They call it the blues. What is it and how to cope with it? The idea of feeling depressed once your baby is born may seem unlikely, or even bizarre, but a dose of the baby blues or postnatal depression is perfectly normal.
The period following birth is a time for learning and a time of stress in which you confront new roles, new relationships and a new daily routine. Here follows some of the things mothers battle with:
Baby Blues
- An abrupt ending to that magical feeling of being pregnant, as the “real” baby has emerged into the world.
- Having to adapt physically, emotionally and spiritually to a new being.
- Starting to doubt your ability to protect and nurture your child/new born baby. What if you make a mistake?
- Dealing with your baby’s constant need for feeding from your own body surprises most women as do the intense feelings of helplessness and hopelessness.
- Learning to tolerate and actually enjoy and accept the huge demands made on you by the total dependency of your baby, this affects you physically, emotionally and psychologically.
- If a new mom has to be separated from her new born baby because of illness or birth trauma, then the feeling of helplessness increase. Feeding difficulties and not being able to console a crying baby may also cause feelings of inadequacy.
- In the early days your partner, family or friends may be wonderfully helpful, but they could start to irritate you as you try to settle down to doing things your way. On the other hand you may feel a sense of abandonment when your novelty wears off, and you’re supposed to just get on with motherhood.
- Many new mothers expect to fall in love with their babies and bond at birth. If this doesn’t happen and you discover you have mixed feelings, then guilt might set in.
- Your body isn’t what it used to be, and you can’t get into your clothes, and hormones rage as they swing into action to provide milk for your baby and helps your uterus getting back into shape. Dripping from every orifice, dealing with postpartum discomfort and sensations, and handling the demands of your tiny new baby, it’s no wonder that many women wonder why they exchanged their peaceful life for the chaos of motherhood.
What can we do?
These experiences and feeling don’t mean that you can’t cope or that you made a mistake. It’s perfectly normal to sob from exhaustion, wail with self-pity or groan with temporary despair. But if you are feeling depressed, you will need to talk to someone, preferably someone who knows how you feel. Once you realize that you are not alone in the world, it will be much easier to get your new life into perspective.
Here are a couple survival tips when having the baby blues
- Tell your partner how you feel
- Let yourself cry
- Eat healthy and often
- Take vitamins and mineral supplements
- Cat nap when you can
- Phone your friend, mom or sister
- Have lots of skin-to-skin contact with your adorable baby
- Keep a diary, so you can look back and see just how quickly you adapted to being a great mom.
- Get help if you don’t feel better able to cope after a couple of weeks.
Article from – your pregnancy
Hope this helps, and good luck! 🙂
BabyRUs