Nowadays, postpartum depression is so widely known that people who have never birthed a child know many of the warning signs. But when I had my first child, I was unaware that what I was experiencing wasn’t normal.
I was young, and living away from family who could’ve picked up on the signs. Doctors were not as vigilant then as they have been in recent years. I was given a postpartum depression screening at my six-week checkup, and no one asked me any follow-up questions. They handed 19-year-old me a child and essentially said “good luck.” Now, mothers are screened at every well-baby visit for their child, and if you’re a parent, you know those happen every couple of months, gradually spreading out as the infant gets closer to a year old.
By screening at every well-baby visit, doctors are now catching many more cases of postpartum depression before they become severe. They can prescribe a course of medication or advise you to seek out therapy with a licensed therapist specializing in perinatal or postnatal parents. Doctors, midwives and therapists are all taking the development of postpartum depression seriously, but rarely do we hear about other postpartum mental health conditions.
Postpartum can activate other mental health conditions outside of depression and anxiety. Some people experience postpartum psychosis, which can be marked by paranoia, auditory or visual hallucinations, as well as delusions. People can experience OCD as well as exacerbation of other underlying mental health conditions that the person may have been suffering from.
It's estimated that 50-85% of people that give birth will experience a mood disturbance in the postpartum period.
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