Yesterday, I cried.

Warning: if you are currently having a rough time with PPMD, you may want to avoid this post. It contains potential triggers.

Yesterday, I cried. It wasn't a messy cry. It was a quiet, gentle, soft cry, with small tears and no snotty nose. But it was still a cry.

Why did I cry?

I cried because Cynthia Wachenheim killed herself.

The story I linked above, from the New York Times, reads:

Sometime before 3:25 p.m. Wednesday, Cynthia Wachenheim, a lawyer who was on child-care leave from her job, wrote out a note. On lined notebook paper, it ran for 13 pages.

According to a law enforcement official who has seen the note, she wrote that her infant son, Keston Bacharach, had previously taken a few tumbles, including “two shameful incidents,” a fall from a Gymini play set onto the wood floor when she walked out of the room for five minutes, and off a bed. She blamed herself, and was convinced that those falls had led to a series of concussions and seizures that aggravated or contributed to maladies that would harm him for the rest of his life.

Her friends, family members and pediatrician did not believe her, she wrote. But she noticed changes in the baby — changes that only a mother who spends all day with her child would notice. For instance, she wrote, her son had grown sleepier and cried more frequently.

She wrote that she could not bear the thought that he might suffer because she had failed to protect him. She wrote that what she was about to do was “evil.” 

She then jumped out of her eighth-floor window. She left behind the note. She did not leave behind her son, strapping him to her body in a Ergobaby carrier, bringing him down with her as she crashed to the ground, the crack sounding like a gunshot to people passing by.

Ms. Wachenheim, 44, died. But her 10-month-old son, apparently cushioned by her body, survived. He bounced out of the carrier and suffered only a bruised cheek.

“I’m sure you understand, I’m absolutely overwhelmed with grief,” her husband, Hal Bacharach, said in a brief telephone conversation Thursday from his apartment at the Sutton, a new sleek building at 147th Street and Bradhurst Avenue in Harlem, where he had lived with his wife.

“I have my son, who was lucky enough to survive, in my lap,” Mr. Bacharach said, sounding in shock as he repeated similar words several times. “It’s unbelievable. Right now my crying son is in my arms.” A child could be heard whimpering as he spoke.

Ms. Wachenheim’s leap was a jarring twist in the life of a highly educated, socially conscious woman who had been active in a women’s group in her synagogue, B’nai Jeshurun on the Upper West Side, and, according to her college class notes, had been a coordinator for a Harlem tutoring program.

She was on leave from her $122,800-a-year job as an associate court attorney in the Manhattan State Supreme Court system, court officials said. She had worked for the courts since 1997, doing legal research and helping judges write opinions.

Christian Johnson, a lawyer who lives a few doors down, said he had seen Ms. Wachenheim twice last week. There was no indication “that anything was askew in their household,” he said. “I was shocked.”

The baby seemed normal, he said. Mr. Johnson would sometimes ride the train with Mr. Bacharach, who never said anything about developmental issues. “Hal never mentioned that to me,” Mr. Johnson said.

But Mr. Bacharach’s mother, Barbara Bacharach, said that her daughter-in-law had not been her usual self lately.

Mr. Johnson said he had overheard the couple arguing — which he said was very unlike them — about two hours before Ms. Wachenheim jumped. He paused in the hallway to make sure it was nothing serious, then moved on when it seemed like a normal marital spat. “He was just asking her why she didn’t answer the phone and why wouldn’t she pick up the phone,” he said. “He just kept asking her and she wouldn’t respond.”

Several times in her note, according to the law enforcement official, Ms. Wachenheim expressed deep love for her son, referring to him as “beautiful.”

She said that she would give her life to bring his health back and that she hated herself for the first time in her life. She believed that her son’s falls might have brought about a serious medical condition, perhaps cerebral palsy or autism, which would have “lifelong consequences.”

Her belief that she failed to prevent it caused her to “crumble.” She wrote that she was depressed and could no longer socialize. She was sure that people would see her behavior as postpartum depression or psychosis.

Dr. Catherine Birndorf, a reproductive psychiatrist at Weill Cornell Medical College, said the word “evil” in the note stood out for her. “Usually these intensely lethal acts happen in the context of losing some kind of touch with reality,” she said. “What mother in their right mind would kill their kid?”

Postpartum depression does not usually lead to suicide and homicide, she said, unless it is left untreated or progresses to more serious mental illness, like psychosis. She compared it to the case of Andrea Yates, the Texas woman who was found not guilty by reason of insanity of drowning her five children in the bathtub. Ms. Yates, who had been struggling with postpartum psychosis, thought that she was a bad mother and that she was protecting her children by killing them, Dr. Birndorf said.

About 10 to 20 percent of new mothers have postpartum depression, according to the state health department, and only 1 or 2 out of 1,000 new mothers have postpartum psychosis. Postpartum psychosis is characterized by delusions, often about the baby, agitation, anger, paranoia, and sometimes commands to harm the infant. It has a 5 percent suicide rate and a 4 percent infanticide rate, according to the health department.

Ms. Wachenheim was valedictorian at Colonie Central High School, near Albany, and graduated from what is now known as the University at Buffalo, and from Columbia University Law School. In 1993, she traveled to Pakistan to work in a law office specializing in women’s rights and worked on subjects like “honor killings” of women suspected of adultery, according to an article at the time in The Times Union of Albany.

Mr. Bacharach said he met his wife on a bus to Boston and was smitten by her “innate kindness.” They were married in 2009, two years after she bought her apartment at the Sutton for $190,750, according to city records.

It is across the street from Jackie Robinson Park, where neighbors said Ms. Wachenheim took her newborn to the outdoor pool in the summer.

Randy Leonard and Sheelagh McNeill contributed reporting.

A version of this article appeared in print on March 15, 2013, on page A19 of the New York edition with the headline: Mother Knew Her Final Act Was Evil One.

I When I read this, I cried for Cynthia. In fact, I'm crying right now while I write this. I don't know that I know the exact pain she was struggling with, but I know the type of pain that leads you to think that maybe the best solution is to kill yourself. I know the kind of pain that makes you feel hopeless and like you're just hurting everyone around you. I know the pain that says "Everyone would be better off if I was gone". I know the pain of "What if I hurt my baby?".

I think it's important to note that this article does not say definitively whether or not Cynthia had a diagnosis of any type of Postpartum Mood and Anxiety Disorders, but the article does list several things that can be symptomatic of PPMD, and there's the fact that the article lists her son as being 10 months old (PPMD can rear their ugly heads at any time in the first 12 months after giving birth, and does not necessarily go away just because a mother and baby hit the baby's first birthday). I feel that it's important to note that I am not diagnosing Cynthia with anything. I'm not an M.D., R.N., C.N.M., or any other type of medical/mental health professional, and I don't know nearly enough about Cynthia and her history/situation to make that call.

