My Struggle with Postpartum Anxiety and Post Traumatic Stress

I have debated back and forth on whether or not to share this publicly. I am not ashamed of what I have walked through, but I also don't need to divulge every single detail of my life either haha. But it is part of my story, and I hope it can be helpful to someone else, even if it's simply to help someone feel like they're not alone.

After Eli and Maddie were born, people asked me about the "baby blues." And I honestly didn't experience it with them. For whatever reason, I didn't have the highs and lows or emotional struggle after they were born. I had a really hard physical recovery, and things were crazy hard, but I didn't have the dramatic emotional swings that mamas talk about. And I just see it as grace from the Lord, as we were trying to figure out life with 2 babies. 

Fast forward to when Aiden was born. I didn't really feel the "baby blues" with him either in the first 3 weeks...and then I ended up in the hospital. With that traumatic experience, and all the fallout from that, I started experiencing a lot of anxiety. Despite having a non-sleeping newborn, I still had a hard time sleeping when he did sleep. I was fearful that I would start bleeding again. I was fearful I wouldn't wake up. I was fearful something would happen to my kids or to Mike. I had a hard time focusing on anything, and would repeat the same things over and over in my mind, simply because I couldn't remember the thought I literally just had 2 seconds ago. 

Postpartum depression never crossed my mind, because I honestly didn't feel sad or depressed. Sure, I had my moments of feeling overwhelmed and crying {we did have 3 babies under 3 years old, and I had experienced a crazy postpartum event...life was crazy}, but mostly I just felt anxious. About everything. About nothing. And I couldn't seem to feel anything else BUT anxious. I can be a high stress person, but this was a level of anxiety I had never experienced before. 

When I started experiencing what felt close to panic attacks, I knew something was really wrong. I was feeling the anxiety physically. My body would feel hot and tingly, and my heart would start to race. I had to take deep breaths to calm myself down, and I felt like I was in a spiritual battle for my mind. My mind would race at 90 mph in 80 different directions, all within the span of 20 seconds; it almost felt like my brain was short-circuiting {that's the best way I know how to describe it}. And it only got worse because I wasn't sleeping.

So there was the fear and the anxiety. And then there were the feelings of being overwhelmed by it all. I had taken care of 2 babies, why couldn't I figure out how to take care of the 3rd? I felt so clueless and like a new mom all over again. All of my supposed wisdom from the first 2 felt useless to me. How was I going to manage it all? I didn't even have time to pee, how was I going to feed and keep 3 kiddos alive? Everyone kept telling me, "you'll figure it out" and I just wanted to scream back how useless that "encouragement" felt to me at the time. I couldn't help but think how easy that was to say when they were not the ones left at the end of the day to actually figure it out! Instead of tackling the hard stuff head on like I usually do, I just felt paralyzed. I couldn't think straight, and literally didn't know what to do next during my day.

And then there was the guilt. Guilt that I needed so much help for so long. Guilt that Mike was taking so much time off work. Guilt that people were having to drop everything to help me. Guilt that I wasn't trusting God enough. Guilt that I couldn't handle 3 babies. Guilt for the moments I didn't want to handle 3 babies. I had prayed for them for years, but clearly I was unfit to care for them. They surely deserved a better mother than I was turning out to be...

I remember fighting off another panic attack and then waking Mike up in the middle of the night to tell him something was off and that I really needed help. I literally felt like I was losing my mind. And I was terrified. I didn't know what was happening, and I just felt so fearful about so many things. So we decided that I would make an appointment with a counselor and with my doctor to figure things out.

Turns out, all of what I was experiencing are classic signs of postpartum depression and post traumatic stress. My doctor even said that she wished they would have a separate category for postpartum anxiety, because some people only experience that part of it. And the more I read about it, the more I understood what she meant. I experienced all of these signs of postpartum depression/anxiety {these are not all-inclusive of PPD, these are just all of what I personally experienced}:

• A feeling of being overwhelmed and trapped
• Feeling guilty
• Lack of appetite
• Panic attacks
• Difficulty relaxing
• Persistent fatigue
• Trouble concentrating and remembering things
• Insomnia
• A feeling of inadequacy
• Trouble making decisions

Could I have experienced postpartum depression/anxiety without all of my post-birth complications? Possibly. But the stress of 3 kiddos under 2, the traumatic hospital visit, and the resulting problems with breastfeeding, all either contributed to or exacerbated it. My hormones were out of control, and my mental health was clearly suffering. When I answered the postpartum questionnaire at my doctor visit, all I could do was cry in the waiting room as I circled all of the "bad" answers. I seemed to be feeling all of the bad feelings, and it scared me. 

I will say, that I did NOT have to circle the scary answer "having thoughts of hurting myself or others," and I am thankful for that. But I didn't know if that was going to come at some point, and that was really scary to think about. I did, however, have thoughts of just leaving. Walking out the door and not coming back. I entertained the thought A LOT, and I wondered what people would do and think if I actually did it. And then I felt immense guilt. What kind of a mother {especially an infertile mother who prayed for years for her babies} thinks that?? Turns out that a mother who just needs some extra help and healing can think those things.

