Maternal Health Month: Acknowledging and Addressing the Struggles

Moth­er­hood comes with a lot of joy, but it can also bring unique chal­lenges and strug­gles. As moms, it’s nat­ur­al to pri­or­i­tize the needs of our chil­dren, and it’s equal­ly impor­tant to take care of our­selves. Accord­ing to Post­par­tum Sup­port Inter­na­tion­al, one out of five women are affect­ed by mater­nal men­tal health dis­or­ders includ­ing post­par­tum depres­sion, anx­i­ety, OCD, bipo­lar, PTSD, and psychosis.

In fact, mater­nal men­tal health dis­or­ders are the num­ber one com­pli­ca­tion of child­birth and one of the lead­ing caus­es of mater­nal death, yet few­er than 15% of new moms receive treat­ment, accord­ing to The Blue Dot Project.

It’s essen­tial to acknowl­edge these star­tling sta­tis­tics and to sup­port moms to make sure that their men­tal health needs are being met.

Break­ing the myths of moth­er­hood: Accord­ing to the book, Not Your Mother’s Post­par­tum Book, some myths include:

• Bond­ing is nat­ur­al and will hap­pen instant­ly. An expec­ta­tion that moth­ers have is that they will instant­ly fall in love with their baby as soon as their baby is out of the womb and they hold the baby. This does not hap­pen for every­one. Some moms may not feel an instant bond/​connection and this bond devel­ops over time.
• Breast­feed­ing is best. Some moms are unable to breast­feed for mul­ti­ple rea­sons. What is best is that the baby is healthy and fed.
• A good mom can push through any­thing. The expec­ta­tion that moms can do any­thing with­out help from any­one is not real­is­tic. It is impor­tant for moms to know that it is okay to ask for help.
• You need to love every sec­ond of moth­er­hood. The real­i­ty is — no one is going to love every sec­ond of moth­er­hood. There are going to be many things that a moth­er will not love and this is okay.
• Hold­ing your new­born will spoil them. It is impos­si­ble to spoil a new­born. What a new­born needs the most is to be held, com­fort­ed, soothed, fed, and changed. These things help a new­born devel­op a secure attach­ment. All infants strug­gle with adjust­ing to life out­side of the womb (some may adjust bet­ter than oth­ers) and some infants need more com­fort and sooth­ing than others

• Offer a lis­ten­ing ear and help­ing moth­ers feel heard. It is also impor­tant to help them know that they are not alone — that there are oth­ers who know and expe­ri­ence the same emo­tions or thoughts they are having.

• Ask new moth­ers about their emo­tions, men­tal health, and how they are feel­ing. It is impor­tant to ask new moth­ers if there are any feel­ings or thoughts they are expe­ri­enc­ing that con­cerns them. Encour­age them to speak with their doc­tor. Ask about how they are adjust­ing to life with their new baby and about their sup­port sys­tem. Pro­vide infor­ma­tion on com­mu­ni­ty and/​or online resources. Pro­vide cop­ing strategies.
  • Post­par­tum Sup­port Inter­na­tion­al offers many types of online sup­port groups. More infor­ma­tion can be found here: https://​www​.post​par​tum​.net/​g​e​t​-​h​e​l​p​/​p​s​i​-​o​n​l​i​n​e​-​s​u​p​p​o​r​t​-​m​e​e​tings

