Post by Admin on Nov 6, 2013 17:28:35 GMT 12
Even though we know more education about PNI needs to be 'out there', many people will still probably have heard of postnatal depression in relation mums health postpartum. What really does fly under the radar at the moment is the growing incidence of postnatal illness in dads. So, what might you need to know?
The following excerpt is taken from www.greatfathers.org.nz
Men get post-natal depression, too. It’s not ridiculous or that uncommon. 3% to 10% of new fathers get depressed following the birth.
The symptoms can include feeling very low, not enjoying anything, poor concentration, poor appetite and worrying at night. The future may look bleak and you may feel things are never going to get better.
Postnatal depression is more common among men who have been depressed before … or whose partner is suffering from depression.
Having a new baby is a huge change and challenge for any father. It carries new responsibilities and sometimes feeling exhausted. It can be particularly difficult to balance the demands of work and fatherhood … and a man may pressure himself to earn more while his partner isn’t working.
A man may feel depressed and withdrawn because of the changes in his relationship with his partner. If this is your first baby, before the birth it would have been mostly just you and your partner. But once the baby comes, most of your partner's attention will shift to the baby. This loss of your partner's attention can feel like a loss. Hang in there, it'll get better!
And if you are depressed, talking about it is better than holding it in. One place to start is your GP.
Thankfully there are dads out there talking about their personal experiences. Here is part of one account by Joel Schwartzberg:
"Man up!"
This is the essence of the backlash I got for revealing the suffocating depression I experienced when my first son was born in 1999. I wrote about my emotional plunge last year in a Newsweek essay, as well as in my collection of essays on dadhood, "The 40-Year-Old Version." This week, a major study in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) puts a familiar name on my condition -- Post-Partum Depression or, more accurately, Paternal Post-Natal Depression (PPND).
Many men I've spoken to share a similar story of struggling with depression when their children were first born, but they do so secretly, quietly, away from the dinner table. They understand that there's no truly acceptable place or context for men to publicly reveal being challenged -- much less rocked to the core -- by what I call "sudden parenthood."
I think all parenthood is sudden. Watch all the TV, get all the family advice, read all the manuals you want -- there's just no way to prepare for its wrecking-ball effect on life as you knew it. There's also no parental model for dealing with it honestly and openly. In our parent's generation, stoicism was a paternal virtue.
I love my son dearly, but when he was born -- to my eyes, an oozy bundle of constant need -- it felt as if I had traded in my own life in exchange. I expected paternal pride to hit me like a recovered memory, but all I felt was loss. To his parent's eyes, the child never ages, so the loss felt like a permanent condition, eventually mutating into resentment...
You can read the rest of his article here. So refreshing to hear a father speak out like this... I wonder just how many others are out there suffering in silence? Maybe some of you will find a safe space on this forum to share. I do hope so.
Further great resources and support at: Father and Child
The following excerpt is taken from www.greatfathers.org.nz
Men get post-natal depression, too. It’s not ridiculous or that uncommon. 3% to 10% of new fathers get depressed following the birth.
The symptoms can include feeling very low, not enjoying anything, poor concentration, poor appetite and worrying at night. The future may look bleak and you may feel things are never going to get better.
Postnatal depression is more common among men who have been depressed before … or whose partner is suffering from depression.
Having a new baby is a huge change and challenge for any father. It carries new responsibilities and sometimes feeling exhausted. It can be particularly difficult to balance the demands of work and fatherhood … and a man may pressure himself to earn more while his partner isn’t working.
A man may feel depressed and withdrawn because of the changes in his relationship with his partner. If this is your first baby, before the birth it would have been mostly just you and your partner. But once the baby comes, most of your partner's attention will shift to the baby. This loss of your partner's attention can feel like a loss. Hang in there, it'll get better!
And if you are depressed, talking about it is better than holding it in. One place to start is your GP.
Thankfully there are dads out there talking about their personal experiences. Here is part of one account by Joel Schwartzberg:
"Man up!"
This is the essence of the backlash I got for revealing the suffocating depression I experienced when my first son was born in 1999. I wrote about my emotional plunge last year in a Newsweek essay, as well as in my collection of essays on dadhood, "The 40-Year-Old Version." This week, a major study in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) puts a familiar name on my condition -- Post-Partum Depression or, more accurately, Paternal Post-Natal Depression (PPND).
Many men I've spoken to share a similar story of struggling with depression when their children were first born, but they do so secretly, quietly, away from the dinner table. They understand that there's no truly acceptable place or context for men to publicly reveal being challenged -- much less rocked to the core -- by what I call "sudden parenthood."
I think all parenthood is sudden. Watch all the TV, get all the family advice, read all the manuals you want -- there's just no way to prepare for its wrecking-ball effect on life as you knew it. There's also no parental model for dealing with it honestly and openly. In our parent's generation, stoicism was a paternal virtue.
I love my son dearly, but when he was born -- to my eyes, an oozy bundle of constant need -- it felt as if I had traded in my own life in exchange. I expected paternal pride to hit me like a recovered memory, but all I felt was loss. To his parent's eyes, the child never ages, so the loss felt like a permanent condition, eventually mutating into resentment...
You can read the rest of his article here. So refreshing to hear a father speak out like this... I wonder just how many others are out there suffering in silence? Maybe some of you will find a safe space on this forum to share. I do hope so.
Further great resources and support at: Father and Child