Dr. Jim Bolton: Postnatal depression is a condition that's actually turns out to be surprisingly common affecting as many as one in 10 mums or more. The main thing we think of a depression is feeling low and sad, but a lot of other problems go along with it, particularly, when you bear in mind that moms are looking after a new baby.
Mums often feel that they lack confidence in their ability to look after the baby. They might feel anxious about the baby's health. This anxiety is out of proportion to what's going on. So if your health visitor, for example, reassures you as a new mum that your baby is fine with postnatal depression, they'll often assist in having worries about the baby's health.
You might find that you are tearful at times, even for no apparent reason. It will cause with a new baby often, you have woken up to feed in the night and sleeping is a problem, but even if the baby is asleep, you might be tired and find you can't get off to sleep at all.
Antenatal and postnatal depression are both very similar in the way that mums are feeling. The main difference is that one time a mother is pregnant and another time she has a new baby for whom she is responsible. And it may be with postnatal depression, a lot of mums feeling is it tied up with the new baby might be concerned about the baby's health, for example.
What's important to bear in mind, is that if a mother has antenatal depression that isn't treated then that will just continue during the time that she has the baby and afterwards. It will just turn into postnatal depression, having a baby isn't an automatic cure for depression. That's why it's so important to tackle antenatal depression, when it's spotted.
Partners are very important. For mothers with postnatal depression, often they are reluctant to talk about the way they are feeling. They might be embarrassed to talk about it; they may just think that the way that they are feeling is all part of being a new a mum. So if you recognize that your partner is feeling particularly low, and has particularly changed in their mood, then helping them to talk about is important and then helping them to seek help either through their midwife, health visitor or the general practitioner.
Dr. Maggie Bolt: Well, recognition of the disorder is the most important thing really. Sometimes a therapy can help, but a lot of women need antidepressant therapy, they need to take medication.
Dr. Jim Bolton: Well, the two main avenues of treatment are either with counseling or psychotherapy or with antidepressant medication. People often heard of some antidepressants like Fluoxetine or Prozac, and that is sort of drugs that can be helpful for depression in new mums.
Dr. Maggie Bolt: But there is a risk if the same problem happening in the future pregnancy. So if woman have postnatal depression after one baby, she has at increased risk of having it in the next pregnancy and that needs to be looked out.
Dr. Jim Bolton: Well postnatal depression affects not only the mum and without treatment that depression can go on for as long as a year, but it's going to effect those people around her. So the partners can be affected by the depression and it can have a severe effect on the quality of the relationship, and of particular importance, you are going to have an effect on the developing child and research has been shown that if mothers have postnatal depression which isn't treated, children can have problems in their own emotional development and their social development and even now it's recognized that children of mothers who have had long-lasting postnatal depression have school problems. So it's problem that persist well into childhood.
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