Regardless of whether or not Cynthia was suffering from a PPMD, she was obviously hurting and struggling with a great burden. I've never met Cynthia but I know that she was so upset and hurting so much in some way that she decided the best thing for her and her baby was for both of them to die, that that was the best way to protect them. I can't say that I can't imagine what she was going through, but I think I can, just a little bit.

Cynthia is the reason why I blog. Her baby, who could have died with her but didn't, is why I blog. Her husband and the rest of her family and friends are why I blog. They are why I cry now. The world is such a cold hard place and for some people that is more true than it is for others. And when I hear about stories like this, it makes my heart hurt. I wish I could go to New York a few days ago and hug Cynthia. I wish I could tell her "It's okay, Cynthia. You're not a bad mom. You need help, let's go talk to a professional. I'll go with you and hold your hand so you're not alone. But you don't have to do this.". I wish I could save her, save all the people she leaves behind. But I can't. All the wishes in the world won't change that. All I can do is hope that she is at peace now and pray for those she leaves behind.

I can't save Cynthia, and as much as I want to, I don't have the technology to be able to go back in time to tell her those things. But I can tell you. And so, I am.

If you are out there reading this and you are hurting, let me help you. If you feel hopeless, please know that there is hope. There is always hope, even when you can't see it. If you feel like you can't go on, you can, and I will go with you. I HAVE BEEN THERE. I was hospitalized twice after my first daughter was born for that very reason. I have survived Postpartum Depression, Postpartum Anxiety, and Postpartum Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder. Cynthia's story is how mine could all too easily have ended if I hadn't gotten help.

You do not have to go through PPMD alone. Let me walk with you. You are not alone and you are not a bad anything. You are the most beautiful and fantastic you that could ever exist.

If you need help, let me help you.

Please.

No more Nuva Ring for me

At my 6 week postpartum checkup, my OB went ahead and got me started on the Nuva Ring. I wasn't particularly fond of the idea of using the mini-pill or another similar "lite" form of birth control since that's what I was on when I got pregnant this last time around. Don't get me wrong, I love my son. Just as my daughters do, he makes my world a little brighter and more full and I wouldn't trade him for anything in the world. However, I really need a little longer than 3 months before I get pregnant again.

IUD's aren't an option I'm willing to consider because I've known too many women who got pregnant on them and then had to hold their breath waiting for the doctor to remove the IUD and hope that neither the wait nor the removal would hurt the baby or the mom. If I'm going to end up pregnant on birth control, I'd rather it be a method that I can discontinue as soon as I find out I'm pregnant. I wanted something convenient and easy, that I wouldn't have to worry about whether I took it at exactly the right time, etc. This pretty much left my options at Nuva Ring or the Patch. I've used the Path before and had good success with it but the doctor wanted to try the Ring first instead.

At the end of the cycle, I said "That's it, I'm done.". It made me WAY too tired. I was having trouble getting off the couch before noon (literally) and had no energy the rest of the day. My mood swings were a little worse, all sorts of fun stuff. Finally I decided that I couldn't go on like that and when the day came that I was supposed to switch it out (the doctor had said to just do it back to back) I just didn't put another one in.It didn't take long before I started to have more energy and notice that my moods were not quite as volatile.

Here's where this ties in with PPMD though: my intrusive thoughts (symptomatic of Postpartum OCD) got a LOT better. I still occasionally have some trouble with them but nothing like they were before I took out the Ring. It makes me reluctant to try another hormonal method of birth control because I don't want to risk having more issues crop up. I need to talk to my doctor about it and see what she recommends but for now, I'm just happy to be feeling better.

You just don't realize how lucky you are

As I've said before, a question that I hear a lot is "What can I do to help?" or "What should I say to my friend who's struggling with *insert PPMD here*?". I've written about things that can help; today, I'd like to discuss what NOT to say.

One of the things that irritates me to no end is when people say things like "Well you just don't know how lucky you are that your baby is healthy" or "You're luckier than you realize". That type of statement can get me seeing red and breathing fire in about the same amount of time it takes my dog to jump up on the chair to pull a plate of food off of the middle of the dining room table, which is to say, pretty darned fast. My feelings about that genre of statement are complex and I doubt that I can adequately express why I feel the way I do (or even the extent of how I feel) but I'm going to give it a shot.

Whether or not the person spouting this pearl of wisdom realizes it, this type of statement assigns blame to the mother for feeling the things she feels, for fighting the battle she's fighting. The message is that if you would just REALIZE how lucky you are, your troubles would disappear. For one thing, we're not stupid. For those of us with healthy babies, we know we're lucky. I think mos - if not all - of us know at least one person whose baby had to stay in the NICU with health problems, was stillborn, died after birth, etc. We KNOW how easily it could be us watching our baby fight to survive. For some women, they have been there before, You're not telling us anything we don't know and you're not giving us some great key to unlock the door that will magically release us from whatever battle we're fighting.

If it were as easy as realizing how lucky we were, don't you think that the number of women suffering from PPMD would be significantly lower, if not completely erased? One of the things that made it so hard for me to seek help the first time around was knowing how lucky I was and feeling guilty for not being "more appreciative and grateful for that".

If you say or have said this, you probably didn't even realize that it can (and often does) come across like this. But now that you do know, please don't say it to us any more. Regardless of whether we're dealing with baby blues in the first few weeks postpartum, or a more serious PPMD such as Postpartum Depression, we don't need to hear that we "just need to realize how lucky [we] are". We already know; it doesn't help.

Happy 100th Blog Post and Happy Strong Start Day 2012

Today I have hit a milestone in my blogging. This is the 100th post that I've published to Through The Tunnel. My first post was on December 14, 2009. I had recently found out that my pregnancy with Elizabeth had caused me to develop hypothyroidism. Depression can be a symptom of hypothyroidism and the doctor and I were confident that 

if we could get my thyroid levels back within normal limits the PPD would clear up.

Knowing that there was a medical reason for the PPD was freeing for me; it was a huge relief to know that there was something we could do to actually fix the problem. I literally cried tears of joy when the nurse called and told me that my lab results showed my TSH and T-4 levels as being so far outside the range of Normal Limits that my thyroid had practically stopped working at all. 

I started taking Synthroid and sure enough, within just a few weeks there was a noticeable difference. 3 months of thyroid medication did what 6 months of antidepressants, antianxiety medication, and sleep aids had not and I was able to come off of all my medication except, of course, the Synthroid. I can't express how much relief I felt at hearing the doctor say that I was "considered successfully treated". 

