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The post Post Natal Struggles in a Covid World first appeared on Mothers Helpers.

To listen to the FULL episode, click here

Thanks to Aethel for the theme song to our podcast “Fog and Fire” – to listen to the full song, you can find Aethel on Spotify

The post The Pressures and Expectations of Motherhood first appeared on Mothers Helpers.

Guest Blogger:  Amy Taylor

After a complex first pregnancy I was anxious that number two would be the same. Much joy but some trepidation when the doctor called to say I was pregnant. I lost that baby. I held my fetus in my hand and weeped. On my very next cycle I was expecting again but this time the anxiety gripped me every day. Each time I went to the loo, I’d check my undies . I found myself sitting on the loo far more often than I needed to just as an excuse to check. My first midwife visit I was a nervous wreck. My midwife was kind, understanding and supportive. She assured me that past complications were not necessarily an indication of future complications, but I would be well looked after anyway. I was well looked after but every extra scan and every appointment brought with it fresh anxiety. I was very run down and struggling with constant, painful Braxton Hicks contractions which really fed into my fears of losing the baby. I guess I suffered antenatal anxiety throughout my pregnancy but it wasn’t diagnosed. I think the medical team knew I was anxious but also knew I had some good reasons to worry. Anyway baby was born normally at 38 weeks and I went home the very next day.

Day three the baby blues hit in a big way. I threw a pie dish in my poor mother in laws direction for daring to ask me if there were tomatoes in the stew. As the days wore on I started to realise that things were not getting any better. I worried heaps, didn’t sleep even when baby did. I’d lie awake next to her listening to every noisy breath. When my husband went to work I’d lie and watch tv in my sweat pants. I’d never worn sweat pants before this baby. I knew things weren’t right and I decided I could fix it by returning to my much loved job..

So I put my three month old in care and went back to work. I bought a scooter and rode to daycare to breast feed. I pumped and pumped. For a couple of weeks things felt better but then the deadlines started piling up. There weren’t enough hours in the day. I was exhausted. Oh and the guilt, the guilt was insane. I was an awful mother and a worse employee. Pressure from work kept building, I needed to be working far more hours, there weren’t enough hours in the day. Baby had bad reflux and was refusing the breast. I felt so inadequate, I couldn’t even feed my baby. Then there were the dark thoughts. They would pop into my head unannounced, so hard to shake. What I really struggled to do was ask for help. I should have asked so many times. Like the time I cried for three days straight after my three year old was naughty at ballet or numerous doctor and plunket visits where I pretended everything was ok. It was driving home after one of these appointments when I almost drove the car off the road that I realised this wasn’t something I could solve myself. Thankfully the baby had fallen asleep. I got home, phoned plunket line, who were amazing and then called the neighbour so I wasn’t alone. That evening when my husband got home I finally asked for help. The next day he took me to the doctor and I was admitted to hospital. It’s four months later and I can honestly say I’m heaps better. Mothers Helpers were instrumental in getting me the funded home help, which along with the drugs and quitting my job are the things that have aided most in my recovery. I now have a little time for me and I’m getting out of my sweat pants and back into the world!

The post Climbing Out of the Darkness (and the sweatpants!) first appeared on Mothers Helpers.

Guest Blogger:  Rebecca Allen

Just this last weekend my husband compassionately said to me “I wish you got to enjoy Harvey the way I did when he was little”. My reply was a heartfelt “so do I”.

For me, being new to motherhood was a time full of anxiety, fear, paranoia, isolation and depression.

Pre-children, I was a woman of the world! I had travelled extensively, really lived my life, and had moved back to New Zealand when I met my now husband. Within two years I had my own Hairdressing Salon, we got married and bought our first home. I was a party girl, always keen to drink wine and have fun, that was me, it was a blast! Dying to become a mother since ‘forever’, I was EXSTATIC when I fell pregnant.

By the time I was 15 weeks pregnant I was struggling to keep my head in the game. I had come undone when I immediately stopped drinking alcohol and smoking when I found out I was pregnant. I had taken my coping mechanisms away, and I had nothing to replace them with. Oh, well, I ate, I ate a lot. I gained 35kgs in that pregnancy, which in itself created feelings of uselessness. How pathetic of me to let myself gain so much! I berated myself continuously day in and day out, it was damaging to my heart.