• Cop­ing Strate­gies include: eat­ing a snack, drink­ing water, breath­ing exer­cis­es, lis­ten­ing to music, get­ting out­doors (e.g., going for walk with baby, sit­ting out­side), talk­ing to a sup­port­ive per­son, watch­ing fun­ny videos, lis­ten to an audio book or pod­cast, relax­ation tech­niques (search relax­ation videos on YouTube), mak­ing a cup of tea/​coffee, and wash­ing your face or tak­ing a shower.
• Nor­mal­ize the expe­ri­ence of intru­sive thoughts. It is report­ed by The Blue Dot Project that 70 – 100% of moms (and their part­ners) expe­ri­ence intru­sive thoughts. These thoughts typ­i­cal­ly occur around child­birth and dur­ing the post­par­tum peri­od. Intru­sive thoughts may include infant harm (such as: drop­ping the baby, infant get­ting hurt, or the mom harm­ing the baby). These intru­sive thoughts are unwant­ed. The mom con­sid­ers them to be inap­pro­pri­ate and cause a lev­el of dis­tress (just a note — these thoughts alone are not con­sid­ered a diag­no­sis). Some moms may expe­ri­ence intru­sive images as well.
  • It is impor­tant to talk to a trust­ed friend, fam­i­ly mem­ber, or some­one in sup­port sys­tem about these thoughts. If a mom wants addi­tion­al help in address­ing these thoughts, then it is impor­tant to encour­age them to talk to a pro­fes­sion­al (doc­tor or therapist).
  • Some sug­ges­tions in man­ag­ing these thoughts — acknowl­edg­ing the thought, label­ing it as a thought (“It’s just a thought, it does not mean that I am going to act on it.”), and talk­ing to some­one to help process the thought.
  • If a mom is expe­ri­enc­ing intru­sive thoughts or images and they are NOT caus­ing a mom dis­tress and instead caus­es relief, it is impor­tant for them to reach out to their doc­tor, call 911, or go to near­est emer­gency room. Accord­ing to Not Your Mother’s Post­par­tum Book, this is a warn­ing sign for Post­par­tum Psychosis.
• Look­ing out for symp­toms and signs of mater­nal men­tal health dis­or­ders. Dis­or­ders can take place dur­ing preg­nan­cy and/​or post­par­tum. These dis­or­ders include: Depres­sion, Anx­i­ety, Post­trau­mat­ic Stress Dis­or­der (PTSD), Obses­sive-Com­pul­sive Dis­or­der (OCD), Bipo­lar, Loss & Grief, Adjust­ment Dis­or­der and Psychosis.

Here are a few resources that detail the signs and symp­toms of mater­nal men­tal health disorders:

• The Blue Dot Project: https://​www​.the​blue​dot​pro​ject​.org/
• Post­par­tum Sup­port Inter­na­tion­al https://​www​.post​par​tum​.net/​l​e​a​r​n​-​more/
• Nation­al Child & Mater­nal Health Edu­ca­tion Pro­gram (from Nation­al Insti­tute of Health) https://​www​.nichd​.nih​.gov/​n​c​m​h​e​p​/​i​n​i​t​i​a​t​i​v​e​s​/​m​o​m​s​-​m​e​n​t​a​l​-​h​e​a​l​t​h​-​m​a​t​t​e​r​s​/moms

• If you or some­one you love is:
  • con­cerned, has, or have ques­tions about emo­tions or thoughts you are experiencing,
  • expe­ri­enc­ing signs or symp­toms of any mater­nal men­tal health disorder,
  • are strug­gling with adjust­ment to preg­nan­cy or life after baby, and/​or
  • expe­ri­enc­ing loss or grief relat­ed to preg­nan­cy or the birth expe­ri­ence, then please reach out to dis­cuss with your OBG­YN or pri­ma­ry care doc­tor. You can con­tact the Quin­cy Med­ical Group Behav­ioral Health Depart­ment at (217) 222‑6550, ext. 3418, to ask about Indi­vid­ual and Group Ther­a­py ser­vices offered for preg­nant and post­par­tum moms. If you are expe­ri­enc­ing a men­tal health cri­sis please con­tact the Nation­al Sui­cide Pre­ven­tion Life­line (call 988), call 911, or go to the near­est Emer­gency Room.

Infor­ma­tion for this arti­cle was gath­ered from the fol­low­ing sources:

Post­par­tum Sup­port Inter­na­tion­al
https://​www​.post​par​tum​.net/

The Blue Dot Project
https://​www​.the​blue​dot​pro​ject​.org/

Not Your Mother’s Post­par­tum Book by Caitlin Slavens and Chelsea Bod­ie
https://​www​.ama​zon​.com/​N​o​t​-​Y​o​u​r​-​M​o​t​h​e​r​s​-​P​o​s​t​p​a​r​t​u​m​-​B​o​o​k​/​d​p​/​1​6​8​3​7​3582X
Instra­gram: @mamapsychologists

The Nation­al Mater­nal Men­tal Health Hot­line
https://​mchb​.hrsa​.gov/​n​a​t​i​o​n​a​l​-​m​a​t​e​r​n​a​l​-​m​e​n​t​a​l​-​h​e​a​l​t​h​-​h​o​tline

Nation­al Child & Mater­nal Health Edu­ca­tion Pro­gram (from Nation­al Insti­tute of Health)
https://​www​.nichd​.nih​.gov/​n​c​m​h​e​p​/​i​n​i​t​i​a​t​i​v​e​s​/​m​o​m​s​-​m​e​n​t​a​l​-​h​e​a​l​t​h​-​m​a​t​t​e​r​s​/moms