Welcome to the Mother's Day Rally for Mom's Mental Health. Happy Mother's Day!

This online rally features 24 open letters to new mothers on the importance of maternal health. They have been written by some of the best parenting authors and mommy bloggers that I know. For the next 24 hours, each hour on the hour, Postpartum Progress will post a different letter.

These lettersare a reflection of what so many of us have gone through, at least in some form or another, and what so many more women willface in the future around the experience of childbirth. You may not connect with each and every one of them, you may not even agree with some of them, but that is why there are so many written by such a diverse group of people. Some have experienced postpartum depression, others just the baby blues and others just a general sense of how motherhood can impact your mind. Some work outside of the home, some are stay-at-home moms, some are medical professionals. Some breastfed, some didn't. Some stories are funny, and some are almost tragic if it weren't for the fact that everything turned out okay in the end. All of them, though, point out the importance of emotional health in being able to start a healthy and (for the most part) happy family. That's the purpose of today's rally.

We don't talk enough about mental health when it comes to having a baby.

We worry about our own physical health — don't gain too much weight, take your prenatal vitamins, exercise, avoid tuna fish with mercury and soft cheeses that may carry listeriosis, make sure that episiotomy is healing right. You know the list …you've read the pregnancy books. We worry about our baby's physical health — will he or she have ten fingers and ten toes, will everything work right, how can I help the baby sleep better, is the baby gaining enough weight, is this cough something I should worry about? Mental health, though,gets left behind, along with personal time and the ability to sleep in, until your child is a teenager anyway.

Why? We should spend an equal amount of time in childbirth class talking about the emotional toll that being a mom can and sometimes does have on you.Not everyone suffers a perinatal mood or anxiety disorder like postpartum depression. Not everyone even gets the baby blues. But enough women do that we have to pay attention. It should be perfectly clear to us and everyone around us that we CANNOT and MUST NOT ignore our own state of well-being when it comes to being able to parent.

When I had my first child, I experienced the shock and devastation of postpartum obsessive-compulsive disorder. Nobody had ever mentioned anything like intrusive thoughts to me. I had a vague idea that you could experience depression after having a baby, but what I was going through didn't feel like that. I had no idea where to turn or who to talk to. It was one of the scariest and loneliest experiences of my life. I only WISH I had had some of the letters that will follow in the next 24 hours. What an impact it could have had on lessening the pain and fear to know others had gone through similar things.Heck, even those of us that don't get sick still have bad days and tough times when caring for a new life, and we could all use some understanding and support.

Let me say that I am just completely overwhelmed by this project. I have had the privilege over the last few days of reading and typing inall of these letters to new moms about mental health that have been written by the participants of the Mother's Day Rally for Moms' Mental Health. I'm blown away. I'm so proud and honored to be in this sisterhood. Thank you God for giving me this idea.

These women (and man!) are true Warrior Moms, and their generosity of spirit is inspiring. I'm telling all of you now that today's writings will be a repository that I hope moms will visit for years to come. Get your printer ready to print them out. Blog them (tag: mother's day rally for moms' mental health). Get your Twitter fingers ready to tweet them away (Twitter hashtag #momsmentalhealth). Share them with your sisters, your friends, your co-workers, your support group members, your patients. Save them for your daughters.

Be that woman that you wish you had standing by you when you were pregnant or just had a baby who cared only for you and your mental health.

You can help save a life, or at the very least make the transition into a new one a whole lot healthier.

I'll see you again in 24 hours to wrap up this wonderful day …