When I received that diagnosis of PostPartum Depression and was hospitalized, the shame and guilt that I felt were overwhelming. I was sure that I would never be able to tell anyone my terrible secret. I limited the people who knew to only those who HAD to know. I asked my parents not to tell anyone else in the family. My husband, being in the military, had to tell his Chain of Command, there was no way around that, but I asked that the information be limited to only those who absolutely HAD to know. I was terrified that people would find out and look at me differently, that they would be horrified and think the same thing I did, that I was a terrible wife and mother, that I was a failure. I was sure that nobody I knew had ever gone through anything like this and there was nobody else who would understand.

I know differently now. I know that none of what happened was my fault and that there was nothing to be ashamed of, that it didn't make me a failure. I know that there are other people who have been through the same thing. Some of those are people I know in person. Some of them are people I know solely from online interactions but I love and respect them just as much as anyone I've ever met in real life.

One of those people is Katherine Stone. Katherine is an absolutely wonderful person, and one of the strongest people I know. From her website,

Katherine Stone (@postpartumprog) is the founder and editor of Postpartum Progress, the leading blog on postpartum depression, and a parenting columnist for Disney’s Babble.com.  She’s also the founder of Postpartum Progress Inc., a national nonprofit focused on vastly improving support for women with perinatal mood and anxiety disorders.

Katherine and PostPartum Progress were my inspiration for starting my own blog about my journey. PostPartum Progress was a wonderful resource for me when I was in the midst of my PPD and has continued to be a wealth of information; I frequently link the blog posts on my Facebook and Twitter because they are so well written and have such an important message. PostPartum Progress is where I found the link to My PostPartum Voice, which led me to the Twitter community #PPDChat and a whole world of support that I never dreamed existed.

The work that PostPartum Progress does is beyond calculable value. In a post titled How Many Women Get PostPartum Depression? The Statistics on PPD, Katherine estimates that each year in the United States of America alone, the number of women who suffer PostPartum Depression is approximately 950,000 women with approximately 1.3 million women suffering from postpartum mood and anxiety disorders, expanding from PPD to include those such as PostPartum OCD and PostPartum Psychosis. That's more women than are diagnosed annually with Breast Cancer (the National Cancer Institute puts that number at approximately 230,000 women). October is well known for being Breast Cancer Awareness month with chain stores selling pink merchandise to benefit breast cancer research and awareness, teams like the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders doing special routines with special costumes for BCA, celebrities doing major breast cancer awareness campaigns, and so much more. Breast Cancer Awareness is well and good but where are the major awareness, education, and outreach campaigns for PPMD?

The shame and guilt that I felt, that so many other women feel every day, is largely due to the lack of public awareness and education, to the stigma, misconceptions, misunderstandings, and myths that are so prevalent in our society. PostPartum Progress is working actively to combat that and change the tide, to make people aware of the realities of PPMD and to let women like me know that we're not alone. When you feel like you're floating alone at sea, struggling to keep your head above water, that realization is like a life preserver being thrown to you by the Coast Guard to keep you afloat until the rescue swimmers can get you to safety.

PostPartum Progress can't do it alone though. Last year, Katherine came up with the idea to do Strong Start Day. The idea behind Strong Start Day is that since October 5 is the day of the year that, statistically, the most babies are born, it makes sense to have that  be a day to focus fundraising efforts towards raising money to help PostPartum Progress expand their capabilities and improve their resources so that they can help give more new moms and babies a strong start.

PostPartum Progress helps and supports so many women and families. It seems appropriate to me to dedicate my 100th blog post to supporting someone who has supported me and supports so many other women who are in similar situations or worse. I'm asking that my friends, family, and anyone else who's reading consider supporting PostPartum Progress. As stated in her post about Strong Start Day 2012, 

My goal for Strong Start Day 2012 is to raise enough money to allow Postpartum Progress Inc. to translate what we have done online into offline materials. I am asked all the time by nurses, doulas, physicians’ offices and if they can use the words we have created here to help mothers understand what they’re going through and that they can get better. They want our words because they believe we reach moms in a safe and accessible way. They want and need materials from us, materials that I have yet been able to give them because I haven’t had the funding to create them. Not every new mom is online. Plenty don’t have Twitter accounts. They aren’t on Pinterest. We need more ways to reach moms who need help.

This Friday, October 5th, is the 2nd annual Strong Start Day for Postpartum Progress. We only ask for your help one day a year because we don’t believe in bombarding our friends with continual requests for donations. I know I get zillions of them — in my inbox, my mailbox. We want this one day — October 5th, the day each year on which more babies are born than any other — to be the one day you are reminded to give whatever support you can to Postpartum Progress, and to encourage everyone who loves you and who believes moms should know more about postpartum depression to support us too. I hope you’ll join us.

If you'd like to donate to PostPartum Progress, you can follow the link or click the red button below. I hope you'll consider joining me in donating to this cause that has meant so much to me and to so many other women. Regardless of whether you can donate monetarily, please spread the word in some way, whether it's sharing the link to this blog post or sharing Katherine's links.

Over the last 3 years and 100 blog posts, so much has changed for me. New babies, a cross-country move, and so much more. What hasn't changed is that many many many other women are suffering, some in silence, from PPMD, and that PostPartum Progress is there to provide support, education, and a variety of resources. What does need to change is the lack of awareness in today's society. Today, we have the chance to help power that change. Will you join me in supporting Katherine and PostPartum Progress?

P.S.
As another show of support, if you're reading this, will you leave a comment below encouraging Katherine in her efforts to advocate for Warrior Moms everywhere?

PostPartum Depression, PostPartum Psychosis, it's all the same thing, right?

There's a saying that goes "You say po-tay-to, I say po-tah-to...". I've never heard it actually used specifically in reference to the pronunciation of the word "potato"; instead, it is usually used as an illustration or argument that although two things may sound different, they're really the same thing. Sometimes this is a legitimate point. Sometimes, however, it is quite the opposite.

You might be asking "What do sayings about potatoes have to do with PostPartum Depression?". Something that I hear a lot is people talking about "She killed her child because she has PostPartum Depression". This often comes up in discussions that reference Andrea Yates and/or Otty Sanchez. Currently, I'm hearing it tossed around in reference to Chevonne Thomas, a mother with a history of mental illness and drug use who decapitated her 2 year old son and then killed herself. I would like to note, I have not read anything indicating that the cause of her actions has been determined through investigation/diagnosis by medical professionals to be a PPMD. The only diagnoses I'm seeing are coming from people around the web who are immediately jumping to the conclusion that since she was a mother and killed her child, it must be a PPMD.

Without even getting into the issues that come with immediately assuming that someone who does something bad MUST have a mental illness, and specifically that a mother would only kill her child if she had a PPMD, the issue I'd like to focus on is the misuse of the term "PostPartum Depression". Otty Sanchez and Andrea Yates did not have PPD. They were both suffering from PostPartum Psychosis.

