The Truth About Postnatal Depression and Anxiety

I struggle with the concept of talking about my PND because I’m a doula, because there are a lot of people I’ve tried to hide it from, because I feel embarrassed, I feel guilty, and I don’t want to be that negative person everyone has on their friends list. But I’m human, and today is a bad day, so sometimes it’s refreshing to work with the raw emotions and go with it.
Today I sat in the bathroom with my partner after the school run and sobbed. I cried about the guilt, the hypothetical situations I might find myself in in the future, the double life I lead, the ‘what ifs?’, the heavy cloud that lives above my head and the realisation that the cloud is a part of me and it will always be there, weighing me down.
Nearly 7 years ago I was induced and gave birth to my son, then he turned 3. That’s all I remember. I missed 3 years. I remember parts, but I couldn’t tell you what his first words were, when he first rolled over, what his favourite food was, or what we did together. I feel guilty because when he asks me questions about his first few years I have to lie. I don’t have a book of firsts to show him and I don’t have pictures. I have a grey and hazy memory which seems like a dream, almost like life hadn’t started yet. The memories of nothing haunt me, they makes my gut ache and my throat tighten, I’m close to tears 90% of the time. My anxiety is still here, its a part of me now. I can’t function if there is a background noise, I am paranoid, I am delicate and I’m vulnerable. I need to take each day at a time, but so do most people right?
Somehow though, with the help of my family and my partner, I’ve managed to bring up a clever, inquisitive, confident young boy with an endearing and charismatic personality. He is loved by many, including myself, although it may not seem it some days. I would kill for that boy, I know I would. He is my boy, we just have to work a little harder together, which makes our relationship more special. He chose me to grow him and nurture him and thankfully, I haven’t broken him, which is a huge relief.
My blog hasn’t been published for self pity, or attention. It’s been published because PND and anxiety happens, because people need to talk about it, and because living with PND doesn’t mean you’re ‘mental’ or ‘unsafe’, it means the balance in your hormones aren’t quite right, or your circumstances aren’t easy. Go easy on yourself and reach out. You’ve ended up in the middle of nowhere and you don’t speak the language, but you’ll pick it up, it takes a while, but you’ll get there. So speak out, you won’t be the only one.

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http://www.pndsupport.co.uk
http://www.mind.org.uk/information-support/types-of-mental-health-problems/postnatal-depression/

The Unspoken Truth About Your Doula

So you’ve hired your doula and now you’re ready to eagerly await your baby. Doula’s are wonderful creatures, and very modest, I doubt you’d ever hear one talk about how incredible she is, or how hard she’s worked. So I thought I’d write a little list of SOME of the reasons your doula is incredible, and dedicate this blog to my sisters;

• From the moment you ask them to be yours, a piece of their heart has your name on it.
• When they go on call, they are available for you 24/7, and from that very second, their phones will be stuck to their hands.
• They are always learning. Doulas love a good book, workshop or course that is going to help their clients. Their brains are like sponges, they soak up that knowledge and keep it close.
• They feel. They feel every emotion present in a birth room. They cry when your baby is born, they cry when a new family come together and they cry again on the way home.
• They are human force fields. They protect the mother like she is their own. Mama bear style.
• We are a varied bunch, you won’t ever meet two the same.
• They don’t mind being covered in bodily fluids. Poo, wee, blood, vomit or tears.
• They love dawn. Traveling to a birth whilst the world sleeps.
• When they tell you that they wish they could take the pain away, they really mean it.
• They know their way around a search engine.
• They will happily miss dinner dates, girly evenings and even weddings to be with you.
• They have a doula community, they are a tribe and they love each other like they are sisters.
• If they don’t have the answer, they always know someone who does.
• Their bags have a ‘Mary Poppins’ quality about them.
• They can survive on carrot sticks and Nakd bars alone.
• They know when you’re in transition, because the room smells different.
• They never turn down a cup of tea. Plans come together and solid relationships are formed. 
• When their client asks ‘did I poo?’ A doula will always tell the truth. ‘No, sweetie’.
• What they can’t do to your hips isn’t worth knowing.
• A doula doulas from deep within, they can’t explain why or how, but this job has been waiting for them all their lives.
• When the time has come for them to step back, they melt away, but their ears and hearts are always open.
• A doula may have attended over 100 births, but she will always remember yours like it were her own.

So enjoy her, trust her and let her doula you. Don’t ever worry about asking too much of her, because working with you will always be an honour.