I had a full-blown breakdown and was taken under the wings of Maternal Mental Health and was diagnosed with Bipolar Disorder. I knew I was depressed, but Bipolar?! My history with addictions and impulsive behaviour spoke a very clear story, the problem was that I was pregnant and couldn’t be treated with medication for it. I was given an antidepressant that took the edge off, and I joined a group of other women experiencing similar issues. We did different types of therapy together and individually, it was a real turning point in my life; sober and keen to help myself as much as I could.

I was the type of woman who wanted a home birth and to breastfeed for 2yrs (yep, I was her). Well, my baby’s head never engaged fully, even after my waters broke, so my midwife told me I was going to have to go to hospital. The devastation was real. I was unfortunate to end up with a three-day labour ending with an emergency c-section. I haemorrhaged badly and had a blood transfusion. My body was madly trying to get me better rather than make milk for my baby, which of course was another blow. I pumped and pumped and pumped. DESPERATE to breastfeed like I always had imagined I would. My feelings of ‘not good enough’ grew by the day.

We stayed in hospital for a week where we were given the news that our baby possibly had something wrong with the bones in his head. I don’t remember thinking much of this at the time because they let us go home.

We hired a super-duper breast pump, and I continued to pump, 8 times per day. I was running on nothing. Not feeling good enough, not enjoying this BEAUTIFUL baby I had grown inside me. I became phobic of public spaces because of germs, and phobic of people for the fear that they could see how useless I was at being a mother. And of course, they did see it, because they kept shoving advice at me, like I had no idea of what I was doing (I believed this).

By the 8 weeks mark I had built my breastmilk up enough to solely feed my baby, no more formula top ups, a MASSIVE feat in my eyes. Unfortunately, my mood started to take a dive, and within another month and a half I was so depressed I thought they would take my baby off me.

One day he lay in the middle of our bed smiling at me and I just didn’t have the energy to smile back at him. I decided he deserved so much better than this and I called my keyworker at Maternal Mental Health. She was there within an hour and so was my husband. The support was wrapped snug around me. I was given a full review of my meds and told I really needed to be treated for Bipolar to get better, which meant stopping breastfeeding because the medication passes through the breastmilk. It cut me in two. I grieved. That may sound dramatic, but I had always seen myself breastfeeding my children.

We had a Psychiatric nurse come into our home for a month to look after both me and my baby. This was instead of putting me in a psych hospital. I am SO grateful to this day for this service because it made a HUGE difference to our little family. I slept for a good 10 days then started finding my feet again as a new Mum with her guidance.

It wasn’t long after this we discovered our precious baby boy had indeed been born with a condition called Craniosynostosis. All of the bones in his head had fused together around birth, and they’re not meant to fuse until the child is approx. 2yrs old, this explained his difficult birth. We were told he was going to need major Cranial Facial Surgery. It was a tough time to say the least and I chose to deal with it by taking up drinking and smoking again. I sat with an undercurrent of disgust in myself and did what I could.

Time moved on, as it does, and when our son was two I fell pregnant with our daughter. As much as I was happy to be pregnant again, I was relieved that my drinking days were over. Again, I stopped it all, and that was where I left it! This was 8 years ago. I have received so much support from different mental health teams in Auckland, Hamilton and Thames. I am not gripped with addiction, I have many healthy coping skills that help keep me a happy well lady. For me to stay well I keep my physical health on top, I exercise 5 days per week, I eat well, I nurture my relationships with family and friends, I practice mindfulness, I use Emotional Freedom Technique to release emotions, I journal, and I take medication. I get a bit wobbly if one or more of these things in my wellness recipe have been neglected.

I am now the proud Mumma of Harvey who is 10 and Lily who is 8. I have the worlds most supportive and understanding husband and wonderful girlfriends who are there always. When I see a new Mum struggling my heart hurts and wants to emit loving energy all around her. It is such a damn hard job and if she is suffering in any way shape or form of mental distress she needs support. One of the BEST things I ever did for myself was make that call, putting my hand up and saying I need help. I accepted every single bit of help that was offered and that’s what I put my wellness down to today.