What far too many people don't realize is that PostPartum Depression and PostPartum Psychosis are not at all the same thing. They are both PostPartum Mood Disorders but they are two separate PPMD. The terms get used interchangeably (usually, in my experience, with people substituting PostPartum Depression for PostPartum Psychosis) but that is not as it should be. It's no more accurate to think/claim that they are the same thing than it would be to say someone has Breast Cancer when what they actually have is Lung Cancer.

The Mayo Clinic lists the following as symptoms of the two:

Postpartum depression symptomsPostpartum depression may appear to be the baby blues at first — but the signs and symptoms are more intense and longer lasting, eventually interfering with your ability to care for your baby and handle other daily tasks. Postpartum depression symptoms may include:

• Loss of appetite
• Insomnia
• Intense irritability and anger
• Overwhelming fatigue
• Loss of interest in sex
• Lack of joy in life
• Feelings of shame, guilt or inadequacy
• Severe mood swing
• Difficulty bonding with the baby
• Withdrawal from family and friends
• Thoughts of harming yourself or the baby

Untreated, postpartum depression may last for a year or more.

Postpartum psychosisWith postpartum psychosis — a rare condition that typically develops within the first two weeks after delivery — the signs and symptoms are even more severe. Signs and symptoms of postpartum psychosis may include:

• Confusion and disorientation
• Hallucinations and delusions
• Paranoia
• Attempts to harm yourself or the baby

When I was being admitted for my hospitalizations for PPD a few years ago, they specifically asked if I was hearing voices or seeing things/people. I've known some people who said that when they were suffering PPP, they had an overwhelming feeling that there was a demonic force waiting to snatch their baby. Some think that they are hearing from God to kill their baby to save it from some disastrous fate. With both PPD and PPP, although there are guidelines, markers, and symptoms that health professionals look for to diagnose a PPMD, there is no guarantee that all mothers will feel an entire checklist or experience the symptoms in the same way or at the same time. In my opinion, the unpredictability is one of the things that makes PPMD so difficult. You can't just assume that someone with a PPMD will look, act, or talk a certain way. There is no one face of PPMD. There is no "This is what a PPMD always looks like or acts like".

Katherine Stone of PostPartum Progress (yes, linking to my favorite PPD blog again) has a couple of excellent posts about the Symptoms of PostPartum Anxiety and Depression and the Symptoms of PostPartum Depression. These lists are written in "Plain-Mama English". They make the symptoms a lot easier to understand and relate to, as well as getting a lot more in-depth than most symptom lists on the internet. If you're wondering about the differences between PPD and PPP, I highly recommend going to those two posts and reading what she has to say.

PostPartum Depression and PostPartum Psychosis are both horrible illnesses. They can both be completely debilitating and, if left untreated, have long-lasting and tragic consequences and implications for the new mother, her baby, her family, her friends, and any number of people. They are both illnesses that I hope someday soon will be the topic of more research and public education campaigns. Neither of them are anything I would ever wish on my worst enemy and they are both something that, in my wildest dreams, I would love to somehow see totally eradicated from the face of the earth. Yes, they have some similarities and some shared symptoms, but that doesn't mean they are the same thing or that they should be referred to as the same thing or the terms used interchangeably. Please, educate yourself on the differences between the two and then spread your knowledge on to other people. Educating ourselves and others, and being willing to speak up and say "Hey, you realize that's not accurate, right?" when we see/hear someone using the terms incorrectly is a good place to start on fighting the stigmas and combating the ignorance that surrounds PPMD.

Breast is not always best, part 2.

Note: I'd like to refer everyone to a post I wrote a couple of months ago about the fact that there are antidepressants you can take while breastfeeding.


In a previous post, I wrote about why Breast is not alwaysbest. Today, I’d like to discuss a specific facet of that.

Usually, people who espouse the idea that Breast Is Always Best will acknowledge that “Of course this doesn’t extend to women with legitimate medical issues”. Here’s the problem that I often see: these people will either not truly acknowledge PostPartum Depression as a legitimate medical problem, or the women with PPD will not realize that they fall inside this criteria and will still succumb to the guilt of “If I get help and have to stop nursing my baby because of medications, I am not doing what is best for my baby”, thus either prolonging the time they go without treatment or, if they do seek treatment, adding unnecessary guilt which may make it even harder to deal with the PPD. Also, when women give a reason other than a “legitimate medical problem”, they are dismissed and scorned as “selfish”. What those doing the dismissing too often fail to take into consideration is that the new mother may in fact have something like PPD going on below the surface that they either don’t realize or don’t want to talk about it.

Even if there is no medical problem, again, if they just do not want to nurse, they should not be made to feel guilty for that. As I stated in my previous post, a woman who breastfeeds due to pressure and guilt, despite not wanting to for her own reasons, may end up suffering negative repercussions such as difficulty bonding, depression, and a host of other problems.

We need to get away from this idea that the only acceptable reason to not breastfeed is to have a “legitimate medical problem”. We need to realize that using this terminology and pushing this mindset may cause those very problems. Who are we to decide what constitutes a “legitimate” reason to make a particular non-life threatening choice?

Of all the issues that we could be devoting our time and energy to, we choose to spend it on judging women for why they choose to feed their child a certain way? As I’ve said before, by all means, let’s educate people about the benefits that breastfeeding can give to both mother and and baby; benefits such as passing along to the baby the mother’s immunities, reducing the mother’s risk of cancer, assisting the mother with weight-loss, the fact that breastmilk contains/helps the baby develop pro-biotics and pre-biotics, and many other positive benefits and side-effects . But please, let’s do so in a manner that makes the mother feel empowered to make an educated choice as to what she feels is best for her and her baby and family, rather than feeling judged for making her choice, a manner that does not add to the stigma, myths, and problems that women with PPD (and their families) already face.

Let's make Capitol Hill take notice that PPMD needs to be a priority.

Once again, I've been inspired by something I read on PostPartum Progress. Today, Katherine posted the following article:

Yesterday, the federal government heralded the Affordable Care Act and how it helps women.  They touted the fact that, “20.4 million women with private health insurance gained expanded preventive services with no cost-sharing in 2011, including mammograms, cervical cancer screenings, prenatal care, flu and pneumonia shots, and regular well-baby and well-child visits.” They trumpeted the fact that, “… 8.7 million American women currently purchasing individual insurance will gain coverage for maternity services.”

Better healthcare for women is a great thing, but here’s what I want to know: What about the mothers with postpartum depression? What about postpartum depression screening?

Section 2952 of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act,enacted two years ago, called for more research into PPD screening,  increased awareness for postpartum depression and better services for women who have it.  Where are those things? When might they be coming? Why has no money been appropriated?

