Tag Archives: postpartum depression

Silhouette Photo Of Women Under Blue Sky
May is Mental Health Month

Women Supporting Women

And now we enter that portion of programming pertaining to women. It’s important to have supportive people of all stripes, but I have found an immense affinity and solidarity and empowerment in female bonds. In the lived experience and in the realm of all things matrescence.

I’ll be using several subsequent posts to share and showcase some amazing women, standing by and showing up for others, starting with a throwback to when one loved me enough to tell me what I didn’t want to hear.

Wisdom in a Cup of Tea

And then to remind myself of the beautiful little stink that never was a question:

For This Child I Prayed

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May is Mental Health Month

May 2013

May 2013 was the first time I undertook a month-long theme of multiple posts to mark mental health awareness. Below are some of my posts from that series. A trip in the way back machine that explains a lot about my current state of mental health, motherhood, and life – and how I got here.

The Perfect Storm
Don’t Fear the (Ir)rational
The Brand of Crazy I Am
You Got Some ‘Splainin to Do
The black dog of depression
All the Rage
A Sit-com of Errors
The Blue Chicken or the Anxiety Egg?
Patate Pazze
Destymie-ing Dysthymia
An Imperfect Porpoise
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may is maternal mental health month, News

May is Maternal Mental Health Month

My first contribution to Rhode Island Moms is live. Check it out!

In a month dedicated to moms, it’s also important to focus on maternal mental health – the most important gift we can give to ourselves.
— Read on rhodeislandmoms.com/health-and-wellness/may-is-maternal-mental-health-month/

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mother vs self, Uncategorized, Write to Heal

How Did We Get Here?

In 2012, I began this blog as an exploration of my experience with postpartum depression. I wasn’t doing it to publicly rehash all the difficult details; I was hoping that in sharing my story, women who had been to the deepest depths that I had wouldn’t feel so hopelessly alone. And I did find others. They found me. I’ve forged some amazing friendships through the wonders of the web.

In the first part of 2015, I embarked on a new leg of the journey. My research began in earnest, collecting evidence of pre- and postnatal care and experiences, outcomes and interventions – all through the lens of maternal mental health. I completed Postpartum Support International’s Perinatal Social Support Webinar Series. In July, I attended Postpartum Progress’ Warrior Mom Conference in Boston, the first ever large-scale gathering of survivors of perinatal mood and anxiety disorders.

I was poised to bring my advocacy to a new level.

I sent my ‘baby’ off to kindergarten – and a month later, got pregnant.

Truly, she was the pleasantest surprise.

My past experiences armed me with a proactivity I hadn’t had in previous pregnancies. And I see now that my knowledge and experience have deepened in the intervening time to enrich my advocacy even more.

Still, even with my depression ‘managed’, motherhood was challenging. And not in a growth mindset sort of way; in a soul-sucking, all-encompassing sort of way. I realized that mothers needed support whether they were suffering from a mental illness or not. Untenable conditions with no support could mean a tip into mental illness. And even if it didn’t, what of a mother’s mental wellness?

With writing being such a cathartic and expanding experience for myself, I sought ways to share it with others. How could I use journalling prompts, easily accessible and customizable to anyone – even if they weren’t in love with writing like I was, to aid women in their journey to authentic and fulfilling mother- and personhood?

In a synthesis of my writing, experience as an educator, and lived-in motherhood, the idea of a workshop was born. A chance for women to share their experiences in a community of empathetic peers and to explore their own personal questions, fears, joys, and challenges through writing. A release and a way forward.

I knew I wanted to offer the inaugural in-person workshops in the month of May, to coincide with Mothers’ Day – not to commemorate that holiday, but to give mothers an alternative celebration of themselves in a world that often lets them down. This finally happened in May 2023. I gave three workshops in three different locations in my surrounding area. But that only served those within driving distance. Readers and supporters reached out to me from other states, even Canada, suggesting a virtual option.

Nothing can replace in-person dialogue and the energy of community and I am no Zoom-inista – but the subscription series was born. I tried to translate the thought and writing prompts into weekly sessions across a monthly theme.

I endeavor to make this a virtual community, even if the gathering place may initially be in the comments section of each weekly module. With the dream of gathering us all in a center of our own someday. A center dedicated not only to the worthy and fulfilling vocation of motherhood – but to the sacredness of our individual personhoods as well.

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Maternal Health Month, may is maternal mental health month

Maternal Mental Health Week 2018

Starting yesterday, April 30, and running through Friday, May 4, the maternal mental health community celebrates and spreads awareness of the illnesses affecting women and mothers.

Did you know?

Created by Jennifer Butler Basile with info from thebluedotproject.org

1 in 5. That means we all know someone whose mental health has or is suffering – and yet we may not know it.

#AskHer

Ask a mom you know – each and every mom you know – how she is doing: the pregnant mom, the grieving mom, the new mom, the fourth trimester and beyond mom.

