I’m Ready to Start Talking about Long PND

I cried my eyes out in the shower this morning. Wept until my lips were puffed and my eyes felt drunk. Perhaps I should have a drink? Let my body catch up with my mind.

It’s been four years since I was diagnosed with post-natal depression. Four years of on-and-off counselling, non-stop anti-depressants and relapses that have only been made worse by this year’s uber-trigger, Covid-19 — have you heard of it?

Let’s put this in context; before my boy — I think Mumsnet insists I must refer to him as DS (darling son) was born, I was a picture of mental strength. It’s not to say life hadn’t been without its rough edges, but I was a master in mind-over-matter. Not only that, but I believed that mental wellness was a choice, like physical activity; as much as you could control your own weight by giving in to a dirty great tray of Krispy Kremes or not, you could surely decide whether to indulge in a little episode of sadness — yes, I was a depression denier.

I got pregnant in one of the more unconventional ways; being married to a woman, and being one myself, it took several rounds of cerebral ‘rock, paper, scissors’ to land on the decision that I would carry my spouse’s (DW’s?) fertilised embryo — the veritable oven to her bun. After just one successful round of IVF, there I was: my eggo was preggo.

One of the first questions the midwife / doctor / health professional / counsellor asks you when they’re collectively trying to decide whether you have post-natal depression (it’s far from a private affair) is, “how was the pregnancy and the birth?”

Fine. Uneventful. Nice, even. I felt grounded, as a pregnant woman. I felt like I’d reached the natural conclusion of something I’d wanted for myself for many years. As someone who considered themselves hugely maternal (spoiler alert: turns out it’s not that clear cut), I felt confident, pleasingly spherical and like I was absolutely acing what the human race had asked of me.

The birth wasn’t as straight-forward, although that in itself is something — we find out afterwards — that was probably never going to follow a well-rehearsed routine. Birth is described to us beforehand as a ritual that, although potentially excruciating, should be something of a polished chorus line. An ensemble cast of midwives and your wide-eyed co-star spouse would be ready to help you perform your big number, as women have done for millennia. Speaking to mothers after-the-fact, you find out that everything from waters breaking to labour times, stitches, latching, the attitudes of severe matrons and the lack, or otherwise, of sleep is as slick a performance as you attempting one last high-kick and stumbling off the stage into the orchestra pit.

My own birth plan was this: have baby, so you can hardly accuse me of having pre-conceived notions of what it would be like, but as it was, I felt somewhat robbed. My baby boy, breach for the last couple of months (this baby was not for turning), would be born by planned C-section. There was absolutely no spontaneity to his conception, having been meticulously planned by fertility doctors, and now it seemed there would be no mystique to his arrival either. Where’s the fun in that?

And so he was born; plucked from my unassuming womb, although — and I’m thankful for this—my body had started to go into labour that morning, prompting a little rush of adrenaline that something was happening unaided by science. I was ill afterwards. Blurred vision, nausea and fatigue transpired as a haemorrhage; after filling one of those awful cardboard sick bowls, one press of the buzzer and a full medical team swarmed round me. In the musical analogy, it was the dramatic plot twist. Without so much as a drink or chat-up line, a doctor was elbow deep in me, pulling clots out of my body as I sucked air in tightly at the pain, watching my new family pace themselves around the room in fear.

The calm after the storm broke almost instantly, for those around me, at least. After life-altering surgery and a whirlwind medical intervention, all attention turns instantly to your new baby, my own included. Is he latching, is he too hot, is he really mine, does he love me yet? The questions, both trivial and deep did not subside for well over 9 months, or the fourth trimester as some clever clogs have called it.

My son was a grumpy baby; seemingly as unimpressed by every activity we tried (baby sign language, baby massage, baby yoga — he was already becoming more cultured than me), he would squawk his way through it and I would have to pretend to be delighted to be added to another Whatsapp group of smiling mums who seemed to be operating on an entirely different planet to me. My frustration was intensifying; one session of baby yoga, where we were asked to carry our 5lb babies on our heads and walk around the space resulted in me shouting (yes, out loud), “what’s the fucking point?” — a question I stand by, even now.

We tried cranial osteopathy, filling him full of porridge at the earliest opportunity, sat through hours of cluster feeding, had Ewan-the-cocking-sheep on non-stop repeat but nothing seemed to cheer his spirits. The osteopath suggested his fight or flight was over-sensitive, and knowing him as the delicate chap he’s become now, adept at explaining his discomfort to anyone who’ll listen, I’d like to tell her she was right. And son, it’s something I have every sympathy for now.

So what was post-natal depression like? Was it endless? Did it brood continuously through every waking moment? The photos of him and I laughing and playing, him cooing, me fawning over him suggest not, although it’s very difficult to hang on to those memories when the other ones — the dark ones — seem so intent on rearing their heads. There were days where I couldn’t look at him; times where the depression hung so low in my eyes that it was as visible as a bruise. There was so much crying in the car on the way home from visiting other mothers and babies and more than one call to the doctor to say, “I don’t think I’m having a good time here.”

