Mind your mental health

Back in 2016 I accepted an offer from a friend to write about my experience with birth and mental health in the first 6 weeks postpartum. For anyone who has given birth and suffered with your mental health, you know the struggle of the first 6 weeks can go on a lot longer than that.

This article appeared in the Irish Times, and before it was published I hadn't really told anyone what I had experienced, including my own parents. I was embarrassed, unable to talk about it for fear I would be told to just suck it up and get on with it. I knew I wasn't right but it took 9 months to admit it and actually do something about it.

I let myself suffer for months. I remember especially crying the whole way home in my car from a friend's hen party after finding being around my friends so overwhelming. I'd spent half the time pumping in my bedroom on my own and the rest listening to stories about their lives which I just couldn't relate to anymore. The whole experience made me feel like an alien. It was at this point I knew I wasn't right but I suffered on for another 3 months still.

My own personal mental health experience has taught me to check in on myself regularly, to recognise when I am not doing OK and take steps to address it as quickly as possible. It also made me see how keeping it bottled up and hidden only fueled it. Talking is part of the healing. I can now spot warning signs in others who might be heading in the same direction. It gives you a deeper sense of empathy for how it feels to be struggling with mental health and how important it is to make time for self-care.

This year of Covid has been testing and I would be lying if I said it hasn't had an impact on my mental health. I have taken steps at each point to keep me balanced and somewhat sane. [The extra glass of wine on a Tuesday evening or bar of chocolate didn't help]. At times I have allowed it to creep in and succumbed to my inner demons. It hasn't been an easy year by a long shot. If nothing else this last year has shown us how important our health is, and how we all need to consider each other's health too, be it from virus or disease or from mental health issues. We are all part of the one community and it is up to all of us to look after ourselves and each other.

Here is the article on The Irish Times website where you can read mine plus the other articles in the short series or continue reading my particular article below, edited slightly to fill in a few information gaps.

"I think we obsess over birth, but actually our focus should be on the weeks that come after. I felt totally ready for my first baby. I was in the Midwife Led Unit in Drogheda, had attended all the antenatal classes and with all my anatomy and physiology training I had a strong understanding of the nervous system, so I knew all I needed to do was let my body do its job. I had the hypnobirthing books and CDs, I had gone to my pregnancy yoga and had my breathing down.

Unfortunately I didn’t get my planned birth [after my waters started to break before going into labour] so I ended up in the normal labour ward with an induction. I signed up for all the drugs at that point and when it came to the push point, I gave it everything I had, and after 40 minutes, we met our beautiful baby Pádraig. He was perfect. I felt such an overwhelming feeling of achievement, it felt almost spiritual. Within a few minutes though it became clear that something was wrong, our room was suddenly filled with people and I was rushed off to surgery. I had a massive post-partum haemorrhage and lost three litres of blood. I spent that night in the HDU being monitored and treated before finally getting to meet my boy 12 hours later. The recovery meant I could barely walk the first couple of days and the first three weeks were a bit of a blur.

On day five I got the baby blues and was convinced he would starve as we couldn’t get him to keep his milk down. Otherwise thankfully Pádraig made life pretty straightforward for us. We carried on as normal, just with a baby in our lives now. We tried not to overthink anything, happy to just be there to enjoy his life. Pádraig was sleeping longer as each week went by and we were counting down to the end of the first six weeks thinking, “Is this it?”. We had been told, like everyone else, that once the first six weeks are over it gets easier from there so we thought, well that’s great as they were grand.

He wasn’t the imposition we had been told he would be. I would consult the books constantly in those first weeks, and felt like the mother in Rugrats, “Mr Lipschitz said...” this, that or the other. I am blessed for my husband Niall who was hands on from day one. He is a hero! As I wasn’t able to [edited: choose not to] breastfeed, Niall was able to feed him, change him, soothe him, do everything while I recovered.

With my second baby Aoibh, we decided a C-section was my best option due to some internal damage I received during Pádraig’s birth. I put all my efforts into planning to breastfeed this time and forgot about the birth part of it all.

What I found most hard about having two in the first six weeks was simply having two. Everything just got harder, you were trying to settle one and the other would kick off. I just couldn’t manage; I was getting stressed all the time. I couldn’t organise myself to go for a walk with them, I was living on coffee and cake. The house was a mess, I was beating myself up over everything I was doing and felt I was doing it all wrong. I wished for more help from people, and took every opportunity to make use of any that was offered.

Unfortunately I suffered a massive emotional collapse. I started to notice I wasn’t right early on, but at six months it hit an all-time low. At nine months I finally did something about it. I was suffering from post-natal depression and post-traumatic stress from Pádraig’s birth. After finally sorting this with counselling, medication, reflexology and reiki I was on the road to recovery and felt a million times better at 14 months post-partum.

With regard to those first six weeks, I’d advise new Mums to join a breastfeeding group if you choose to breastfeed. To remember that each phase passes. Call your friends who have babies, especially the ones with babies just slightly older than yours. They will reassure you; never underestimate the power of a Mammy friend."