Your question may be the first in a line of interventions needed to get her back to herself. Other points on the line may be her child’s pediatrician, her primary care physician or ob/gyn, a therapist, and/or organizations like Postpartum Support International and The Blue Dot Project.

You can help her start her journey. You can help her see she’s not alone.

The push is on this week. The hashtags are on fire these five days. But the struggle is real everyday.

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Mental Health Month 2017

For All Mothers

Three years ago, Kelly Kittel began her journey of book tours and signings, publicity and PR for her newly published memoir, Breathe: A Memoir of Motherhood, Grief, and Family Conflict.  I’d journeyed with her, on parallel paths, in a shared writing group for months before.  Kelly has journeyed today to Washington, D.C. to advocate for appropriate allocation of funding for maternal health programs.

In December 2016, the Bringing Postpartum Depression Out of the Dark Act of 2015 was signed into law.  Today and tomorrow scores of women visit the Capitol to discuss how to enact programs highlighted by the legislation.  It’s wonderful to see my news feeds filled with faces I’ve met in my maternal health circles, gathering together at the core of our country, for the health of mothers.

Kelly and I have had different journeys in motherhood.  She will be speaking to bereavement and infant loss.  She is speaking from her own personal experience.  My personal experience is with postpartum depression.  I was honored and touched that she asked me to give her my take on the care I’d received postpartum and what it may have lacked; to bring a firsthand account of what mothers in Rhode Island might need to recover and thrive despite postpartum depression.

To be a mother is to know the utmost joy and deepest despair.  While our manner of grief might differ, we all embody the emotion.  I thank Kelly Kittel for taking hers, and mine, on her latest journey.

More info on this initiative:

http://mmhcoalition.com/advocacy-days/

http://mmhcoalition.com/impact/

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Living, Mental Health, parenting, Recovery, Survival

Not in Vain

Before my third child, I never dropped the JC.

I was no pure linguist, but I did not take the name of the Lord in vain.

In the months and years following her birth, it became a regular part of my vocabulary, satisfyingly venting my rage and frustration at things gone wrong. Stupid things. Teeth not being brushed. Butts not being wiped. Nothing that should unleash rage, but they were the proverbial straws.

I knew its use signaled a loss of center, of control.

Perhaps it was a desperate plea. But it came out sounding like a kid forced to say please and thank you. Totally inappropriate in tone and timbre.

Finally, one Lent, I decided to make a focused effort to stop saying it improperly. Keeping track of my missteps, I counted eight uses during those forty days. A significant reduction. I never did decide what would be an appropriate penance for each of those eight uses, but my non-JC oath habit stuck.

So here I am 32 weeks into pregnancy #4 and I’m being pelted with more stupid little straws.

My six year old has decided this is a fabulous time to assert her independence. Not in a dig-your-heels-in toddler sort of way, but in a snotty teenage you-can’t-make-me sort of way. Holding a stuffie I’d told her to put away at least three times, I stood over her as she sat on the bathroom floor fully dressed and not making any attempts to prepare for bed. I had to fight the urge to bean her over the head with it. After numerous non-oath reminders, I unleashed a torrent of reprimands peppered with choice words (though no JC – does that earn me some credit?).

Having to remove myself from the situation, I stalked in our bedroom, where my husband stood.

“This kid isn’t even born yet and I’m already swearing!”

He laughed. I think he appreciates seeing me get as frustrated as he does sometimes.

But his laughter also signaled to me that perhaps my reaction, while a bit overblown, was natural. I may be hyper-vigilant to signs of rage due to my postpartum experience last time, but that doesn’t mean that every freak-out is a bad sign. It could just be a bad day. Or a bad moment.

Just as uttering Jesus Christ in a proper context is not a bad thing, expressing anger or frustration in an appropriate way is not either. I need to watch the tone of my words and actions to see whether I’m struggling. It may not be a spiral, but a slight dip in the mood of the day.

I know many postpartum women – or anyone who’s suffered a mental health crisis – who see a bad day, a down period, a low point as a relapse. But even if it is, having been where we have and coming back from that place, we are equipped to do so faster, better, and with the proper supports.

We also are entitled to the same bad days our “normal” counterparts have all the time. Not every infraction is a sign of our condition, a harbinger of more to come.

Of course, all of this is easier said than done. Ironically, the organ we must rely on most strongly to convince us of our strength and resiliency is also the one most affected by our illness.

In that case, perhaps a call to the Lord would not be in vain.

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Maternal Health Month, Maternal Health Month 2014, may is maternal mental health month

A Common Language

 

I’ve been thinking a lot about how to ensure that available mental health resources get into the hands of the women who need them. When and where resources are available, there seems to be a gap between the offering and the accessing. As always, I think back to when I first slid on the shoes of the women now making the postpartum trek.

Women of all socioeconomic, racial, and educational backgrounds share one extremely daunting obstacle when in need of such help: they must articulate their exact problem in order to get the help they need.

