Recovering from PP

Hello Kirstielou

I'm glad you found the forum ... it's a good place to 'meet' mums and talk about our experiences of PP. My PP episodes were quite a long time ago, when I was 23 and 29. You have done very well to recover in 9 months and I'm sue your daughter is a delight.

It's early days for you so try not to worry about being quieter and not as happy as you once were. You have been through so much in nine months! Sometimes we expect too much of ourselves. In time you will relax a little more and your confidence will return. As mums with PP we have missed those precious first few weeks or months of our baby's life but there are so many happy times to look forward to.

We are all here to listen and chat.

Take good care of yourself.

Hello. I just read your post and it sounds very similar to what happened to me. You will get through this and soon it will feel like a distant memory. Mine happened in Dec 2013. I had a very stress free birth but didn't sleep well for the first 3 months. O was born in Sept and by the week before Xmas I had hardly slept. I was feeding her myself and got a bot obsessed with it. The qweek leading up to Xmas I didn't sleep for a whole week. It started with anxiety and stress worrying I wasn't looking after my baby properly. I wouldn't let anyone else not even my partner near her. Then things got a lot worse. I thought everyone was talking about me, I thought my Dad was dead and my partner was dying. My Mum was poisoning my baby. Things got to much for my partner he asked my mum to help as she lives locally. My mum came to get me in the middle of the night and I tried jumping out of the moving car! Once at my mums things got even worse. I thought my mum was so evil and her house was burning down and she wouldn't let me out . I tried calling the fire brigade but mum hid all the phones! At the time it felt SO real. Must of been very frightening for my family. Eventually after a few visits to dr.s. I got taken to a mental hospital. They said I had post natal depression that led to P. P. I had 4 treatments of E C T. And was put on 10mg of olanzapine and 200 mg sertraline. Was in hosp for a month all over Xmas and New year so missed out on my babies 1st Xmas. After 6 months I was off the olanzapine and am now only on 50mg of sertraline. I would say I feel back to my old self and still have a laugh. I feel a lot more chilled out now than I used to be! Sorry I went on a bit but I really can sympathise with you. Good luck with your future. Anything else you want to chat about. I'll be here. X x

Hi Kirsty thank you for sharing your experience with us. You have done so well to recover after 9 months after the experience you have been through. I had a similar experience of PP as I had ended up with an emergency c section as well and traumatic time with my daughter after that with her ending up on the neonatal unit for a month. I was then separated from her for 10 days as I ended up sectioned and on a psychiatric ward before they found me a bed on a mother and baby unit. When I then got home I couldn't bond with my daughter. I had never suffered from mental illness before either. After about 9 months I felt similar to what you are going through now. I was upset that I had missed out on all those months with her. Now my daughter is 3 and she is amazing. She has no memory of me being ill. I realised I just needed to take it a day at a time and make the most of the time now that I was well again. It does get easier as time goes on. The laughter and confidence comes back with time. Take care of yourself.

I had a similar experience to you 24 years ago when my son was born . I was hospitalised for a couple of months and was unable to look after him . I felt he wasn't my baby. I felt I missed out on so much when he was a baby and was absolutely gutted when I couldn't breaSt fed him. I then went on to have a second son. After he was born we kept everything really quiet and restricted visitors and I was fine. I bonded with him immediately. 5 years later my first son was in the school where the Dunblane tragedy happened. Luckily he was not in the class that was shot but after nearly losing him I finally bonded with him. That day changed my life forever. Afterwards I had a further episode of mania but then began to appreciate how fragile life is and lucky I was to have two healthy sons. 2 years later we decided probably naively to go for a third baby. I had a much longed for daughter. I didn't get PPP this time but had a manic depressive episode when she was 6 months old. I was then well for 15 happy years until last summer I was diagnosed with breast Cancer. I suffered from a very dark deep depression last summer. My Cancer has now been treated and so has the depression. I feel great and am having a lovely summer this year. I don't regret my periods of illness or wish they hadn't happened to me. It takes times like these for you to appreciate the good times and how lucky I have been. There is so much more help and information available nowadays . When I had PPP no one had heard of it. I haven't ever spoken to anyone who has had it until this morning! Luckily I had a very supportive family who got me through it. You have been through a very traumatic experience so I would just give your body time to heal. You are not the same person you were before but I'm sure you are a better person after experiencing what you have gone through. Time is a great healer in my experience .I wouldn't worry about whether you get it again . You got through it the first time so there's no reason you wouldn't if it did come back. Life is too short to spend it worrying about something you can't control so I would just get out there and enjoy every day you have with your daughter. Believe me they grow up so quickly . My daughter left school last month, my oldest son is a qualified doctor and my Middle son is in Brazil for 6 months doing his 5 th year uni project. I love spending time with them all but am really looking forward to spending quality time with my lovely husband now they have all left or are about to leave home. I wish you the best of luck and a very happy future. xx

Wow can't believe 24 years after having PPP I have finally read these stories about others with the same illness. I have always felt no one has ever really understood what I have been through until now. Thank you so much everyone for sharing your experiences .

