Post-partum depression.
It's more than occasional tears or random bouts of sadness.
No.
It goes deeper.
It's utter hopelessness. It's emptiness. It's the ability (?!) to look beyond every blessing, every positive, every comfort to see the nothingness on the other side. It's looking at your new baby and wondering how you will ever manage to keep them alive, let alone happy, because you certainly cannot manage to feel alive or happy yourself.
Women with PPD are horribly undertreated.
Because it is an emotional problem that crops up after one of the most physically and emotionally draining events a person can experience, PPD symptoms are typically swept away in the files of postpartum discomforts. After all, childbirth is hell. Nobody goes through something that major completely unscathed.
So until a major breakdown occurs, women are either over medicated, under treated, or simply told that it will all pass.
Should she dare speak about her symptoms--the sweeping despair, the inability to get out of bed, the desire to be anywhere but where she is--she's reminded of her precious new baby and how blessed she is. She's told to cheer up. She's given a quick hug and assured she isn't alone.
But she is--because when a person does not seek to understand you, there is no way they can ever really be there for you. They can give only surface comfort. A bandaid to a bullet hole.
See, depression isn't a flesh wound--it's a wide, gaping hole. Postpartum depression is that same gaping hope with the added sting of guilt.
You just had a baby. You're a mom now! Why are you sitting here staring off into space? Why doesn't that baby fill you with joy?
The thing is, that baby probably does fill you with joy. You're just so clouded with grief (yes, depression does this--you will alternate between grieving your normalcy and grieving the emptiness gnawing at you now) that joy is a distant cousin who simply doesn't visit you much.
When a celebrity speaks about PPD, they are brave. They're showered with affection and positivity. They're reminded how strong they are and how much the world needs their particular light. "Hold on! Stay strong. You're so brave for telling the truth and getting some help."
When a regular Jane speaks?
Her Facebook statuses are ignored--they're too sad. She's attention-seeking. Her visitors dry up, because no one wants or is comfortable to sit with a sad sack very much. Invites out don't happen because when she can't drag herself out of bed, she's deemed antisocial; when she can, again, who wants to he around a sad sack?!
It's a lonely condition.
Her doctor might give her pills.
Or they might call DFCS.
Being honest about depression is a mine field--on one hand, the doctor might be very understanding and offer counseling, medication, therapy, or a combination thereof to help her bridge from existing to finally being alive. They might even
On the other hand, the doctor may deem her a risk to herself and her kids. She may be sent to a mental treatment center against her will, with social workers swooping in to divide and delegate childcare.
...but generally she'll fall somewhere in the middle. Far too many OB/GYNs are not well versed in spotting PPD, and even fewer understand that the treatment must be more than, "take two of these and call me in the morning." As a result, unless the woman can afford top-notch doctors or muster enough energy to raise a holy enough stink for her own doctor to take her seriously (which, let's be blunt--completely and utterly sucks that this is even a possible scenario), she will dance frantically on the line between surviving another day and caving in to the despair she lugs around every waking moment.
Friends disappear.
Family keeps their distance.
She's stuck with herself.
Only herself.
...at least, it can feel that way. When a person lacks the energy to entertain, the average person either does entirely too much or flatly not enough. Forcing them to talk is bad. Ignoring their voice is also inherently bad.
There's no way to tell which is which, because depression changes a person to the point that who they were is moot to who they are in this moment. They aren't the same and can't really be handled the same.
A strong one will crumble. One usually full of laughter will brim over with tears at the slightest. The life of the party shrinks away into a wallflower in the smallest corner.
