After my second child was born, and at about the time I stopped breast feeding at 5 months, I noticed, or rather my husband noticed that my moods and irritability at things wasn't 'normal'. I had always been a very consistent person. You always knew how I'd react to things within a reasonable parameter, I didn't 'flip out' or go into a rage about anything. I could argue, and disagree, but I was level headed and reasonable. Gradually as my baby became 6 months old and then 8 and 10 I was turning into a monster!
I'm going to share just a few incidents with you to illustrate this, because, what may be OK behaviours in some homes, or unreasonable in another can be very different. I'll let you be the judge of these incidents and if you recognise any of it, then you need to read on.
My husband would come home with his usual smile and cheery disposition after a day's work. I hadn't always managed to do all the housework, the meal was half prepared and I'd tell him I hadn't felt too good during the morning. So and so had called.. and I'd go into some detail as to how this person had made me feel inadequate, had commented on something I hadn't done, and how I now felt horrid and upset. I might even cry as I recounted this story.
This could now go one of two ways. If he said, that perhaps I could do more, and try to go out a bit more, get some exercise etc and maybe this would help me to feel better, I'd fly at him for criticising me, tell him it was clear he agreed with so and so, and rail at him for not hearing me when I said I hadn't been well that morning.
If he said not to worry, that so and so hadn't meant any harm and that maybe I'd misread the conversation, or even that so and so had no right to ring me and says such things, I'd still shout at him and ask what was his 'game', why was he trying to be nice, was it his usual trick of trying to keep me sweet for later when we went to bed!
On one occasion, he wanted to watch a TV programme that he'd highlighted in the TV book ( not just a whim then!). we sat down together, but after 5 minutes or so, I became irritated by the language, the drinking and the sad jokes and such that were not to my taste. I was rude and pushed him aside as I asked if we had to watch this? When he gently said, please could he, I stormed from the room, smacking the door with my hand as I left. He was trying to stay calm so said nothing, but didn't move. Once away from the room I crashed around in the kitchen for a minute or two, oblivious to children sleeping upstairs, but returned to the sitting room to angrily tell him how selfish he was etc. I successfully ruined his evening and mine, but was left just to sob on the bed until I calmed down and finally apologised.
Another occasion saw me slam the bathroom door so hard it cracked the plaster down beside the door frame. I threw that door into the wall so hard I ended up with bruises on my hand where the handle had been and almost a split door. Why had I repeatedly slammed it? Because the noise wasn't loud enough the first time, and also, my husband did not leap to his feet to chase after me and that irritated me as well.
Was I mad? Was this part of my usual personality? How was I when I spoke to people the next day, when someone noticed the bruises?
Well, to that question, evasive, dishonest, uncomfortable and unprepared to allow others to know quite what I was like. Mad? Well there were times when I felt maybe I was. Part of my real true self... absolutely not!
Never, in my life to that point had I experienced behaviour like this. I hadn't even engaged in arguments with raised voices, let alone a kind of violence. My parents had been quiet calm people and my husband had never raised his voice to me in the nine years I'd known him.
So what was going on?
Answer, Post-natal depression... What is it? A deficiency of the hormone progesterone, that has been dispensed after the birth in huge amounts, (with the placenta) causing the baby blues in many women, but in me, the blues and worse. I had never recovered. It wasn't a mental illness. No amount of anti-depressants were going to help. The same would be true if your symptoms occurred regularly on a monthly basis.
So what did? Taking progesterone.
My story and how I made it back to normality can be found on my website. But what you mustn't do, is put up with it and believe that all you need to do is find 'coping' mechanisms.
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