If you’re a Mumma reading this and if you need help, please ask for it, please.

With Love

Rebecca Allen

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The post When I Look Back first appeared on Mothers Helpers.

Guest Blogger:  Annonymous

For me, it began two hours after I saw two distinctive lines on a pregnancy test and left slowly but surely in the months after my little boy entered the world.  Antenatal depression is experiencing depression and anxiety during pregnancy. It doesn’t have as much publicity surrounding it as postnatal depression but a 2015 study by Growing Up New Zealand discovered that one in eight New Zealand women suffer from depression symptoms while pregnant.

Antenatal depression can potentially have significant effects on the health of both the mother and her unborn child. Mothers who suffer from depression during pregnancy can struggle with taking care of their own health and wellbeing, which in turn can slow the foetus’ growth, increase the risk of a premature birth and delay the child’s motor and emotional development.

For me it began while my husband and I were living in Virginia, USA. The pregnancy was planned. Perhaps too well planned, we’d be discussing, stressing and worrying over the looming question of children since I’d turned 30. Now 34 and one and half years into our  “later in life O.E” we had seven months till we returned home to New Zealand and we thought now was the time.

The reality of it hit me like a ton of bricks. I literally doubled over while out jogging when I realised my whole life was about to change yet again.

The Symptoms

If I could summarise my state of mind during that time it would be: “The Fear of the Unknown.” It manifested into months of constant worrying: How much weight would I gain? Would I get my body back? Will I ever play sport again? How will I continue to have a career? What will people think of me if I do? How will I cope being a stay at home mum? Will we still have a social life? How will we ever travel or buy a house without me working? Will I still be depressed when the baby arrives? Will I ever be happy again? And even bizzarely…..how will our dog cope, will he have to be given away?

A certain amount of fear and anxiety is healthy when facing a big life change but mine was so overwhelming I couldn’t sleep, eat or focus on anything.

As well as the “Fear of the Unknown,” pregnancy was taking away all I enjoyed in life.
It began by robbing me of social contact because the constant morning sickness (until 22 weeks) meant I couldn’t eat, and no drinking meant no fun either.  Dinner with friends became too difficult to be around food without throwing up, at it’s worst I couldn’t even go into the supermarket. I’m a hugely social person so this left me feeling so isolated and alone.

It robbed me of wearing my favourite clothes and feeling good about my body, something I’ve always struggled with, but as my boobs and belly got bigger, my self-confidence got smaller and smaller. It robbed me of my beloved daily gym routine and playing my favourite sport (golf), I couldn’t do many workouts due to the nausea and constantly being surrounded by healthy fit people in lycra while I got bigger messed with my head too much. I cried the day I stopped going.  I never loved my pregnant belly, I hated it with a passion and my body image issues were worse than ever.

Sometimes I would lash out-  at work colleagues, my husband and my parents when they came to visit us in Virginia. Probably the worst feeling of all was feeling so disconnected from my baby, I didn’t feel any love, just fear that this thing inside me was already making my life miserable and it would soon get worse. I never bought a single toy or piece of baby clothes during the entire pregnancy.

Finishing up at work was devastating. Being a primary school teacher was a huge part of my identity and without it I felt lost and useless. By this time we had completed the logistical nightmare of bringing ourselves, golf clubs, tent, cat and dog back to New Zealand from Virginia (a process that I’m sure didn’t help my state of mind though my husband took care of most of it) and I was working at a wonderful school till the summer holidays. Without a job I was bored and irritable, and not in the mood to hear for the 100^th time: “Get some sleep, you’ll need it before the baby comes!”
You know you can’t bank up sleep to use later right?!

Getting Help

Because I have experienced depression twice before in my life, I was able to be proactive about my situation. In Virginia I was prescribed antidepressants by my doctor and began seeing a counsellor. Upon returning home I had a great midwife who referred me to Auckland Maternal Mental Health who were proactive in getting me further counselling, a support group and anti-anxiety medication to help me sleep.