I read the brief that was released this week, entitled The Affordable Care Act and Women. It lauds the legislation’s sections 1001, 1401, 1421, 2001, 2401, 2404, 3509, 4104, 4201. I didn’t see anything about section 2952. I care about those other sections, I truly do. But it’s my job to care most about section 2952. I really, really need to see action on 2952. I want to work with the federal government to get 2952 off the ground.

WE NEED 2952.

Are you with me? Do you care about 2952? Are you wondering why more isn’t done?

My initial reaction was "WTF?!?". Then I sighed. Then I thought "Wow, I wish there was something I could do. I'm no good at writing online petitions, just at signing them.". Then, I happened to see a tweet from one of my US Senators, John Cornyn. Senator Cornyn tweeted 

"Funny if it were'nt painfully true RT@Doctorfreefall:@JohnCornyn Obama has approved his "Pipeline to nowhere!". ". 

This was just the latest in a line of tweets taking aim at President Obama. I thought back on the Tweets I usually see from my elected officials. I follow (on Twitter) President Barack Obama, Senator Kay Bailey Hutchinson, Senator John Cornyn (Texas' Senators), and Congressman John Carter (Texas, District 31, U.S. House of Representatives). I tend to see a lot of tweets that are partisan politics, a politician taking aim at either another politician or the "other" party, etc. So I thought "If they have time to tweet about why we shouldn't like another politician/candidate or why one party is better than the other or what exactly the other party is doing wrong, they should CERTAINLY have time to read - and respond to - a tweet about an issue that affects constituents across party lines!"

I proceeded to tweet to all four something along the lines of  

 Pls make care/research for #PPMD a priority. Signed,1 of your voters http://p.ost.im/p/eXnhUU via@postpartumprogr 

It had to be tweaked and edited depending on who I was tweeting, to allow for the 140 character limit. However, that is the copy-and-pasted tweet I sent to Congressman Carter. 


After that, I thought "Why not tweet about this to Rick Santorum and Mitt Romney too? To them, I tweeted 

"What is your stance on bettering care&improving access to that care for women w/ #PPD? What about #PPMDresearch?"

I'm not holding my breath that any of them will respond to my one tweet. Really, my hope is that more people will see this and start tweeting the same types of questions and requests to THEIR elected officials and to the presidential candidates. My one little voice may not register on their radar but hopefully, if we can get a whole bunch of voices raised together, they'll start to listen (and maybe even respond?). 


Let's start a Twitter campaign to bring awareness of the need for PostPartum Mood Disorder research to be made a higher priority on a national level, to the need for our elected officials to work to improve the standards and quality of care for those who are suffering or will do so in the future, to improve the ease of access and affordability to this care so that no woman has to worry about whether her insurance will cover her care or whether she'll be able to find a medical professional who will help her how she needs it, when she needs it. Let's remind our elected officials that they are elected by us to work for us, to represent us and our interests. Will you join me in this endeavor?

If you don't know who your elected officials are, find out. Once you know, look up and see if they have Twitter accounts(I've been able to find this information on their .gov websites). I've provided the Twitter handles for the President, the two US Senators from Texas, and the Congressman who represents Texas District 31 in the U.S. House of Representatives, as well as Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum. Once you have the Twitter info you need, Tweet away. Feel free to use the tweets I sent out or compose your own. The main thing is to let them know that we will not be silent, that we are here, and that we are watching and listening, that we expect them to do their jobs in taking care of us, even if it means taking a break from party politics and (heaven forbid!) working together. And one of the beauties of this is that as we tweet about this, every time we @ one of those politicians, everyone who follows them can see that tweet. We have the potential to reach literally hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of people.


If you don't have Twitter or don't use it or, for whatever reason, don't want to get involved on Twitter. You can still join in the effort. Link this post and others related on your Facebook. Send it to your friends and family. There are so many ways that you can help spread the word that it's time to make Capitol Hill take notice. Many of us suffered through a PPMD in silence, our families may have suffered in silence with us. We don't have to be silent any longer. Will you join me?



P.S. 
If you have ideas or suggestions, please feel free to comment and share them here!

In the words of Gomer Pyle, "Surprise, surprise, surprise".

Today's blog is difficult for me to write for a variety of reasons but mostly, my fears of being on the receiving end of the very stigma I try to combat with my blog. If this particular post rambles or seems disjointed or confused, please understand that it's a reflection of my own inner turmoil. I must have started this post five different times and I always get stumped trying to express what I'm feeling and going through. So please, be patient with me.

After I had Miriam in April 2011, I went on birth control. We had a variety of reasons for needing (and wanting) to hold off on having another baby. We anticipated an Army-ordered move in the near future, we wanted to get a little more financially stable before having another one, we needed to make sure I wasn't dealing with any type of PPMD, we needed to make sure my thyroid stayed under control, and we wanted to give my body some time to recover. We wanted to have some time to just enjoy our two girls. The move we anticipated did indeed happen. We had very short notice that we were moving from Texas to California and the move itself was very stressful. We're actually still unpacking boxes due to the fact that we're working around having a ton of books and no bookshelves (the movers had to leave them in Texas because they weren't solid enough to transport).

Recently, I was able to wean off of the Zoloft I had started on at 38 weeks pregnant as a preventative measure. I started having more energy and generally feeling better (very good signs that it was definitely time to be off of the Zoloft). I decided to compete in the Mrs. California America pageant to raise awareness for PPMD, I started working on getting my GI Bill squared away so I could start school to get my BSN. We started making plans for things we wanted to do and trips we wanted to take as a family this coming year. I was doing really well at losing weight and getting back into shape.

On Sunday, January 8, 2011 I got the surprise of my life. I had been feeling a little nauseous, unusually exhausted and irritable, and just kind of generally under the weather. I was also late for my period by a few weeks. I had been excusing it on the basis of "Well, my periods have been goofy since Yumyum was born since I'm nursing her still" but the nausea was a symptom I only get when I've got the flu or am pregnant. I went with my Sister in law and her fiance to Target for some snacks for them for their drive back down the coast and decided to pick up a pack of pregnancy tests. I was so sure that it would be a negative test that I got a three-pack.

Lo and behold, before I was even off the toilet...

That's about as positive a home pregnancy test as you can get. I was in shock. I told my husband, he was in shock too. We told our family and got lots of congratulations. My sister-in-law was excited to finally be the first one to get the news that someone was pregnant.

I've been on an emotional roller coaster ever since. I'm pretty sure I'm "supposed to be" excited and happy. Right now, I'm still waiting for reality to sink in. It doesn't seem real yet. I keep asking myself "How the heck did I get pregnant on BC, while nursing, with irregular periods and infrequent/irregular ovulation? We don't even have sex that often thanks to the Zoloft suppressing my libido!!!". The conclusion we've both come to is that this baby is clearly meant to be and determined to join our family.

