Not What I Expected
postpartum depression is real, it isn't your fault, and it gets better

My story  |  Blues or depression?  |  Signs  |  What helped  |  Where to find help  |  For husbands, mothers and friends  |  Other mothers' stories

My name is Jessica Forrester. I'm 23, I live in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, and I used to be a teller at a bank downtown. Now I'm home with my son Scott, who was born in January and is eight and a half months old. My husband David is a lineman for the phone company. He climbs poles in the snow and he is not scared of anything, except for a while this spring, he was scared for me.

I had a healthy baby in January and I couldn't stop crying for three months. I didn't tell anybody. I thought I was the only one. I'm writing this page because I wasn't.

My story

I have tried to write this part about six times. I'm going to just write it.

I wanted Scott so much. David and I painted the nursery yellow and stenciled ducks around the top, and I read every pregnancy book in the Sioux Falls library, some of them twice. I thought I was ready. Scott was born on Saturday, January 9, 1999, after a long labor, and he was perfect, and when they put him on my chest I cried because I was happy. That was the last time for a while that I cried because I was happy.

The books all said I might get the "baby blues" for a few days, so when I cried on the third day, and the fourth, I figured that was it. But it didn't stop. By the time Scott was three weeks old I was crying every day, sometimes all day. I couldn't sleep even when he slept. I'd lie there with my heart pounding, listening for him to breathe. I stopped eating breakfast and then lunch. I didn't shower some days. I didn't want to see anybody, and when people came over I put on a smile and said "we're great, he's great, I'm just tired."

The worst part, the part I was most ashamed of, was that I didn't feel what I was supposed to feel. I took care of him. I fed him and changed him and rocked him. But it felt like I was watching somebody else do it, through a window. Everybody kept saying "isn't this the best time of your life?" and I'd say yes, and then go in the bathroom and run the water so nobody would hear me. I thought I was a terrible mother. I thought maybe I shouldn't have had a baby at all. I had some dark thoughts that I'm not going to write here, except to say that if you're having them too, please look at the box at the top of this page.

On Thursday, March 18, my mother-in-law Rosalie came by with a pan of hotdish. Scott was down for his nap, and I'd gone out to the car to get the diaper bag and just... sat there. In the driveway. With my hands on the steering wheel, crying so hard I couldn't breathe. I don't know how long I'd been there. Rosalie opened the passenger door and got in and didn't say anything at first. Then she said, "Honey, I had this after David was born. Nobody called it anything back then. They just said I was nervous." And she held my hand. And I told her everything.

She called my doctor herself that afternoon, and she drove me there the next morning, and she sat in the waiting room holding Scott.

My family doctor listened to me for a long time. She asked me a lot of questions. Then she said the words I needed to hear: "This is postpartum depression. It's an illness. It isn't your fault, and it's very treatable." I cried in her office too, but it was different crying.

Here's what we did. I started seeing a counselor every week. My doctor started me on an antidepressant, one she picked carefully because I was nursing Scott and she wanted one that was right for both of us. (Please don't take that as advice to take or not take anything. That's a conversation for you and your doctor. Mine explained everything and answered every question, and I had a lot of them.) And the counselor sent me to a new mothers' group that meets Tuesday mornings at the hospital where Scott was born.

It didn't happen overnight. The medicine took a few weeks to start helping, and the first two weeks I wasn't sure anything would. But one morning in April I was giving Scott his bath and he kicked and splashed water all over me and laughed his first real belly laugh, and I laughed too, and I realized I wasn't watching through the window anymore. I was in there with him.

By May I felt like myself. Not the old me exactly. A new one, who's been through something. Today Scott is crawling backwards (he hasn't figured out forwards yet), he has two teeth on the bottom, and he thinks the dog is the funniest thing ever invented. I'm still seeing my counselor, every other week now, and I'm still going to group, mostly so I can tell the new moms that it gets better. Because it does. It really, really does.

The baby blues, or postpartum depression?

I didn't know the difference, and I think that's part of why I waited so long. Here's what I've learned from my doctor and my group. I'm not a doctor, so please ask yours.

If you're past two weeks and it's not lifting, or if it's getting worse, or if it started later, call your doctor. You don't have to be sure. Let them figure out if it's the blues or something more. That's their job.

Signs to watch for

Not everybody has all of these. I had most of them.

• Crying a lot, or feeling sad, empty or numb most of the time
• Not being able to sleep, even when the baby is sleeping and you're exhausted
• Not wanting to eat, or eating all the time
• Feeling worthless or guilty, like you're a bad mother
• Not enjoying anything, even things you used to love
• Feeling anxious, panicky or on edge all the time; worrying constantly about the baby
• Not feeling connected to your baby, or feeling like you're going through the motions
• Pulling away from your husband, your family and your friends
• Trouble thinking straight, remembering things or making little decisions
• Feeling like you'll never be yourself again
• Thoughts of hurting yourself or your baby. If you have these, call your doctor or 911 today.

What helped, and what didn't

What helped:

• Telling the truth. To Rosalie, then my doctor, then David, then my own mom. Every time I said it out loud, it got a little smaller.
• My doctor, my counselor and my medicine. All three. For me it took all three.
• The Tuesday group. Eight or nine moms with babies on our laps and a nurse named Helene who has been running it for years and has seen everything. The first time I went, a mom named Molly said, "I used to sit in the car in the driveway too," and I almost fell off my chair.
• Sleep. David started doing the two a.m. feeding with milk I'd pumped, so I could sleep five hours in a row. Five hours! I felt like a new person after three nights of it.
• A shower every single day, even if it was at four in the afternoon.
• Getting outside. A walk around the block with the stroller, even in the cold. Even when I didn't want to.
• Letting the house go. Dishes can wait. Laundry can wait. Nobody ever got better from a clean kitchen.
• Letting people help. When somebody says "let me know if you need anything," tell them something. "Could you hold him while I take a nap?" They mean it.

What didn't help:

• People telling me to "enjoy every minute, it goes so fast." I know they meant well. But when you're barely getting through the minutes, hearing that you're supposed to be enjoying them makes you feel like a failure.
• "You have a healthy baby, what do you have to be sad about?" That's not how depression works. I knew I was lucky. That made me feel worse, not better.
• "Just get some sleep and you'll feel better." I couldn't sleep. That was the problem.
• The magazines in the doctor's office with the smiling moms in white sweaters. Nobody wears a white sweater with a baby. Nobody.
• Comparing myself to the other moms at church, who all looked fine. (Two of them have since told me they weren't.)
• Waiting. I waited two months because I thought it would go away. I wish I hadn't.

A lot of moms with postpartum depression also have anxiety or panic. I did. My heart would race and I'd feel like I couldn't breathe. If that's you too, It Passes is a page by a man in Philadelphia about panic attacks, and it helped me understand what was going on in my body.

Where to find help

• Your doctor, your OB, your midwife or your baby's doctor. Any of them. Your baby's doctor sees you every few weeks anyway, so tell them how YOU are doing.
• Postpartum Support International, a group that helps mothers with postpartum depression and their families find support and information.
• Depression After Delivery, a national support group for women with postpartum depression. They can send you information and help you find a support group near you.
• The hospital where you had your baby. Ask if they have a new mothers' group or a support group. Ours does, and I bet yours does too.
• A counselor. Ask your doctor for a name, or call your local mental health center if money is a worry. Many have a sliding scale.
• Me. I'm not a doctor or a counselor. I'm just a mom who's been there. But I'll write back, I promise.