In a complex web of medical jargon, insurance restrictions and loopholes, and a frustratingly-absent physical presentation of symptoms (for the most part), it falls upon the sufferer to demand treatment for the condition that, no doubt, impairs the very confidence, decision-making skill set, and strength it takes to do so.

It’s an ironic catch-22. The doctor has the tools to ‘fix’ you, but you must lead her to the workshop. The doctor is the artist, but cannot pick up the paintbrush unless you led her to the canvas. The horse must determine the source of water before the doctor can lead it there.

There is no solution unless the patient gives the doctor information to determine the problem.

When I hinted that I felt like running away a few months postpartum, my midwife recommended I talk to a LISCW. This therapist helped me chip away at the enigma that dragged me down, but it was I who eventually had to request medication from my physician. When that dull cloud still hovered, I made the final call to increase dosage. More recently when I intimated to her that I still felt low sometimes, I apparently wasn’t descriptive enough because I was told the meds shouldn’t make me feel flat; there should be ups and downs.

How well my mental health situation is addressed directly correlates to how accurate I am in describing it. How empowering and crippling at the same time. If I do not share every pertinent detail in clearly descriptive language, I will not feel better. I will not get the meds, therapy, tests, information, etc. that I need to make anything resembling a full recovery.

Regardless of my level of medical literacy, the debilitating effects of depression and anxiety can keep me from adequately representing my plight. Regardless of the quality of care available to me, its benefits will not be afforded to me if I do not say just how much I need it. Nothing will be given to me unless I ask.

How do we on the receiving end of such conversations draw the stories out of the women who need help? How do we teach/speak the language to give them a voice? How do we release the language bubbling beneath their skin? In that wordless abyss is the bridge between therapeutic, wholistic maternal care and the women who need it.

word bubbles

 

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Maternal Health Month, Maternal Health Month 2014, may is maternal mental health month

What Postpartum Depression Recovery DOES NOT Look Like

Read this article, peeps.  Truth.  Simple, yet sage advice.  Your rational side may know it all already, but that stubborn irrational side of you needs to hear it again.  Believe me, I’ve been there and felt all these – and so has Katherine Stone, the author.

 

What Postpartum Depression Recovery DOES NOT Look Like.

Get well card with fresh chamomile flowers on blue background

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Maternal Health Month, Maternal Health Month 2014, may is maternal mental health month

It Just Makes Me Sad

News broke late last week that a California mother had taken the lives of her three children.  Conduct a man-on-the-street interview and you’d likely hear outrage, vile epithets directed at the monster who would kill her own offspring.  My own husband brought it up to me in a pained tone of voice.  He was disgusted.  It IS disgusting when such a thing happens.

But I’m not angry at her.

Horrible events like this make me sad.

Sad that three lives on the cusp were snuffed out.  Sad that poor defenseless, innocent babes were terminated.  Sad that the father had to watch his bloodied babies be carried from his home; that his partner in life, in giving life, was the one responsible.

Sad that no one connected to this woman perceived any threat of dangerous behavior. Sad that perhaps she felt she couldn’t express such feelings before it was too late for fear of judgment, backlash.  Sad that she didn’t know how to get help.  Or perhaps didn’t have such resources available.

Sad that things like this continue to happen needlessly.

We live in a society with a different-hued ribbon for everything – and things like this still happen.

And woman like this are still labelled as crazy.  I found ONE account that handled this story sensitively.  (Read here)

In the anger and outrage that follow such an event, it’s easy to point fingers.  Why was she left alone with the children?  Why didn’t anyone ensure she got treatment? Thankfully, I never experienced postpartum psychosis (nor has it been substantiated that this woman did); even still, I hid my negative feelings for fear of judgement as a bad mother.  I never asked for help because my struggles were so far out of the realm of a competent mother.  Would I have been more likely, then, to admit to homicidal thoughts toward my children?  Not something someone who loves and cares for their children – which all postpartum mothers do on some level – would readily admit.  Therefore, there may not have been warning signs of this impending tragedy.  Many postpartum mothers are uncannily adept at masking the turmoil inside.

So here’s the lowdown:

  • For all its awareness, we still live in a society where women are compelled to hide their unhealthy mental symptoms.
  • For all the coverage of tragedies such as these, a lot of people still cannot recognize or suss out the warning signs and symptoms of the mentally ill to prevent future scenarios.
  • For all the resources available, the paths to these therapeutic and rehabilitative programs are still unclear and/or blocked.
  • For a species that values nurturing, we are quick to throw a troubled and needy person under the bus.

There is work to be done, people.  It is sad that we cannot look each other in the eye and see the need in that person.  It is sad that we look away for fear that the beast inside us will be awakened by the raw reminder in front of us.  It is sad that, instead, we cannot look and see a solution, a way to lift up the depressed and rise together.

kids

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