Postpartum Depression: Let's Be Real.

She’s up crying again, wanting to be fed to sleep again. My eyes are bleary because I’ve taken the anti-psychotic and anti-depressants that make me tired so even unscrewing the bottle top is more of an effort than I can manage. It falls to the ground, “fuck”, I pick it up and drop it again. I look at it - squinting my eyes - briefly debate leaving it there, then hear Reyna’s cries from the living room and bend over again. 

If only I had been a better mother I could be breast feeding right now and this wouldn’t be an issue. Shame and disgust pour from my body, I’m a little surprised I’m not slipping over the feelings as I walk they’re so intense.

I just can’t produce milk.

I slip into bed and get situated enough to feed her while we lay there, my eyes barely staying open. I nod off; my arm jerks the bottle from her mouth, she roots around for it, “I’m sorry, so sorry,” and I stuff it back in before she starts screaming again.

I understand the feeling.

He’s sleeping behind me, he always sleeps through everything. I clench my nails into the fat of my thighs until it hurts, then dig a little harder. I clench my teeth. Release. He doesn’t even work tomorrow. Looking over at Reyna I notice she’s asleep, completely, and the bottle is just lying in her mouth dripping formula everywhere.

She’s only drank and ounce.

I struggle out of bed, the C-section incision pulling and tugging as I crawl from one end to the other. I have to sit on the edge of the bed for a second holding my stomach and breathing before I can actually stand. Tears are forming now, I want to push them away so I swipe angrily with the back of my hand but more replace them. They burn against my cheeks.

I hate crying.

After shoving the bottle in the fridge I stand in the doorway, tears tracking down my cheeks like acid. I lock my eyes on the scissors above the bed in the window sill. I want them. So badly do I want them that I curl my fingers in imitation of holding them. It’s all I can think about. All I can process. I begin pacing, to get them is to wake Steven and while I wanted him awake before I don’t want him awake for me to lose my mind.

Four steps to the right, four steps to the left, stop, stare. Start forward, shake my head. Four steps the right, four steps to the left, stop, stare. Clutch my fingers, twine them around themselves and start forward again

.

His eyes pop open. “What are you doing?”

I shake my head and run from the room, escaping into the bathroom. With the door shut he shouldn’t be able to hear me so I sob. Razors dig into my throat as they tear my mouth, Struggling not to scream I cover my lips.

I want to cut so badly.

Eyeing the room like a prisoner given one chance of escape I frantically search for anything even remotely sharp to drag across my skin. There’s a screw in the wall. Fuck infections. I grasp it, the outside cutting into my fingers as I begin unscrewing it from the wall. It’s only dry wall so I know I can do it.

 I manage.

Tears fall onto my legs as I sit on the toilet seat and pull the screw across my thigh. The skin parts like water as redness wells up. I stare. The feelings of hatred and worthlessness are still there so I cut some more - until my thighs look like a patchwork of beef.

Undamaged skin is nowhere to be found.

The door opens then. “I woke up and you were gone.” Then he notices.

“No”, he screams while starting across the floor. I stand, feel blood drip across my thighs, and turn away. He wraps his arms around me in an effort to take the screw and I fight him.

He wins.

His arms stay around my body, chin digging into my head because I’m so short. So fucking short. And fat. His fingers dig into my back and I can hear him start to cry. I stand there, arms at my sides, gaze on the screw he’s thrown to the other side of the room, feeling nothing.

I finally feel nothing.

******

While I had a very extreme case of PPD, it can still happen to any woman. It doesn't mean you’re not strong, it doesn’t mean you don’t love your child, and it doesn’t mean that you can’t function and live through it.

I hate that PPD is frowned on, like it’s something you should be able to fight and not experience. It’s hormones; it’s not you hating your life or your baby. You could be the happiest person in the world and still end up with PPD.

Society needs to start making it normalized so that women can get the help they need when they need it rather than feeling ashamed of things that aren’t their fault. 

As soon as I started feeling like that again, I knew what it was. I didn’t experience it with my first but I’ve dealt and struggled with depression for my entire life. PPD was like an intense unstoppable version of that.

5 months later I am finally feeling normal again and I'm med free. I still have super crappy days where I want to curl into a ball and sob for hours, but mostly I’m ok.

My family is what makes me strong.