That still doesn't solve my problem of "How do I feel?". I have so many mixed emotions. Of course I'm happy and excited in a way, I believe with all my heart that life begins at conception and that all babies are a gift from God. But that doesn't change the fact that I feel disappointed, overwhelmed, frustrated, almost resentful. It's not so much that I'm disappointed that I'm having a baby as disappointed at the timing and the fact that my plans, these things I was so excited to do, that I was so sure were things God wanted me to do, are now coming to a screeching halt around me. Yes, it's probably just a temporary halt, a detour if you will, because it's all stuff I can do later on down the road, but still. I'm feeling overwhelmed because I haven't even weaned Yumyum off of nursing (and she REFUSES to take a bottle, even the Lactation Consultants couldn't think of anything to try that we hadn't already), I feel overwhelmed because I just got off the Zoloft and was feeling better and was looking forwards to time to just be ME, to be (at least somewhat) normal, and now I'm facing another pregnancy with the concerns and fears of "What if PPD strikes again?". We just started potty training Lizzie so I've got two in diapers with another on the way. I'm frustrated that I tried to do what we thought was the responsible thing and it didn't work and that I just got back into non-elastic waistbands and now it's back to maternity clothes.

It doesn't help that my hormones are nuts (this does explain my reactions to a lot of stuff recently though) and I'm sure I'm reacting a bit more strongly to things than normal. It also doesn't help that people seem to think their jokes about "Another one already?" and "What, haven't you heard of birth control?" are funny. No, it's not funny. I might laugh but it's mostly because I'm trying not to start a fight by saying something like "Birth control, what's that?" or "I dunno, have you ever heard of tact?". I mean, if you insist on "joking" about it (admittedly, it's hard to tell who's ACTUALLY joking), at least come up with something original.

It's hard for me to know how to feel. It's hard for me to even figure out *how* I feel (other than tired and moody). It's hard to talk about it because it feel like since I'm married, I'm supposed to be automatically thrilled. It's hard to talk about how I feel and don't feel because I worry that people are going to hit me with "Children are a gift from GOD, they're a blessing, you need to start being grateful.". Come to think of it, that's the same thing people told me when I was dealing with my PPD.

I guess that's the tie in, and it's why I decided to post this openly instead of anonymously at someone else's blog. No matter what the circumstances, nobody has the right to tell me or anyone else how to feel about any situation, and most especially a situation that has a huge impact on one's family. My emotions and feelings are my own and nobody has the right to tell me how I should be feeling or reacting to a situation. I'm pretty sure God is okay with me needing some time to work out my emotions and doesn't need someone else to try to speak on his behalf as to what my feelings and expressions of them should be.

So in closing, I guess it's time for a new adventure, a new branch of the path, another foray through another tunnel. I'd love to hear from anyone who's dealt with an unplanned pregnancy while married and how you dealt with it and the things and attitudes you experienced.

Is Post-Partum Depression a Cop-out?

I follow Katherine Stone of PostPartum Progress on Twitter. Today, she tweeted this:

postpartumprogr Katherine Stone 

No. That is all. RT @GaModernMom: Is Postpartum Depression Being Used As A Cop-out? goo.gl/fb/arS8H

I, of course, followed the link and my jaw literally dropped at what I read. Allow me to quote the entirety of the blog post.

Is Postpartum Depression Being Used As A Cop-out?

I personally never suffered with postpartum depression, so I can’t say 1st hand about the severity of the condition. I have however, had several friends whom suffered with the illness. These new mothers were down and out, suffered with mood swings, sudden crying and sadness for no apparent reason.

Before I go any further let me clarify, I do know this condition exists! I just do not believe it should be used to get off murder.

While I am no professional, I can’t help but wonder if postpartum depression is being used as a cop-out for mothers who commit the ultimate crime- killing their own child. Defense attorneys look for any reason to help their client, we already know that. I however, do not agree that it should be allowed as a reason to kill and get away with it.

Today I came across an older news note about Otty Sanchez, a mother who killed and ate her child. This woman who investigators say suffered with postpartum depression, killed her baby, tore his face off, chewed his toes off and ate pieces of his brain. Otty Sanchez was found not guilty by reason of insanity in the death of her baby.

Regardless of the reason, she killed her child! She should spend the rest of her life in prison or be handed the death penalty!

I’m sure you all remember Andrea Yates, the mother who killed her 5 children by drowning them in the bathtub. Her attorneys said she had been suffering from severe postpartum psychosis, and a jury found her not guilty by reason of insanity in 2006.

After looking at just these two cases, out of thousands, I can’t help but wonder if people are using postpartum depression as a cop-out when they kill their children. It seems like the cases where postpartum depression is claimed it allows the mothers to serve no jail time, face no prison time, and pretty much get off free. Maybe they are labeled insane, but who the hell would no be insane after they killed their own blood?

What are your thoughts? Should moms be able to use postpartum depression as an excuse for killing their children or should they rot in prison with the rest of the criminals?

I don't even know where to start. I *think* I can at least excuse this blog post better than I could swallow Sheryl Paul's outlandish nonsense, since at least this blogger isn't claiming to be an expert and peddling a product she claims will prevent PostPartum Depression. But still, I'm blown away... I guess the best place to start is at the beginning: the title.

 "Is Postpartum Depression Being Used As A Cop-out?"

No. PostPartum Depression is not a cop-out. PPD, PostPartum Psychosis, and any PostPartum Mood Disorder are very real, very legitimate, very horrible conditions. And by the way, PostPartum Depression and PostPartum Psychosis are NOT the same thing. Anyways... I don't know a single person who deals with it who says "Dude, I love this! This is fun, I never want to stop feeling like this.". Everyone I know who is or has dealt with a PPMD has wanted nothing more than to stop feeling how they do and go back to feeling "normal" again. They don't use a PPMD as an excuse for stuff. In fact, the women I know who deal with PPMD are usually ashamed of their feelings and thought patterns and find it extremely difficult to say "I'm dealing with a PPMD".

"I personally never suffered with postpartum depression"

I can say from personal experience that I felt far differently towards people with a PPMD before I suffered one than I did after I received my own diagnosis of PostPartum Depression. It's amazing how much it changed my opinion to walk a mile in the shoes I had previously been decryng. In fact, I would like to say right now that I apologize to anyone I hurt back in my pre-PPD years with my statetments that "It's no excuse".

" I can’t say 1st hand about the severity of the condition."

I can. And I have. Go look back through any of my blog posts. It's miserable. And I didn't even have to deal with PostPartum Psychosis, but I know someone who did and it was NOT a happy thing.

"I have however, had several friends whom suffered with the illness. These new mothers were down and out, suffered with mood swings, sudden crying and sadness for no apparent reason."