There was counselling, an unpicking of my own childhood, parts of which I’d neatly, gladly boxed up — it was practical of me to do so; a necessity. There was guilt, so much guilt as the realisation that I wasn’t the mother I had always wanted to be became apparent. I bought bunch after bunch of bananas, with the keen intention to make my baby a healthy weaning snack, and as bunch after bunch became overripe, soggy even, they would be discarded, a reminder of my failings at being ‘the’ mother.

There was a brief return to work, an escape from the four walls I’d started to loathe (more on that later), and then the rather bold decision to start my own business. If PND had given me anything positive, it was a rather devil-may-care attitude to life; the worst had seemingly happened, i’d succumbed to depression at the time when I should be feeling like I had everything I’d ever wished for. For good or bad, I started to see little to no value in my own life, considering suicide just a handful of times, in a detached, unemotional way. Please don’t think for a second that i’m minimising it; it’s just that at the time, it seemed like a pretty rational course of action — a solution to the grief I was feeling.

I wrote “grief”, just then, almost absent-mindedly, but in some ways, that’s what it was; I was grieving the loss of my old mental state, my old life, my old coping mechanisms and my old relationship. I haven’t spoken about my co-star, as her memories are hers to share, but I think it’s safe to say our relationship took a pounding. She was used to being married to a resilient Jedi master-of-her-own-mind, and here I was, calling her almost daily as she was on long shifts with the NHS, asking her to talk me through bedtime with our baby as I breathlessly sobbed.

I realise now how much my old coping mechanisms (see: alcohol) skewed the notion that I was mentally untouchable. I wasn’t of course, and it’s no surprise to me now that I have since been ‘diagnosed’ with ADHD. It’s a revelation, in your 30s, but it explains so much of my previous experiences and intolerance to much of the necessities of life — and more tellingly, motherhood. It was through counselling that I had started to realise I had a neuro-diverse way of thinking; I am hypersensitive to noise, smell and some feelings; I am easily bored, drawn to risk-taking and I have little to no ‘stop’ button when it comes to partying. These qualities shouldn’t appear top of your C.V. when applying for ‘Mother of the Year’. Maternity leave was prison for my mind. I am currently sat in the spot where I spent hours upon hours breastfeeding my guzzling child, feeling paralysed, both mentally and physically. I was used to ‘doing’, creating and exploring; turns out nurturing, relaxing and calming your child aren’t great bedfellows to those ADHD traits.

And so here we are now, I’m writing this on the much-indented sofa I whiled away many unhappy months, during this latest period of self-isolation: Lockdown Part Deux. Typical of the WebMD generation, I have self-diagnosed as suffering Long PND. If Covid, even in its nascent existence can have a ‘Long-’ prefix, then so can I.

Lockdown: the Original was a massively triggering experience. I can only imagine it’s what PTSD feels like, although again, I’m self-diagnosing. Almost overnight, just like with motherhood, my job, my liberties and my mental strength were obliterated, it seemed. My wife, being one of those front line heroes to whom we’re so indebted, was, of course, one of those pairs of hands to the pump. She was again working long shifts as I poorly navigated domesticity with my child.

I was right back there. Context, sense, resilience were all gone; I called my Mum and emotions swept over me as they had done in those hard post-natal days, me adamant that I just couldn’t go through it again. She had to watch me, through Facetime, unravel as I had done a few sad times before. The depression was back; it filled my eyes like murky puddle water.

Lockdown ended in its most severe form, and we — I — started to rebuild. There are two things I can be proud of out of this whole situation; number one, and taking a clear lead, is my exquisite child and number two, digging deep and continuing to work (to varying levels of proficiency) throughout the whole goddam affair. Celebrating three years recently of self-employment, and paying it forward by employing two sensational colleagues-in-arms is not to be sniffed at. Yeah, I’m proud of that.

So what’s got up my nose this time? Despite the rebuilding, the counselling, the working-on-being-the-best-version-of-myself, I’m back here again. Crying in the shower. Under house arrest and exposing my child to a side of me I hoped would be swept under the rug of his earliest years.

I worried… worry, that my bought of illness and the apparent relapses will affect our relationship, but it certainly hasn’t gotten in the way of him being a deeply inquisitive, fiercely assertive boy. I don’t know how to fix that; there is no cure nor set treatment for Long-PND. Especially seeing as I just invented it. Perhaps talking about it, ‘over-sharing’ as the cynical side of me would see it, will be a step. Catharsis for me, an insight for you.

But this, this is what I need you to know, son, in case the lingering nature of online testimony sees you ever reading this: my god, do I love you. And it was never in doubt.