My doctor said I needed to figure out some ways to get more sleep, finish weaning from breastfeeding, eat more protein, see a counselor, and consider medication. So we started making steps toward all of those ends. My mom came back into town to help again {so Mike could go back to work}. And by help, I mean basically move in with us for months. There will never be enough words or actions of thanks for how my mom {and my dad} put their lives on hold to help us. Having her here helped relieve some of the stress of doing it all by myself, and it allowed me to focus on weaning, a major hurdle I needed to conquer in order to start feeling like life was manageable. That was one of the hardest processes I have walked through, as I struggled with a plugged duct almost every other day for several weeks. Those suckers are SUPER painful, and mastitis is from the devil. 

I saw a counselor several times. I needed to talk through my hospital emergency and come to terms with the fact that I almost died. I needed to learn some good coping mechanisms for the times I started to feel overwhelmed and panicky. I needed to process the life we had intentionally stepped into with 3 babies under 3 years old, be relieved of guilt, and be encouraged that I would survive it. And mostly, I needed to be reminded of God's truth to help combat the lies that kept bombarding my mind. 

And yes, I did make the decision {along with Mike, my doctor, and my counselor} to take medication. I felt like I wasn't in a position to make such a big decision, and that was really stressful to me, so I am thankful for those around me that helped me make it. Looking back, knowing how I felt before the medication and then after...hands down, I would do it again. And I would encourage others in my situation or similar to not be afraid to consider it as well. When my doctor and counselor explained to me that my brain essentially needed to be repaired, it made so much sense. And that's exactly how I feel that it helped me: repair my brain so that I could get back to feeling like "me" again. It wasn't an overnight fix, but it absolutely helped. I stayed on the medication for 8 months, and I have since weaned from it. That was a scary process, because I wasn't sure how my brain would react without the meds, and I definitely didn't want to go back to where I was. I definitely felt on edge for a couple of weeks, and I have still been battling some insomnia. But I haven't felt overly anxious, so that is a definite win. I am still waiting to see if more symptoms return at any point, in which case it is no longer postpartum related, but possibly an underlying anxiety disorder that was brought to the surface with all the stress of last Fall. Since weaning from the meds went fairly ok, I feel hopeful that I can put this behind me, but I know the steps I need to take if the Lord chooses to bring this struggle back into my life.

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It was a rough several months, for sure. Scary. Overwhelming. Hard work. Humbling. Other mamas I have talked with who have experienced PPD/A have described it as being in a cloud. Which is an accurate description that makes the most sense when the cloud finally lifts. While I had an amazing support system that I will never be able to thank enough, it was probably the loneliest 8 months I have experienced. It was hard to explain all of what I was feeling to people, even the people closest to me. The fear, the anxiety, the feelings of guilt and inadequacy. It was hard to be around people when I was just trying to make it through the day. And even when I started to feel a little better, more like myself, it was frustrating to feel "off" and yet still have to go about normal life. I was on medication and started to feel better so everyone around me thought I was ok, back to myself. Since we had been in crisis mode for so long, once things calmed down, everyone moved on and got back to normal. But for me, it was still several months of internal mental battles before the cloud lifted. And that was a lonely place to be. 

So if you know and love someone who is struggling with depression and anxiety....keep checking on them, keep asking them how they are doing, let them talk/process, even if they seem to be "ok" and back to "normal." And even if they say they're fine. Because they very likely could be fine that day you ask, but not the next day. For me, it was an emotional roller coaster {which was incredibly frustrating at times}, where some days I felt great and "normal" but then another day I felt like I was regressing again.

Many mamas feel the same {or different} symptoms in varying degrees and intensities. I believe my symptoms were accelerated because of my personality and my postpartum complications/trauma. My point in saying that is this: just because you don't experience it with the same intensity, or you think, "I didn't have a traumatic experience like that, so surely what I'm feeling isn't PPD/A," doesn't mean that it's just the "baby blues" either. If anything feels "off" in any way, it's worth a conversation with the people who know you best and your doctor. Because too many mamas have brushed it off for a long time, only to suffer in silence for too long, and/or eventually reach a high level of intensity when maybe they could have been helped sooner. And you may not need everything I did {meds, counseling, etc.} to feel better. Better diet, exercise, and even simple breaks can all help. Our bodies go through so much during pregnancy and childbirth; it's worth asking the questions to make sure you can re-balance yourself and get back to feeling like your old self. 

I'm thankful that the Lord walked with me in the dark and scary places. I'm thankful that when I felt alone, I could be reminded of the truth that He is always with me. I'm thankful that in my weakness, the Lord shows Himself faithful, strong, and sufficient. And I am thankful that the cloud has finally lifted, and I feel like "me" again.