Infant Sleeping patterns….Or ‘Not Sleeping’ Patterns

For one of my assignments I researched this subject, after hours of skimming and internet searching I read things that made complete sense…which subsequently made me wish I knew this years ago as a young sleep deprived mum. Take from it what you will, but I hope you find it useful….and that the ‘clock watching’ eases.

Infant sleeping patterns are a hot topic. One of the first questions you are asked as a new mother is ‘how are they sleeping?’ or ‘are they sleeping through yet?’ Not only are these questions incredibly frustrating as a new and tired mum, but it makes you feel like you’re missing something. Is my baby supposed to be sleeping? It’s also very isolating to feel that you’re the only one in the world that’s awake, especially when you’ve had one of those nights where nothing will settle the baby and the husband that you used to love ever so dearly is snoring loudly next to you. There also seems to be an ongoing competition to see whose baby can sleep through first, and when you scroll through Facebook for the 74^th time that night looking for companionship, and your night turns into dawn, it seems like it really is only  your baby that isn’t sleeping. Ever.

To begin research for this assignment I headed straight for Google and typed in ‘Newborn Sleeping Patterns’. Immediately I was hit with ‘Establish good sleeping habits’, ‘How to set good sleeping patterns for your baby’, and ‘Getting your baby to sleep.’  The question I really wanted to know was; what is a normal sleeping pattern and should we be trying to encourage longer and deeper sleeps?

A newborn baby has a polyphasic sleep pattern. This means that they sleep multiple times in a 24 hours period instead of just once. Although we are mammals, humans are both mammals and primates, known as ‘secondarily altricial’. Unlike other primates, such as chimpanzees and gorillas, our offspring are born needing our full care and the need to keep them close in order to survive. The attachment we have with our young will regulate their temperature, heart rate and maintain nourishment and security.

Newborn babies may sleep for 18 or so hours a day, but often for only for 2 hours at a time. It is important to remember that these are recommendations.  Each child is different and the recommendations may not fit every child.

The baby does this for a few reasons;

• He has not yet developed circadian rhythms. A baby cannot tell the difference between night and day and so sleeps sporadically. ‘During the first year overall sleep duration falls to around 15 hours, and the majority of sleep becomes concentrated during night-time as circadian rhythm’ A circadian rhythm can establish when the baby is a few months old. (isisonline.org.uk, 2014)
• He has a small stomach, and needs feeding frequently. Babies need to feed throughout the day and night, this satisfies and comforts the baby, and also maintains the mother’s milk supply. Feeding at night actually increases the milk supply more than it does during the day.
• Emotional reassurance. Babies need to be close to the mother, and touch is as important as food and warmth. Babies are designed to want to be close to us, to be held and secure. By frequent waking they can be reassured their needs are met. ‘Newborn’s cannot distinguish themselves from you, they are being assaulted by smells and sounds that are unfamiliar to them, you are home to your baby.’ (Beyond The Sling, Mayim Bialik, 2012)
• Light sleep is crucial for brain development, blood flow to the brain doubles during REM sleep and requires a lot of energy. Light sleep also reduces the risk of SIDS.

‘If a baby’s stimulus for hunger could not easily arouse her, this would not be good for baby’s survival. If baby’s nose was stuffed and she could not breathe, or was cold and needed warmth, and her sleep state was so deep that she could not communicate her needs, her survival would be jeopardized.’ (http://www.askdrsears.com/, 2015)

Due to the pressures of living in the Western world, a wakeful newborn is not an easy addition and as we know, sleep deprivation is a form of torture. But understanding infant sleep from an anthropological point of view can help mothers feel that what they are experiencing is in fact normal. A baby waking up as soon as you lay them down alone in a cot is normal. A baby waking up after only 20 minutes is normal. An infant still waking up frequently after 18 months or 2 years is normal. Babies aren’t born knowing they are in the 21^st century, so their sleep patterns reflect that of a baby that would have been born over 10000 years ago. They doesn’t know that there aren’t sabre toothed tigers around every corner.

So, seeing as an infant’s  sleeping patterns are perfectly designed to help them develop and grow, should we do all we can to train them to sleep longer periods? According to Psychology Today, ‘There is an incredible disconnect between mainstream medical notions of normal infant sleep and sleep advice for parents’.

So what do parents need to hear?

‘If a baby is waking, parents may not like it, but they should understand that it doesn’t mean that anything is wrong, this is normal behaviour for newborns through to infancy.’

In other words, roll with it mama, this too shall pass.