Article by Steven Chang

Even though pregnancy often evokes overwhelming joy, it is also a stressful event for most women. For individuals whose fetus is at high risk of developing malformations and other hereditary diseases, the stress is increased. All through pregnancy, physiological and hormonal changes create a totally unique and often uncomfortable experience to a lot of mothers. Added to that, once pregnancy is nearing term, stress may be appreciably increased as anxiousness builds up regarding the end result of the pregnancy, baby care, and lifestyle changes that come right after delivery. Pregnancy is indeed a major stressor that can produce or even unmask depressive tendencies of some women.

* Depression is a mental disorder wherein the affected person presents with depressed mood, loss of interest to virtually anything including pleasure, feelings of low self-worth, disturbed rest, altered appetite, low energy and poor concentration.

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Throughout the past 33 years in private practice, hundreds of women have told me they felt that their current health problems started soon after the birth of their child. The child may have been her first or fifth, and might now be a teenager or even a grown man or woman, but the mother remembers the postpartum onset of her symptoms as if it were yesterday.

The symptoms that usually start within the first to twelfth postpartum months vary widely among mothers. A few of the most common are despondency and despair, chronic fatigue, sleeplessness, anxiousness, lack of confidence, loss of sex drive and passion, muscle and joint pains, unhealthy skin, hair and nails, digestive disturbances, bladder problems, heart disease, trouble breathing, and a host of troubling emotions and moods swings. A woman can be puzzled, frustrated, even embarrassed when she reveals symptoms that have plagued her for years. She may have shared her self–observations with doctors only to find that they were not worthy of an acknowledgment or comforting comment from her physician. Any attempt on her part to connect the birth of one of her children with those symptoms may have been met with skepticism or passed over. Yet, she can’t shake the feeling that something about that particular birth began her health decline.

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I appreciate any advice you have. I have been on Paxil for 4.5 years now. I began getting horrible panic attacks after the birth of my daughter, plus I was stressed as my now ex-husband lost his job and I learned he was doing drugs. I was on Paxil before my daughter was born(not during pregnancy) because I was having severe panic attacks. I had switched from Buspar, which made me feel like a complete zombie.
So when my daughter reached 3 months(she is now 4.5 years old), I began having those panic attacks again. My dr. put me on Paxil again, and I have been on it for over 4 years now. Good news, no panic attacks, but I feel like its not helping my depression. I am also on Welbutrin, 300 mg a day for depression and I was trying to quit smoking on it, which sadly, I did for awhile, then I am back on them. I still suffer from depression, and probably always will. Can a medication stop being effective after so long? Is there another depression med that I should try?

hi, i am 19 +1 week pregnant for the last month i have been extremely tired, i cry at the littlest thing that upsets me and my mood has all of a sudden got bad which i never suffered with in my first 3 months of my pregancy. i have got constant worries that there is going to be a problem with my baby mainly down syndrome as i havent had any of the scans or tests done for it. my partner has recently been made redundant so we only have 1 income and i earn too much to get help with benefits so we are struggling. i work shift which isnt helping as i’m up at half 4 in the morning which i found hard even before i was pregnant but never struggled as much as i am. i finish wok at 2 and by half past im fast asleep on the sofa for an hour then back in bed for 8 to make sure i get enough sleep to get my through the next day. i’m finding it really hard to concentrate or even move about too much.
work isnt helping as im constantly on my feet which gives me backache and stomach ache, i’m also eating foods that are making my sick as i work within a food factory and my boss isnt really listerning to me when i try and talk to her. but i’m mainly worried about the tiredness as i have to drive and the worrying. i feel like i have so much going on in my head that i just dont know what to do but cry and i even then start to worry that my stress is going to harm my baby which i REALLY dont want.

please help
i very miserable helen

I’m 21 and I have been out of work and school and barely able to drive for the last 8 months for my panic disorder/ severe depression…I went to the hospital last night because
i felt really sick and found out I was 5 weeks 4 days pregnant..I had no idea because I was still having my menstrual..I’ve been on ativan for the last 8 months b/c I havent found a med for my panic/depress. and its keeping me somewhat stable until I found a med so I could get my life back..I’m so scared and idk what to do everyone saying I should get an abortion so I can get myself better but I really dont believe in that but I dont know what to do..I wouldnt be able to support the baby right now b/c im unable to work due to my severe panic and stuff..
i smoke and i’ve been taking ativan this whole time and didnt know I was pregnant and im worried its harmed the baby and I’ve been on it for 8 months and I know coming off of it causes seizures..any advice would be greatly appreciated..thx

Product Description
Eighty percent of all pregnant women struggle with depression during or after their child’s birth. But there is good news about postpartum mood disorders—they are almost 100% treatable. In the definitive guide to postpartum depression, written from a Christian perspective by a team of experts including best-selling author and popular psychologist Dr. Paul Meier (Happiness Is a Choice), The Postpartum Survival Guide explains why this depression occurs, who’s at… More >>

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I did not get a baby shower because MY family lives 3K miles away and there was so much jealousy and drama over pregnancies in my husband’s family that caused problems throughout my pregnancy that I was uncomfortable having a shower thrown for me when the only guests would be his family – WAY awkward. I had not lived in my new town long enough to have developed any friends close enough to throw me a shower. My MIL would have thrown one but she would have driven a long distance and really her kids (other than hubs) were the ones I was at odds with AND the only guests other than his sister, mother and dad’s girlfriend would have been the brother’s inlaws. My decision not to have one wasn’t because I didn’t want one but because it would have been painful and awkward. Nonetheless, that this was the lesser of the two evils (not having one) has been a source of great pain for me to the point that now that the sister is pregnant and having showers I am so resentful. There is a lot to this story that I can’t type here because it is just too long and involves a lot of jealousy over my getting pregnant first which is so sad and rediculous.

Every time I look in my son’s baby book and see the absence of a shower I feel depressed and miserable to the point of bitterness.

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Lately I’ve been getting abnormal symptoms since Wednesday (the 31st)… High depression, intestinal upset (burning, cramping), stomach upset, heartburn, and nausea. Normally I get intestinal upset the day before and during my period. I am gluten and lactose intolerant but I know for sure I didn’t eat any of it (and I used lactaid). The depression strikes me as odd because I am not under any stress at all, in fact I’m really quite bored lately. I eat perfect… chicken once a week, lots of fruits and veggies, raw nuts, sugarless peanut butter, brown rice… I drink my 8 glasses of water practically every single day. I am hypoglycemic but my blood sugar is very stable. Also, I’m chemically sensitive but I know I haven’t been exposed to anything abnormal.

I cannot explain why or how these symptoms are coming about. Could pregnancy be a possible issue? I have VERY irregular periods so I never know when or how long it’s coming. I had my last period starting on the 13th, and intercourse on the 20th and 27th. I was very careful and used condoms (none showed signs of tears). Could pregnancy even be possible with that small time frame? If so… when and how do you test? Or is it best to just wait out the whole month of april until I get a period? Could it be something else entirely?

I am pregnant and feeling extremley depressed about some other things going on, no relation to the pregnancy, however I am thinking about going to the doctor and asking about anti depressants, will I need a blood test and if so will it show that I am pregnant.