The columnists at the Wall Street Journal's working parents column, The Juggle, took on the topic of whether to take antidepressants during pregnancy with a column called "Medication During Pregnancy: A Vexing Dilemma".
The column covers the normal back and forth that all of us go through when trying to make the decision on medication during pregnancy. What I found most interesting, though,were the comments. You can see some of thestigma that exists andhow uninformed some people are. The following comments stuck out to me the most:
"PPD is temporary depression. Anyone who is clinically depressed is different. You may be clinically depressed and don’t know it, get PPD which triggers your depression tendencies and it becomes long term due to the trigger. I think we need to be very very careful how we use the terminology due to confusion with the actual illnesss and the opposite of temporarily being down and out."
"Go back to work and put the kid in daycare and PPD will go away. It's a phase, its not clinical depression."
Aha! Postpartum depression isn't real depression. It'smake-believe depression!
Real geniuses, those two.
WOW. People just don't know, do they? Those comments are amazing, and are truly evidence that there are so many still so uninformed about this VERY REAL ISSUE that isn't a "phase", or a "slump" or the "blues".
Man. So much work to be done, informing the world. Thanks for leading the charge, Katherine!
Those types of people always test my belief that "I wouldn't wish 'PPD' on my worst enemy".
Amen, Diane! Unfortunately, as with many things in life, depression (and PPD) is something that is only fully understood by those who have actually experienced it firsthand. Loved ones of those individuals may (or may not) develop an understanding based on seeing their loved ones suffer. These ignorant comments are so annoying! My wish is at some point in our lifetime we will see depression and PPD destigmatized and these ignorant comments will no longer be tolerated!