My experience with postnatal anxiety

By Fi Morrison

My journey through motherhood started out rocky. I went through postnatal anxiety as a new mum, and the unfortunate thing is I didn’t even realise what it was at the time. I only recognised my experience as postnatal anxiety (PNA) AFTER I escaped from the struggle.

My hope is that by sharing my experience of PNA, other mums can seek the support they need as soon as possible, so they can enjoy their children’s childhood earlier.

I’ve always been an “anxious” type of person. The type of person who almost obsessively worries about minor details. (Like driving somewhere unfamiliar and having to park somewhere new – the voice inside my head says, “Is there a carpark? Is there street parking? Will I have to reverse parallel park?”). I’m also a perfectionist in my attempt to seek acceptance with others – and of course, with that comes anxiety when I see something I’ve done as “below par” (which, for me, is all the time), or worst of all: when I’m late or behind schedule.

This was my life BEFORE having my son, and yet I never saw it as any type of anxiety-related issue. I just thought this was my personality.

Then we welcomed a little tiny human into the world, and in almost every way possible, everything changed. For starters, we had made the loudest baby in the whole entire universe. He had a decent set of lungs on him, and he clearly wanted everyone to know it. Added on top of that was the sleep deprivation, constant feedings, minimal hygiene practices or food intake, and moving house when my son was three weeks old. We were well and truly wrecked.

The first few weeks of our son’s life is such a blur, I hardly remember the details of the first month or so. What I do remember is that we did it all together: mummy, daddy, newborn son.

And then it came time for my husband to go back to work, and again everything changed. I was now solely responsible for looking after the tiny human for hours at a time, and my natural predisposition to worry emerged even more.

With each passing day, I became more anxious about what the day would bring. This was particularly amplified by my son’s fussiness and loud crying, which escalated around six weeks of age. When he was 1.5 months old I started making plans to take him on more outings, to socialise with other mums. But with his increased screaming sessions, I became extremely anxious. I was worried what the other mums would think. I panicked at the thought of him having a meltdown in public; I was afraid that I would be stuck in the middle of the shopping centre with a screaming baby.

I attempted several outings which ended in disaster. At mother’s group – which had 16 other mums and bubs, plus the health care nurses – you couldn’t hear anyone over the sound of my son crying for over half an hour. I rushed back to my car and called my husband in tears. On another occasion, I was racing through the supermarket with my screaming son in the pram, with onlookers displaying looks of extreme annoyance, occasional sympathy, and downright pity.

My last straw was attending a sleep seminar. The event went for 2 hours, and my son had done really well up until the last 20 minutes, when he started to fuss. I quickly packed him in the pram to leave (to be fair, it was his bed time), and I had other mothers giving me what I felt were looks of disgust and judgement as I hurried out. That was it. That was the moment where I felt my anxiety burst. I couldn’t take it anymore.

So I stopped going out. I cancelled plans to socialise. I made up excuses for why we couldn’t go out (usually to do with my son’s sleep); and unless hubby was with me, I refused to even shop. For almost six weeks, I became a hermit. Of course, that didn’t curb my anxiety. My son still had screaming sessions at home. Sometimes I’d put him down in the cot, come out to the kitchen and swear my head off, before bawling my eyes out. I hated how angry, and then how guilty, I felt.

And then it was like a switch was flicked in my son. Around 12 weeks, he calmed right down. In fact, he was like a completely different child. To this day, he is the most placid and chilled baby you could ever meet.

I didn’t realise until after he chilled out just how anxious I had been. As he started to relax, so too did my anxiety. I slowly built up the courage to venture out of the house.

Week by week, I made plans to catch up with friends in public. I left the house more regularly with my son, less worried about a meltdown. It was only after talking to other new mums that I realised my fears and panic about leaving the house weren’t “normal”. I thought because I wasn’t having panic attacks, or I wasn’t “depressed”, that I was fine. But I know now that I wasn’t coping very well.

What I do know is that with the encouragement of family and friends, I have managed to work through my anxiety. I now work out of my comfort zone, making plans I know I’ll be anxious about in an attempt to work through my anxiety. And I have become a PANDA Community Champion to bring awareness to postnatal anxiety in the hopes that other mums will seek support sooner to allow them to enjoy their baby’s childhood.

If you are looking for more information on postnatal anxiety or depression, or would like someone to talk to, check out the PANDA website, or call their hotline on 1300 726 306 (Mon-Fri, 9am-7.30pm).

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