I also made the decision to cut off things that weren’t good for my mental health, I stopped reading “mummy bloggers” as all the doom and gloom about sleepless nights and mummy tummies was too much for me and distanced myself from certain people who were too keen to press their own opinions on what I should and shouldn’t do when the baby arrived.

Are you pregnant and recognise these or other symptoms of depression or anxiety?  

Request Help from Mothers Helpers

The post A Different Kind of Depression first appeared on Mothers Helpers.

It took me 18 months to go and get some help for the way that I was feeling.  9 of those months I was anxious throughout my pregnancy but the midwife didn’t pick up on it.  In the first week after my baby was born, I had a new midwife, and she said to me that if I was still crying by day 7 (hours of crying every day), then I’d have to go and see the doctor as I may have postnatal depression.  So I forced myself to stop crying.  I didn’t want to have postnatal depression.  And I didn’t want to have postnatal depression for the next 9 months that I avoided seeking help.  I did go and see a counsellor, but it had little impact on me.  I knew that if I went to the doctor, he would diagnose me and offer me medication that I didn’t want to take.  This inability to be rational and problem-solve clearly as well as denial of the full extent of the problem is very common for mothers who experience antenatal or postnatal depression.  It’s even harder if this is your first baby and you have nothing to compare your experience to.  I left it till things were really, really bad before I got help.  By that time my energy was so low that I could barely manage to get myself off the couch, I had to summon all of it just to attend to my baby’s needs, the entire 12 hours or more of caring for my baby on my own while my husband was at work overwhelmed me.

When I finally went to the GP, I of course was offered medication, which I accepted.  And I felt better within a few weeks.  I didn’t know at the time that medication was not a miracle cure – that within 12 months, the medication would stop working simply because I had not made any changes to my life.  I didn’t know that recovery from depression required an holistic approach.  I didn’t know because nobody told me and there was nothing out there that helped me to understand recovery from depression more fully or to help me make those changes.

The consequences of depression that was not diagnosed and not treated for such a long time was devastating for me.  I developed chronic (life-long) depression.  Most of the time I am well, but it means that I have to take medication and commit to holistically caring for myself in order that I stay well.  Antenatal and Postnatal Depression was definitely a contributing cause of my marriage breaking down and subsequent separation.  Tragically, it is likely to be a contributing factor of my 6 year old son’s development of an anxiety disorder – the impact of which we are still wrestling with on a daily basis.  I can almost bear my own suffering in this whole story, but watching my son suffer is really unbearable.  Every family has their challenges, but the challenges I have faced are preventable, and I want to prevent this suffering from happening to you and your family.

I don’t write this to frighten you.  The last thing I want to do is cause you more anxiety.  I write this because I want so much for you to get help for your depression and anxiety.  It is crucial not only to your own wellbeing, but to the wellbeing of your family.  Please go to the GP.  Please consider treatment.  Please find out more about how you can recover holistically from antenatal/postnatal depression and anxiety.  Mothers Helpers runs courses throughout Auckland and an online course that is available to anyone in the country.  These courses have proven to help the majority of mothers to recover from PND, and all of them their condition has improved.

The post From One Mum to Another first appeared on Mothers Helpers.

My son was 6 weeks old when I was diagnosed with PND and put on medication and counselling. I remember locking myself in the bathroom to get away from my screaming child. We were at the family centre daily and as the hours ticked by until they had to close I remember the anxiety getting greater and greater at the thought of having to take my baby home and be alone with him. I loved him to bits but it was hardwork and I wasn’t well. I saw everything as reflecting failure upon me.

It has taken alot of counselling sessions and almost 2 years of antidepressants but I am feeling so much better! The dark tunnel has a close clear light! I am back at uni slowly getting through my degree and my son is a pleasure to take care of. The concept of failure is still something I struggle with but I can now put it in perspective. I have dealt with a sick baby, university and family stresses, I have had trouble with my partner, overcome self-harm and I am now so happy to have made it through.

The post A Young Mums Story first appeared on Mothers Helpers.