Hi kirsty. I had pp almost a year ago now. I also had times when I felt like I was going to die and I would panic and try to get help from hospital staff. I had nightmares all the time that made me fearful for my life and family too. I felt like I couldn't trust anyone and no one was helping me. I was in hospital away from my baby for a month and it was such a terrifying experience. I still get daily flashbacks that make me upset but im getting better every day. Life goes on. For us pp mums its just so hard to forget. I also feel im a lot quieter and not my previous more outgoing self.

I live in Brazil and had 2 emergency c-sections in 2 weeks. The first obviously for the birth of my son (Which I found out later I probably didn't need but doctors get more money for c-sections here and it's less inconvenient for them!) and the second a couple of weeks later because they had left a swab in my uterus and it had caused an infection. That, being a new mum, the language barrier and being away from my family lead to me getting PP. I thought my baby had died in the second c-section and that I had 2 babies because I had 2 c-sections. 4 and half months on I feel like I am back to normal but still on medication. I was treated pretty quickly but had no support other than on here.

Going through everything really made me appreciate my health and my friends and family more. It was a tough thing to go through but I found it has made me stronger and appreciate things more.

There is many similar events in ur story that are the same to mine. I had pp back in November 2013, 8 days after my son was born. I was in labour for 39 hours and then retained my placenta so got taken to surgery. My son then developed low temp and low blood sugars so was looked after by neonatal. I spend 6 nights in hospital and all that time, I didn't sleep due to worrying about looking after my son and the other babies crying.

I then got home and went very quickly down hill with thinking I was going back into labour and that me or my son was going to die. I was taken to a mother and baby unit were I spent almost 2 weeks. I was on olzanpine 10mg and it took 16 months to come off them. It has taken a long time to recover and I had cbt back in October which helped a lot with the regret of feeling like I had missed out on time with my son and helped with the flashbacks of the events that happened. U do get better but unfortunately it will always be a part of my life.

Hi Kirstielou

Thanks so much for sharing your story - and everyone else. Very moving to hear of everyone's experiences, which is similar but each person's I think is unique and different.

Kirstie, it's great to hear that you are improving and enjoying your little girl. That's what kept me going too. I had PP back in August 2011 so it is four years on... I just wanted to reassure you, for a long time (perhaps a year and a half / 2 years) I didn't feel fully myself but I can say hand on my heart I do feel fully myself / recovered etc though I think it is something that will be with me forever and there are probably still aspects of it that I still need to come to terms with. But I have to say so much positive has come out of it - an amazing bond with my son (I so appreciate him and our relationship, I think because of everything I went through) and finding APP and this forum has been amazing - to meet so many strong, brave women has been life changing for me.

I just wanted to reassure you that you will feel fully yourself again, and it's great that you have recovered so much already.

Take care X

Oh wow, that is awful. I thank God you pulled through this bad

nightmare. I am grandmother, have 2 grown daughters. My youngest just had baby in June '15 and is suffering from another

depression. I'm on here--to get support/give support to mom's.

I don't want to give her name, etc. its very shameful to her. Even if

its not her fault; it makes her doubt her self-worth. My heart is also

feeling pain, cuz I'm trying to help-and her recent husband won't

take what I have to say "seriously." A stubborn hardheated type.

If you can join a local group of women who can meet 2x month for

talk therapy, have lunch together.

You never want to close yourself off, let local church guide you to

any resources they can offer. Be proactive, in your quest to learn

about this PPI the causes and hopeful a cure. Do not stress over the days your missed out on; but be focus on the "now." Give yourself time to mend the threads of your lost self. I will keep you

in my prayer time--asking God to heal & bless you abundendly.

Ever cloud has a silver lining. Look up to the hills from where your

strength comes; it comes from God.

Hi kirstielou

I was admitted in dec 13 after having my son. I had a straightforward pregnancy and labour and no history of mentam health previous. My son was due on the 19th and i had him in the 8th.

With the run up to christmas i felt like i had a million things to do with a list that wouldnt end.

My symptoms started wouldnt sleep at all, lost appeitite and lost a stone and a half, emotional then really angry, fell out with friends, having strange thoughts, not making any sense, speech pressured talking fast. We was living at my partners house temporarily and i went back to my mums where i was already deterioted so bad. I was so paranoid my mum took me AnE and i was kept in this room with no windows or doors just two cameras and sat in my mums arms and she was telling me to sleep,it was so frightning but i realise it must of been routine to trst weather to keep me in. I was sent home. Saw my go the next day and we went to the chemist to get what i no now sleeping pills that should of knocked me out but they didnt. I was too manic for the local mental health ward and transffered milea away to a Pcu intense ward. I remember my whole stay there the staff and other patients. My behaviour and what i was thinking and saying.

When i became better i was then put into a mother and baby unit. I had forgotten i had a son!! I was still confuaed but didnt ask my mum or partner any questions. For the first few weeks i sometimes didnt make sense with what i was saying. I then began to feel this hurt and guilt the time spent without my son. He was huge to me.. i had a newborn now a 3 month old.

All us women have similar experiences and i feel its comforting to know we all understand each other. Whereas in the mother and baby unit no other women had what i had.

It took time for me to bond with my son, i was so frustrated feeling an emptyness. But im grateful for all the support ive recieved to finally find happiness.

You will find a positive out of what you went through and thats your child. I wanted my newborn baby back so much but i just look forward and make new memories as much as i can. Dont stop taking photos!!

Take care of yourself x