I am currently pregnant with baby number two, my son was born last year in January. After he was born I had a 'breakdown', insomnia, huge OCD, hearing a telephone ringing that wasn't there, seeing 'people' in the garden, and hid a lot of my symptoms and I was hugely suspicious of all health professionals and my family following a traumatic birth experience.....until it all came to a head when my boy was 4 months old.
My husband came home from work and found me staring out the window unable to speak, I aparently didn't know who he was and he got us help.
I had an assessment by a community crisis team, who I believe thought I was making it up, as they left saying they would ring back and never did.....
I then self referred to IAPT for CBT, as my husband was convinced I was ill, and then my anxiety got a lot better, then by about October my hallucinations had totally gone, but the mood swings and OCD remained.
FF to this pregnancy....lots of my 'delusions' about not trusting health professionals and my husband have returned, and everything seems amplified again. I am now under the care of the perinatal mental health team, who are recommending olanzipine and CBT throughout my pregnancy and postnatally.
I still havnt come.to terms with my diagnosis, as so many people have told me no way it could have been PP last time as I didn't go to a MBU, and they are telling me it is.
I'm so scared. Has anyone else had anything similar? I just feel I have gotten used to my new 'normal', and worried if I acknowledge that there is something wrong, it will let it in and take over.
Thanks in advance x
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Jo-jo2005
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Welcome to the forum and congratulations on your pregnancy.
I am sorry you were unwell with your first pregnancy and that it seems like you did not get the help that you needed from the crisis team. It is great that you are now with a perinatal team so that they can support you through this pregnancy.
I had PP in 2015 after the birth of my daughter. It came on quite quickly after childbirth, I started to get paranoid and was restless and couldn’t sleep, my mind was racing with lots of thoughts and I was very suspicious of the health professional too, and didn’t really believe they were health professionals. I started to see and hear things that were not there. I was admitted to a general psychiatric ward and treated with medication and I have gone on to make a recovery. It is hard to say whether you did have PP or not, as I am not a health professional, but just because you did not go into an MBU, does not mean you did not have it. If the perinatal team seem to think that is what you had, then I would be guided by them.
We have some insider guides that might help if you have not seen them already (app-network.org/what-is-pp/.... There is a recovery after PP one, a partner’s guide and also one that explains what to do if you are risk of PP (if you have had a previous PP). There is also a page on our website about what PP is, with some of the symptoms, that might be useful to you (app-network.org/what-is-pp/).
It is hard to come to terms with having been through something like PP, especially if you were not really diagnosed properly in your first pregnancy. The perinatal team should be able to help you with this and help you to talk through everything that happened. I was in denial for a long time when I was poorly. I just did not want to believe that I had been ill and had something like PP. A lot of my recovery was about working through those feelings and emotions and learning to accept that is what happened to me. It sounds like that might be helpful for you too.
Hopefully, some of the women on here have had a similar experience to you too, and you can gain some confront from them. I can understand how scary this must be for you to ‘accept’ and that you are worried you might ‘let it in’, but it is just great that you have reached out here, you are under a perinatal team, and are starting to try to understand what happened to you.
Hi Jo-jo2005, congratulations o. Your pregnancy. I am very sorry you felt unwell after your first baby last year and that with this pregnancy some intrusive thoughts have come back. I am also very pleased that this time around you are under the care of a perinatal mental health team. They are the experts on mums mental health around the time they are going to have their baby and a year after, so you can't possibly be in better hands.
I understand that you may be feeling some anxiety regarding a diagnosis, and that it takes time to come to terms with it. But bear in mind that many mums who are at high risk of pp (either due to a previous pp or other factors) stay well after second and subsequent pregnancies.
I am sorry that your experience with mental health services in the past have given you a degree of mistrust towards professionals. You can always address your concerns with the perinatal team, they are there to help you and answer any questions you have, without judgement.
Keep well, I'll be thinking of you, and write here whenever you want.
I just wanted to say I had a similar experience to you, with my first daughter I didn’t seek the help I needed and suffered terribly (along with my partner and Daughter) I would see, hear things, be suspicious of health visitors, family, friends, I would have intrusive thoughts, clean the house
From top to bottom constantly, and it went on and on. I basically missed out on the first two years of her life as the depression hit soon after, again I didn’t seek any help.
Last year we welcomed our second little girl I. To the world and the experience was night and day to my last. I decided at the start of the pregnancy to tell my midwife everything as I was petrified of us having to go through all that again, they were very supportive and I was under the perinatal mental health team throughout my pregnancy. Plans were out in place if I was to experience this again, my partner felt supported and I was given citalopram a low dose to take in the last few weeks of pregnancy and have continued to take to present.
My 2nd little girl is happy smiley and full of the joys .
as a family we have experienced all the incredible good bits that was stolen from us before, my only regret is I didn’t seek the help needed with my first little girl, I missed out on so much and she Missed out on having a happy mummy but we live and we learn and we get stronger every day.
Anyways all I wanted to say is talk talk talk, don’t be ashamed of talking, or asking for help.
ask for help when you are struggling, accept you will have bad days and good days, don’t be frightened of “it coming back” if it does you have the support of the professionals And family to guide you through because you have asked for help this time, be kind to yourself mamma and enjoy your little bundle of loveliness. The perinatal mental health teams are awesome and they will help you through things . Take care xx
such lovely support, I hope after reading the above mentioned messages you feel a bit more at ease. A warm welcome to the forum, where women and family members receive help and support. There is also lots of good information and guidance on the APP website. I certainly have been learning by exchanging experiences and reading factual information offered by the APP community.
Congratulations on your pregnancy and I do hope that this time round you will receive appropriate support by the perinatal mental health team.
I have had PPP after 2 weeks when my son was born, however health professionals in my area did not pay attention to my partner. Eventually midwives and the crisis team figured out after longer observations that there was something seriously wrong. Even though I was sectioned to a Psychiatric Unit I was misdiagnosed and unfortunately did not experience suitable care for some time.
After recovery I continued to have extreme anxiety and hallucination, such as seing people and constant bell ringing. This was possibly triggered by stressful events in the family as I lost my dad 2 months after his bike accident in 2013 and 2.5 years later my partner's mum to cancer.
Eventually 8 years after PPP I finally was diagnosed with a chronical illness (BP1).
It helps to focus on quality of life instead of always wondering why my mood swings are stuck in a Pendulum
I do wish you well. I believe it really helps to communicate about your feelings. I am much better now with the trust issue and have developed a lovely support network with kind friends.
Perinatal mental health and the development of MBU's can nowadays reassure families and their family planning.
Even though I was not diagnosed with PP with my first, I now see all the markers. I self isolated, was severely depressed, and had strange beliefs/thoughts. I also had difficulty sleeping. Getting pregnant a 2nd time seemed to make these things go away to a degree but they reemerged with fury following the birth of baby 2. It all came to a head abt 4mo after the birth of my 2nd and I got the help that I so desperately needed from the start.
Yes this is exactly what happened to me. 4 years ago I got so I’ll. was starting to recover and got pregnant again. This time went into Mbu. I will reply properly tomorrow when I can read your post properly, sorry not good right now x
I hope from the replies already here you will see you are not alone. I’m so sorry you had such an awful time during your first pregnancy. I had PP many years ago and was sectioned to general psychiatric care.
I’m sorry that In your current pregnancy lots of your ‘delusions’ have returned. I also had delusions which were all very real and frightening at the time. Hopefully the perinatal team will be able to guide and give you peace of mind.
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