor wishing that I would get sucked into it so I could disappear. I wanted to climb into bed and lay there until I disappeared. I would stay in bed for hours during the day. It would take me 4-5 days to change my clothes and take a shower. Sometimes when it was time to make dinner I would lay on the kitchen floor for over an hour until I would be able to stand up and cook. I have had thoughts of suicide. I have put a knife to my wrist with a full hand of pills. My subconscious was reaching out to my husband but the right words for him to understand still have not come out of my mouth. He still does not understand exactly what goes on inside of me. He has tried many times but just can't. I think that the only people who truly understand are the ones that visit this website to post their own experiences with this disease. I used to get so tense that I would try to reach into my arms to pull the bones in my forearms out. I would get in the car and drive to get away. I could not focus. When I went back to work I would lay my head down on my desk for sometimes an hour at a time. I just could not get my act together. I have been seeing a therapist who has helped me tremendously. Since my kids are so young and so close to each other in age I have a tremendous fear of being alone with all 3 of them. I can't face the responsibility for taking care of all 3 of them. I am so afraid that I will be busy with the baby and something will happen to the other 2…they will fall and get hurt, they will do what kids their age do and just get into kid-type trouble. I have been slowly getting better. It helps tremendously that my baby is a very calm baby. She does not easily cry. She will cry and fuss with a dirty diaper and/or when she is extremely hungry. In the beginning of my depression I felt so guilty…I thought that God had given me such a good baby because he knew I was going to have a hard time and that I would not be able to handle a generally fussy baby on top of my 2 and 3 year olds. That guilt still stays with me. I have been lucky that I have not had too many thoughts/feelings of hurting the kids. When it comes to those feelings my mind focuses on myself. I just want the depression to go away. Last week I convinced myself that I wanted the feelings to go away so bad that I almost didn't care about whether my family missed me or not. Today as I was getting my daughter ready for her first dance recital I looked around the house as I was trying to get all 3 kids dressed and thoguht out aloud…"this family could not survive without me". My husband instantly agreed knowing that the responsibility of work and taking care of all 3 kids and their numerous trips to dr's for checkups and dance class and soon preschool would be too much for him to keep up with. I admitted to him that I had put together a calendar loaded with all activities (regular and sporadic) as well as the birthdays of all our extended families' birthdays so that he would be able to carry on in case I did commit suicide. He didn't say it in so many words but I could tell that he was shocked, confused, and touched all at the same time. He doesn't understand me…my mother tells me to "hurry up and get over your baby blues"…and in the meantime I feel like a sinking ship. I was quietly laying on the living room floor tonight…resting, not because I was having a meltdown moment. My husband asked if everything was alright. I responded with…"yeah, just tired". He said he was asking because he did not think I was having a meltdown but wasn't sure if something was wrong. For the first time in forever it felt like he might be slowly picking up on my feelings. He went on to state…"usually if you are having a meltdown you have a blank stare..like you are an empty shell". My response was…"that's funny…that is exactly how I feel when I have a meltdown". Meltdown is what I call it when I am having a hard time dealing with my depression. I feel like I am on the way up the ladder back to who I once was. I think that I may even end up better for having this disease. It has changed how I view things. I think I manage the kids and their behavior better now. I'm not sure if it is the antidepressants or if it is just me maturing as a woman. My 10-11pm obsessive cleaning sure has left my house in the best shape it has ever been in. I have started exercising. I have lost all the baby fat but still would like to lose another 60 pounds.

I know this was a long comment. I know that every woman's experience is different. I just hope that some of the words I have left tonight may help somebody else in the future. Good luck to all of you who suffer from a form of PPD or whose partners suffer. The best advice I was given during the past 3 months has been…"if everything else is too hard to face…focus on making it through the day. Whatever it takes to physically get through the day. Don't worry about anything else than ending the day with the same headcount you started it with".