This is Ruth Sell’s story…

Before having kids I really believed I could handle anything. I was a successful Advertising executive, I had travelled the world on my own and had come through many personal challenges, I had never suffered serious depression. Not much was said about PND prior to the birth, and what I did hear about I paid little attention to. If anyone had asked more about my history of anxiety or how well I deal with sleep deprivation it might have hit home a little more, but still I wouldn’t have expected it.

My pregnancy was wonderful and the birth was easy by my midwife’s standards (though it was hands down the most painful and gruelling experience of my life). My son fed well and was healthy. I had a supportive husband and no financial worries. Our only vulnerability was that we were on the other side of the world from all our family and being new to Auckland we had very few friends.

The PND started pretty much from the birth of my son but I didn’t really realise it was unusual until he was 3 months old. I developed terrible insomnia and anxiety, which led me to get depressed. I went to a useless GP who didn’t even look me in the eye as she prescribed me medication that didn’t work.

In desperation I flew back to the UK and stayed with my Mum for 6 weeks. When I got back to Auckland things were at breaking point, I never thought I would come so close to ending my life, it was a terrible terrible time. Thankfully I discovered an amazing GP who told me “you know it’s not normal to feel this way. You’re missing out on your son and you deserve to enjoy life and being a mum.’ She gave me the right medication and I started going to a support group and a therapist. I also found the most amazing acupuncturist.

I learnt that PND really is an illness. It’s not all in your head, much as it feels like it. Your body becomes so depleted from the physical trauma of birth, and the physical and mental challenge of being a mum that it can’t perform the functions that help you sleep and feel happy and have energy etc. Add to this the reality of all the challenges and emotions that come with being a Mum, plus the crazy hormonal changes and it is a ‘perfect storm’. The more it goes on the worse you feel and it becomes a vicious cycle. Medication lifted me out of the hole I was in so I could start living my life again.

After 6 months I came off the meds and was mostly fine until a few months after baby 2 was born and the insomnia and anxiety kicked back in. So I’ve been back on the meds for 10 months and am doing really well. Next hurdle – coming off the meds! I now live in Wellington.

The post PND Can Happen to Anyone first appeared on Mothers Helpers.

I have always wanted to be a Mum. Right from when I was a teenager I can remember longing to have a baby. When I got married at 22, all that was on my mind was babies babies babies. It took a while to fall pregnant with my son, nearly a year. Trying to conceive him was stressful and I became absolutely obsessed with the process and convinced myself I wouldn’t be able to have children. Perhaps this is where my depression started. When I fell pregnant with him finally, I was absolutely estatic. Being pregnant was the most wonderful time of my life. There was so much hope and happiness and excitement, planning for this little life, what he would be like, what he would look like, every little detail. I have never been so happy or so secure within myself. I look back on my pregnancy with such fondness, even though it wasn’t all smooth sailing. I had my appendix out at 9 weeks pregnant, risking losing the baby, and from 36 weeks I got high blood pressure and borderline pre-eclampsia, which was a horrible experience to go through. But my beautiful little boy arrived 2 weeks early, the night before a planned induction.

My birth experience all in all was wonderful and I cried tears of joy when this amazing little being was placed into my arms. But the first few days in hospital were not as I expected. This beautiful little boy was rather grumpy because he had been pulled out with forceps and was bruised from head to toe. He screamed and screamed all of the time he was awake, and I had no idea what to do with him. Because he was so upset, he refused to feed. I had midwives and lactation consultants poking and prodding at me, and as a rather shy person who was not used to baring it all for the world to see, I found that experience humiliating. But we finally managed to get breastfeeding going, and were allowed to go home. The first week was a dream. I couldn’t believe how beautiful my baby boy was, took a million pictures, gazed at him sleeping, it was everything you imagine it would be.