The thing she is apparently failing to keep in mind here (okay, one of the things) is that not all PPMD are created equal. Different PPMD have different symptoms, and different people with the same PPMD will often present differently. You might find that one woman with PPD is listless and feels numb, while another is restless and feels a wide range of intense emotions. One woman may suffer insomnia and never be able to sleep while another may sleep constantly and not get out of the bed except to use the restroom. Just because you know someone who shows some symptoms one way does not mean you know how everyone else with a PPMD will behave.

"Before I go any further let me clarify, I do know this condition exists! I just do not believe it should be used to get off murder."

I hardly think anyone who is found "Not guilty by reason of mental insanity" gets off free. Just because they don't get the death penalty or get put in general population with the guy who knowingly raped and murdered his sister just because he could but is fully mentally competent and cognizant doesn't mean she's getting away with what she did without any consequences. I'd say that a life sentence (with or without parole) to be served in a secure state mental health facility constitutes consequence, it just happens to be consequences that are in keeping with the crime and the condition that caused it.

"While I am no professional, I can’t help but wonder if postpartum depression is being used as a cop-out for mothers who commit the ultimate crime- killing their own child. Defense attorneys look for any reason to help their client, we already know that. I however, do not agree that it should be allowed as a reason to kill and get away with it."

Once again, they don't get away with it.

"Today I came across an older news note about Otty Sanchez, a mother who killed and ate her child. This woman who investigators say suffered with postpartum depression, killed her baby, tore his face off, chewed his toes off and ate pieces of his brain. Otty Sanchez was found not guilty by reason of insanity in the death of her baby.Regardless of the reason, she killed her child! She should spend the rest of her life in prison or be handed the death penalty!"

What this blogger fails to mention is something from this particular article that I think should be quoted:

"SAN ANTONIO (AP) — The warning signs were there. Otty Sanchez, a schizophrenic with a history of hospitalizations, wasn't taking medication and was depressed after her son's birth, the boy's father said."

This is the same article the blogger linked to. Otty Sanchez had more going on that "just" a PPMD. She was schizophrenic and NOT taking her medications, AND she was living in "a house where she had access to Samurai swords". She was found with not only her dead baby but also with "self-inflicted cuts to her torso and an attempt to slice her own throat". Also from the same article:

"Scott W. Buchholz, the infant's father who met Sanchez six years ago while they were studying to be pharmacists assistants, said he isn't buying it. He said although his girlfriend had postpartum depression and told him a week before the killing that she was schizophrenic, she didn't appear unstable.He wants prosecutors to pursue the death penalty."She killed my son. She should burn in hell," Buchholz, 33, told The Associated Press.Otty Sanchez's medical history is muddled. A family member said Sanchez had been undergoing psychiatric treatment and that a hospital called looking for her several months ago. Gloria Sanchez, Otty's aunt, said her niece had been "in and out of a psychiatric ward."In May 2008, Otty Sanchez's mother, Manuela Sanchez, called police after her daughter didn't return from a trip to Austin, saying she was concerned about her daughter's safety. Manuela Sanchez told police she suspected Otty was into drugs and specifically told police she wasn't suffering from any mental issues.Buchholz, who is himself schizophrenic and takes six anti-psychotic and anti-convulsive medications, said Otty had postpartum depression and had been going to regular counseling sessions after the birth, but refused to take prescription medication for her depression. Still, he said she seemed fine."She seemed like a a very caring, loving mother. She held him, she breast fed him. She did everything for him that was nice," he said.On July 20, Sanchez was taken to the hospital for depression and released less than a day later, Buchholz said. Sanchez told him that she was schizophrenic and was going to live with her parents and sister. Sanchez was arrested at her mother's house, where police found her and the dead infant."

I would suspect that the schizophrenia and refusal to take medication probably played into the situation as well. This woman was extremely mentally disturbed and needed treatment. And I do not see how it's vaguely acceptable or logical to say that someone who is suffering from such conditions beyond her control should be put to death. However, it's a lot easier to say that when you've never experienced first hand what it's like to go through a PPMD.

"I’m sure you all remember Andrea Yates, the mother who killed her 5 children by drowning them in the bathtub. Her attorneys said she had been suffering from severe postpartum psychosis, and a jury found her not guilty by reason of insanity in 2006."

Andrea Yates wasn't exactly let off the hook. From a CNN article:

"A Texas jury spent less than an hour deliberating before sentencing Andrea Yates to life in prison Friday for the drowning deaths of her five children. She will be eligible for parole in 40 years."

I don't usually like to quote Wikipedia but I think they summed it up best:

"On July 26, 2006, a Texas jury found that Yates was not guilty by reason of insanity. She was consequently committed by the court to the North Texas State Hospital, Vernon Campus,^[4] a high-security mental health facility in Vernon, Texas, where she received medical treatment and was a roommate ofDena Schlosser, another woman who committed filicide by killing her infant daughter. In January 2007, Yates was moved to a low security state mental hospital in Kerrville, Texas.^[5]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrea_Yates

Yates conviction was later overturned due to the fact that one of the experts who testified had been found to lie. From this article on MSNBC:

