Blues

Recently I had a first hand encounter with depression and postnatal blues. Originally I wanted to blog about it from my (an outsider’s) point of view but I felt I needed to get permission from the person suffering from it first.

So I approached my sister after she was feeling better and asked if it will be alright with her for me to blog about her experience to the world. Being a sport that she is, she actually suggested that perhaps she should guest write instead.

So here it is:

I am one who is seldom at a loss of words. This is one of the rare occasions. I was asked by my brother to share something very personal with all of you and that is my experience with postnatal depression (PND). It wasn’t hard for me to agree to it because I hope by sharing, my experience will help some of you who are either having PND or someone whom you know has it.

It all started for me when I was extremely adamant about breastfeeding. In this day, breastfeeding is often deemed as the right, best and the only thing to do for your kid. And hence, to me, breastfeeding equates to what a good mother’s duty is.

Being so adamant about breastfeeding, I was latching on once every 3 hours and I soon had insomnia. This was because after each feed, there was always the issue of the next feed at the back of my mind – will I wake up in time, is my milk supply enough, how do I build up my supply, will eating such and such food affect the taste of my milk and hence rejection from my baby. My insomnia soon turned chronic. It was so bad that I slept a total of less than 7 hours in 3 days. By then, I was a lost cause – I had a glazed over look in my eyes, my body was shutting down, my milk supply plummeted due to the lack of rest and I barely had the strength to carry my daughter. When I visited my gynae, he suggested giving me a sedative to take so that I can sleep through one to two nights and basically reboot my system. Well, perhaps it was Murphy’s law but what happened was after taking that sedative, I actually sleepwalked. My husband told me that I woke up in the morning and walked him to the door, kissed him goodbye and spoke with him yet I recalled none of it. The scariest part was when I realized upon being “awake” that my hair was nicely plaited (my hair is always left undone when I sleep) and the T-shirt I wore to sleep was different from the one I had on in the morning. It was then that I freaked out because I had no recollection at all of what I did, where I went and whom I spoke to. I admitted myself to the hospital right away.

I stayed for a total of 4 days in the hospital for respite care and it was quite possibly one of the lowest points in my life because I actually lost total confidence in being able to fall asleep naturally. Insomnia is a horrible horrible condition – the rest of the world is sleeping and you are awake pacing around at home, dead tired to the bones but still unable to shut down mentally and rest, while watching the clock the entire time and wondering what on earth is wrong with you.

After I was discharged, I also had very bad hot flushes (which further hindered my sleep) and hyperacidity where I needed to eat once every 2 – 3 hours and I was gorging myself silly with food. I had 2 bowls of rice at every mealtime and a “snack” would be 4 slices of bread, a banana, an apple and a milo and I still did not feel full.

In depression terms, it was comfort eating but for my case, it was also because the stress level I had cause the hyperacidity and hence, I had to eat. For someone who only gained 7kg during my pregnancy and has never weighed past 50kg, it was a sudden shock to see the scale go up.

To top it off, my baby is very alert and active since birth and does not sleep much unlike most newborns. Hence, fatigue and stress and insecurity set in. I became obsessed with my ‘failure’ as a mother and my weight gain. Being depressed also caused lethargy which made it even worse for me because I have always been a very active person and was exercising right through my pregnancy. It was hard for me to wake up and feel spaced out and groggy and barely having enough energy to accompany my dad walk my brother’s dog in the morning.

On a good day, I was able to converse normally, laugh and joke but on a bad day, I would feel like such a complete failure and was simply detached from the world with no interest in getting out of bed, talking to anyone and having any interest in anything. I just wanted to be left alone and ‘rot’ in one corner. The scariest moment was that at my down-est time, I actually had a thought pop into my mind and that was “how I wish I could chuck my baby down the chute”. My “rationale” was that if that happens, then I would have no one to worry about, to care for and no one to depend on me. That was when I realized that I had depression.

Next to my husband, my brother is my other best friend and we have always been very honest and close. It was him who called me up one evening and spoke to me very openly about his observations on my mood swings and condition. I broke down and cried and admitted that I needed help. My sis-in-law and him, God bless their souls, had already started asking around about depression since weeks ago when they first noticed that I was a bit off. I was able to get an appointment with a psychiatrist the following day and started treatment immediately.

I am now seeing the psychiatrist on a fortnightly basis and am on a mild anti-depressant dosage. The fact that I am not in denial about my condition, she says, make me very treatable. Additionally, I also sought help early as I truly want to get better soonest possible.

Based on my visit with the psychiatrist, PND usually happens to perfectionists and yours truly, am definitely one. It is because perfectionists having type A personality have a fixed set of ideas and mindset about how things should be and we are usually the ones who keep anticipating what can go wrong to prevent things from going ‘wrong’. But of course, as we all know, babies do not have a “fixed” set of rules and habits and hence, it is this same trait that caused my chronic insomnia.

I now force myself to head out of the house everyday with my domestic helper and do simple things like heading out for lunch, grocery shopping to start injecting some normalcy back into my life. When I am out, most often than not, strangers would come up to me and touch / play with my baby and comment on how lovely she is. These comments help me drastically as they make me realize how lucky I am to have such a healthy and beautiful baby when there are many who are not able to conceive.

I am also extremely blessed because I have very strong family support – my mother-in-law has been staying with me for the past 3 odd weeks to help me with the night feeds despite having a full time day job; my sister-in-law though pregnant has been there to comfort and console me and drove me to my psychiatrist visit; my husband who despite his very punishing work hours, stayed with me in the hospital even when he ended work only at 11+ and had to leave for work again at 7+am the following day and my parents who constantly called and brewed tonics for me.
I would like to end off by saying that having PND does not make us a lesser parent or person and it is not a disease nor is it something to be ashamed of. It is simply a condition that we have that is treatable so if you are suffering from PND or know someone who seems to have the same symptoms that I had, please seek professional help and you WILL get better.