Photo by Sharon McCutcheon on Unsplash
When you’re a first-time mom, you are living in a world of brand-new experiences. Pregnancy, childbirth, and the postpartum phase will all bring expected as well as unexpected changes. It can be exhilarating, scary, joyful, and uncertain, all at the same time. Bringing a baby into the world is a truly life-altering experience.
There are so many changes in your life and your health as your body changes throughout pregnancy. The changes continue after childbirth, and there is a healing process the body goes through afterwards. With a newborn, there is definitely a period when lack of sleep is a very large obstacle in functioning day-to-day. You can quickly get overwhelmed taking care of a newborn and fighting fatigue at the same time.
Baby Blues
Postpartum “baby blues” and lack of sleep, with a predisposition to depression, can turn into full-blown postpartum depression. You don’t always feel it coming, or even creeping up on you. It can feel sudden, even if it’s been accumulating in the background. One day you are feeling fine, and the next day—you are not fine at all.
When you are in the fog of taking care of a newborn, and your body is healing from childbirth, it’s easy to miss signs that your mental health is declining. Friends and family can mistake your reactions and behaviors for normal results of major hormonal changes instead of something that goes beyond that. Postpartum depression is another one of those conditions that can seem like a totally normal reaction to a major life event, a major adjustment time in a person’s life, but can take a turn for mental health difficulties.
More Than Baby Blues
The after-effects of childbirth and having a newborn are both physical and emotional. There is a lack of sleep and exhaustion, there is physical discomfort from labor. Especially for first-time moms, there can be a lot of anxiety about breastfeeding and taking care of a newborn. All of those very expected feelings that can definitely be baby blues will subside. As the baby goes through different stages, mom gets more sleep and more experience, and things start to fall into place for a routine in the household.
For a lot of women, it can be hard to transition to being at home, recovering from labor and learning how to take care of a newborn. It is very common for new mothers to feel anxiety and fatigue after their bodies have been through so many changes and their sleep changes as well. For the majority of women, the feelings will start to subside a few weeks after childbirth as they get their bearings.
Prepare During Pregnancy
Postpartum depression is much more intense than anxiety and fatigue. It can involve panic attacks and complete lethargy, to the point where you don’t take care of yourself and/or your baby. One woman was never intended to take care of a baby entirely by herself. Practicing self-care when you are taking care of a helpless baby is paramount. Take some time to rest, and consider asking a family member or friend to take care of your baby so you can get some needed rest.
Please consult with your Ob/Gyn at the first sign of feeling down for a number of weeks. Your doctor will ask you about this at your postnatal check-up and it’s really important to pay attention to your feelings and share any details you can. And, it doesn’t only happen to first-time moms. Even if you’ve been through it once, and you are being proactive to prevent it from happening again, it can happen again. It can happen again, but in a different way and it can feel different the second time around. During subsequent pregnancies, you can prepare and make plans with your doctor and your family.