"Andrea Yates’ murder conviction for drowning her children in the bathtub was overturned by an appeals court Thursday because a psychiatrist for the prosecution gave erroneous testimony that suggested Yates got the idea from a non-existent episode of “Law & Order.”The ruling by the state 1st District Court of Appeals means Yates is entitled to a new trial, though prosecutors said they would try to have the conviction reinstated.The court based its reversal on false testimony by a prosecution witness, forensic psychiatrist Park Dietz, who stated during Yates’ trial in March 2002 that the killings occurred shortly after an episode of the NBC police drama in which a woman drowned her children and was acquitted by reason of insanity. (MSNBC is a joint venture of NBC Universal and Microsoft.)Other witnesses testified that Yates watched the television series, allowing the prosecution to suggest that Yates had seen the show and used the plot to plan the murders of her children.Jurors did not learn until after Yates was convicted that the episode never existed. They were informed before the sentencing phase of her trial, however, and rejected the death penalty.Psychiatrist acknowledged error Dietz, a nationally known authority who took part in the Jeffrey Dahmer and the Unabomber cases, was the lone mental health expert to testify for the prosecution, and he was the only one to say Yates knew right from wrong.“His testimony was critical to establish the state’s case,” the appeals court said. “Although the record does not show that Dr. Dietz intentionally lied in his testimony, his false testimony undoubtedly gave greater weight to his opinion.”
Later, during closing arguments, a prosecutor referred to Dietz’s testimony to suggest that Yates learned from the TV show a way to escape responsibility for her actions. The prosecutor told the jury: “She watches ‘Law & Order’ regularly. She sees this program. There is a way out. She tells that to Dr. Dietz: A way out.”In his testimony, Dietz said he was a consultant for the popular NBC series and added: “As a matter of fact, there was a show of a woman with postpartum depression who drowned her children in the bathtub and was found insane, and it was aired shortly before the crime occurred.”The error in Dietz’s testimony became known to prosecutors and jurors before the sentencing phase in 2002. The defense asked for a mistrial because of it, but the judge refused. The jury ultimately spared her from the death penalty.A receptionist at Dietz’s office in Newport Beach, Calif., said Thursday that neither Dietz nor his firm would comment on the ruling. In its ruling, the court noted that Dietz “acknowledged that he had made an error in his testimony.” The defense argued that Yates, 40, who was under psychiatric care for postpartum depression, was insane at the time of the killings.The appeal cited 19 alleged errors from her trial, but the appeals court said that because the false testimony issue reversed the conviction, it was not ruling on the other matters. Among other things, Yates attorneys had claimed that the Texas insanity standard was unconstitutional.Prosecutors said they planned to appeal Thursday’s ruling.“We fully intend to pursue a motion for a rehearing,” said Harris County Assistant District Attorney Alan Curry, who argued the case before the appeals court. “Barring that, we’ll continue to appeal to the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals. We still believe we have a good shot to prevail in appeal.”Prosecutors told the court last month that there was no evidence that Dietz intentionally lied and that the testimony was evoked by Yates’ defense attorney during cross-examination. They also argued that Dietz’s testimony was not material to the case and that there was plenty of other testimony about Yates’ plans to kill her children.“We agree that this case does not involve the state’s knowing use of perjured testimony,” the appeals court said in its ruling. But the judges said prosecutors did use the testimony twice and referred to it in closing arguments.Convicted in three deaths On June 20, 2001, Yates drowned her five children one by one, then called police to her Houston home and showed them the bodies of Noah, 7, John, 5, Paul, 3, Luke, 2, and Mary, 6 months.Jurors in 2002 sentenced Yates to life in prison in the deaths of three of the children. She was not tried in the deaths of the two others.“She smiled and said she was basically just kind of in shock,” said Todd Foxworth, warden at the Texas Department of Criminal Justice Skyview Unit, who delivered the news. “But she was very happy. Physically and mentally, she’s doing as well as I’ve ever seen her.”Yates was thrilled after learning of the ruling Thursday at the psychiatric prison where she is serving her sentence.Defense attorney George Parnham said he had no plans to seek her release from the prison about 140 miles north of Houston, where she works in the flower garden and has janitorial duties.“Andrea is where she needs to be right now, as far as security is concerned for her,” he said. “The last thing Andrea needs, quite frankly from my perspective, is to walk from the TDCJ Skyview Unit into the public arena.”

A psychiatric prison. Tell me, please, how serving a life sentence in a state prison constitutes not serving a life sentence in a state prison?

"After looking at just these two cases, out of thousands, I can’t help but wonder if people are using postpartum depression as a cop-out when they kill their children. It seems like the cases where postpartum depression is claimed it allows the mothers to serve no jail time, face no prison time, and pretty much get off free. Maybe they are labeled insane, but who the hell would no be insane after they killed their own blood?"

I believe I've already shown, citing one of the cases this blogger herself cites, that these women do not get off scott-free and they do serve time.


Aside from the factual inaccuracies in this blog, the thing that gets me the most is the language and the attitude. This blogger uses language which vilifies and trivializes PostPartum Mood Disorders. This blogger and attitudes and language such as that contained in her blog and her tweets contribute to the stigma that causes women to be reluctant to seek treatment. It's difficult, to say the least, to reach out for help and say "Hey, I think I'm dealing with PPD" when you're faced with the prospect of dealing with people saying "It's a cop-out". The attitude displayed here and by so many other people is, regardless of what they try to say, one of "It's not really a legitimate problem, it's just an excuse, it's not a real issue". It is a very real problem. 


Instead of saying "OMG it's a cop-out!", people such as this blogger might consider trying a dose of sympathy. Try looking at it from the perspective of "Wow, their body and mind are betraying them and causing them to do things they wouldn't normally do" and be GLAD that these women are receiving MEDICAL TREATMENT instead of simply being "left to rot in prison" with the general population, with those who really don't have a mental health issue causing them to commit their crimes.


This blogger refers to Otty Sanchez's actions as "The ultimate crime". I think that the ultimate crime is that we in America have become so callous, shallow, and selfish that we are incapable of showing compassion and prefer to say "Die!" instead of "Wow, let's get you the treatment you need". The crime is that we think it's acceptable to pooh-pooh the idea that a mental health condition could legitimately cause someone to do things they don't want to do or wouldn't want to do were they healthy. The crime is that it's so difficult to obtain proper treatment for PPMD, that there are so few facilities easily accessible to receive in and outpatient treatment for PPMD by health professionals TRAINED specifically in dealing with PPMD.


Next time you want to label a PPMD as a "cop-out", think twice and actually research your facts, and then use them all instead of picking and choosing what you want to quote to serve your purposes.


In closing, these cases are all incredibly heartbreaking. It's impossible to comprehend the thought process, the things someone would feel, that would make them believe that they need to kill their baby. But I, for one, am not willing to condemn them for it. I'm not willing to brush them or their conditions off as "cop-outs" or assume that they must be making things up. Nobody should.


If you are reading this blog and have never suffered from a PPMD, please read through some more of my posts. Better yet, go read some of the other blogs I have linked. Some of my favorites are PostPartum Progress, Motherhood Unadorned, Farewell Stranger, and PPD to Joy. Go to twitter and check out the threads at the hashtag #ppdchat and #ppdarmy. Read all these with an open mind to what PPMD Survivors and their families and friends go through. Decide for yourself whether or not you think we use it as an excuse or a cop-out. Make up your own mind as to whether or not we're fighting it. I can tell you, these are some of the strongest, bravest, most amazing women I've ever met in any way. I will fight to the day I die to educate the public to the fact that PPMD do exist, that they are not an excuse but a real condition that can take over your entire mind and life and cause you to think, say, and do things you never would have dreamed of. If you (general and specific) have never dealt with a PPMD, you're welcome to your own opinions but PLEASE think about how you express them and how very painful your words can be, how much damage they could be doing to someone who is or has suffered through a PPMD.

To all my other PPMD mamas, we are survivors. We are fighters. We have done nothing wrong. You are ALL beautiful, strong, courageous, and loved. Do not EVER let someone else's uneducated, ignorant, factually incorrect, judgmental, lofty, self-righteously pompous attitude make you think otherwise. We are not the ones to be pitied, they are. I am grateful every day for each and every one of you, whether I know you or not, and the strength you show in fighting, in hanging on. I fight for you, I fight for me, I fight for all of us and our right to be heard and not judged. You should be looked up to, not looked down upon. I love you all. Thank you for teaching me so much about life and about myself.