But after the first week, something shifted. My previously content little boy suddenly started screaming all the time he was awake. He began refusing to feed, physically pushing away and arching, and spewing up most of what he was fed. He was unhappy most of the time being on his back, most of the time in general- if he was awake, he was unhappy. I took him to the doctor and they said it was likely reflux, and gave me some medicine to give him which I had to syringe into him at every feed. There was something quite unsettling about medicating my 2 week old, but I did it anyhow. The medicine didn’t really help and I continued to have a screaming baby. He would stay awake pretty much all day. I would have to rock him for 40 minutes to get him to go to sleep only to put him down and have him wake screaming 15 minutes later. I couldn’t do anything- eat, sleep, live. I remember a few nights of tending to this screaming baby for hours on end, willing him to stop, tears streaming down my own face, to the point where I was lying on the ground sobbing at my wits end, not knowing what to do. It’s amazing what listening to a screaming crying baby for hours on end can do to a person, moreso when it’s your own and it provokes that emotional reaction. I began to lose myself in all of this. It felt like a living hell. Every day I would wake up dreading what might happen. Sometimes I would rather hide under the sheets than get up and face the day. Each night I would cry to my husband exhausted over just how hard it was. It really did feel like some kind of torture. And the worst part was I loved him SO much, I couldn’t understand why caring for him was such a nightmare. I felt like if only I was a stronger person, a better mother, it wouldn’t get to me so much.

Things came to a head when he began to point blank refuse to breastfeed, and I had to put him on a bottle. I remember passing him to my husband and collapsing in tears because I just couldn’t do the one thing I was meant to do- he didn’t even want to. At first I tried to express all his feeds so he could stay on breastmilk, but after a while I just couldn’t keep up with the 3 hourly ritual alongside a baby that didn’t sleep and eventually my supply got low, and I switched to formula. I was the first of my coffee group to do this and I faced judgement and worse still pity, which served to make me feel worse. All the while I was thinking, it wasn’t meant to be like this! I was meant to have a lovely happy baby who was breastfed and all was meant to be well in the world.

Things came to a head for me when I was standing in the kitchen one night making a bottle for the screaming baby downstairs, and I looked over at the knife block and I thought, I can understand why people cut themselves. It always seemed like such a foreign and absurd idea to me, but in that moment, I could understand the idea of wanting to feel another different kind of pain, so you didn’t have to feel the one you were feeling at that moment. With the encouragement of my family, I went to see my lovely GP who encouraged me to try some antidepressants. I was willing, as I just wanted to feel better somehow. For the first 2 weeks I felt like a bit of an alien, my head was buzzy, I didn’t feel myself somehow. Slowly but surely after that though, things got a little bit easier. I like to think of it like instead of being a rollercoaster of up and down, I was more like a straight line, not ecstatically happy not terribly sad, and it allowed me to cope.

The experience of a difficult baby and my depression also took a huge toll on my previously very stable and secure marriage. The stress led to fights and in hindsight perhaps my husband experienced some degree of depression himself. Neither of us expected parenthood to be as it was up until that point and we took the stress out on each other. Gradually things got a little easier. I took my son to a paediatrician to try and figure out his severe reflux and we discovered he was dairy intolerant and he was put onto a hypoallergenic formula. After this, he was a changed baby. He stopped vomiting after every feed, stopped screaming so much and I was able to see the happy baby again that I always knew was there.

After this we started to heal. There were still some very rough times along the way in the first year and a half. Times where parenthood really just was the worst thing I had ever done. And also times where it was absolutely the best thing. We fought many times, I cried many times, spent many nights up with a screaming baby. At times I feared I was losing my mind, that I would never get through it. These days things are a lot better for me. I am still on antidepressants, having tried to come off them twice unsuccessfully and I find myself better on them for the moment. I have returned to work which I found to be a massive turning point in overcoming my depression. I was able to gain some self esteem again as I lost it all going through PND, I was able to see myself as worthy again, as a person again. My son has thrived at daycare, having more money has taken some pressure off, and our relationship is going from strength to strength having faced all this and made it through.

I still feel sad looking back that my first experience of motherhood had to be that way, and it will take me a while to come to terms with the fact that most people don’t experience this, but, more people do than you realise and that’s ok. For now we are not having any more children as I am not ready, and things are good as they are, but one day I may feel strong enough to do it all over again.

Mothers Helpers offers support to prevent postnatal depression in those who are at-risk, and minimize the damage it can cause a mother and her family.  To support our work, buy a green ribbon, make a donation – give a little!!!

The post Lisa’s Story first appeared on Mothers Helpers.

The post Another Mother’s Story first appeared on Mothers Helpers.