hal·lu·ci·na·tion
noun
an experience involving the apparent perception of something not present.
Before having Hazel I’d never experienced a hallucination outside of doing drugs but that’s another story for another day. Last month I had put Hazel on our bed and then took a quick shower. I heard a weird noise and walked around the corner and could see a man standing over her and instantly I began to panic. I saw all the things that were about to happen and none of them were good. I remember reading a news story where a man raped a 6 month old baby and that baby obviously died. That’s exactly where my mind went. I started to hyperventilate. I kept saying to myself “This is not real. This is not real.” My mind knew it wasn’t real but It also wasn’t convinced. After a few hours I was able to calm down and pull myself together enough to go get Ollie from school and come back home. Moments like these were happening every day and I wasn’t sure what to do or how to stop it. The thoughts were constant and irrational but they kept happening.
I had postpartum depression with Ollie but it just went away after a month or so and I figured the same thing would happen with Hazel but I never did. It just got worse and I didn’t tell a soul. I knew that what I was experiencing (and had through the entire pregnancy) was most likely postpartum depression but in my mind If I told anyone what was happening and explained all the awful and grotesque scenarios that I was hallucinating I’d for sure get put away with the other crazies and have my babies taken away.
My experience this time around was MUCH DIFFERENT than when I had Ollie. I never connected with Hazel when she was in utero because I just knew she was going to die and If i didn’t have a connection then It wouldn’t be as hard when I delivered my baby who was no longer alive. This was the beginning of my PPD. Some days I forgot I was pregnant because of my lack of thinking about her and I’d look in the mirror and be reminded. Days would pass and i would realize I hadn’t even thought about her. It was the weirdest thing. I knew I should have felt joy and excitement but I just wanted to forget about it.
Brad’s work gave him 8 weeks of Paternity leave (which i’m so thankful for) but eventually he went back. I had been fine up until that point with only a few OCD and anxious thought but once he wasn’t home all day to protect us, that’s when my mind went nuts. I’ve always had mild anxiety and am 100% OCD but the way my counselor described my Postpartum OCD and Anxiety is that your mind takes something that has a little bit of truth to it and then exaggerates it to the worst case scenario making me unable to function. We had a snake in our house a month or two ago. It was a tiny nonvenemous snake but my mind latched on to the fact that there was a snake in our house and it went crazy. I ordered a 100 pack of sticky traps and put them all over the house and outside the house and I mean everywhere. In the morning I would walk around and check all the traps and make sure I didn’t catch a snake. There were so many out that Ollie even got stuck on one. It was hilarious and also a visual that I was losing it. My mind knew that it was irrational but I wasn’t able to believe it.
The day I finally broke was a Wednesday.
I heard a noise outside and I saw a man come over the fence and break into our house. He killed me and took Hazel so he could sell her for sex. The hyperventilating started and I couldn’t calm down. I was holding Hazel and crying and It wouldn’t stop and that’s when I picked up the phone to my friend who is a counselor and asked her If I could be a new patient. I explained That what I thought was happening was PPD and I apparently needed to work through something and I’m sure that it had to do with past trauma and being raped at 20 but I wasn’t able to fix this myself. I told her I need tools to get through my day. She said yes and we set that appointment.
The next day at dinner I told Brad what had been happening (through lots of snot and tears) and he said that he knew something was wrong and he felt bad that he didn’t ask more questions. There was no shame or taking my kids away like I had imagined. You don’t have to suffer in silence. It’s going to be so much better when you tell someone and the moment I told him I could feel the weight lift off of me.
I had heard about PPD after I had Ollie but what I didn’t know existed was PPD OCD and PPD anxiety.
Those are what I have and am working through.
Postpartum OCD is a type of postpartum anxiety disorder. It is characterized by intrusive thoughts and behaviors that are in response to a perceived danger toward their baby. These thoughts and behaviors are constant and repetitive, and they can severely disrupt daily life. Postpartum OCD is a severe condition that requires treatment in order to manage and control symptoms.
Women with postpartum OCD are aware of their intrusive thoughts but they cannot control them. Instead, the thoughts cause counteractive behaviors and other symptoms as well.
Postpartum Anxiety symptoms include racing thoughts that you have difficulty controlling, constant worry, impending fear that something bad will happen, trouble sitting still and focusing, and dizziness and nausea.
Basically the two are a cocktail for living in misery and feeling like a prisoner in your own body and house.
It was awful.
I never knew these two things existed because I’d never heard anyone talk about them. But the fact of the matter is that I’m not alone in the PPD fight. 10% of postpartum women will experience Postpartum anxiety and 3-5% will experience Postpartum OCD…. That’s a lot of people and you don’t have to suffer through it.
With the help of my counselor (and some OTC medicine) we have worked through several scenarios using Cognitive Behavior Therapy. This has been life changing for me. Before I was constantly checking locks and the alarm and didn’t leave the house and now i’m able to leave more freely and don’t always have to have the alarm on. I’m not where I want to be mentally but I’m not where I was. You still won’t find me going to the grocery store alone but I also won’t be looking out the windows for rapists for hours on end.
The PostPartum time needs to be talked about more frequently. If you have a friend who had a baby and she doesn’t seem ok. Ask her. She may or may not tell you but It’s so hard being a new mom and if you’ve been a mom you know that. Maybe share this blog with her in hopes that she will realize she’s not crazy.
One thing I was having the hardest time with was Breastfeeding. It’s so hard and it’s even harder when you don’t produce enough milk so you sit on the couch for 18 hours a day trying to feed your kid. Everyone likes to give their opinion about what you should do with your body and for your kid but finally my counselor told me that I needed to stop breastfeeding because it wasn’t healthy. Formula is fine. Breastmilk is fine. It’s all fine.
Breastfeeding wasn’t healthy for my mind or for the people around me and I was so discouraged and sad but I had convinced myself that I could keep going the way I was for the sake of Hazel. I had decided that parenting is all about sacrifice and this was just my cup to drink. Finally I did what my counselor had said and I stopped. I can’t believe the difference in myself just after a few weeks.
At the end of the day you have to do what’s best for you.
Don’t listen to anyone’s opinion, your mental health matters. Brad has to remind me of this.
Everything about PPD is darkness and chaos and since i’m a Christian I tried praying the crazy away but that wasn’t doing anything in the moment. I was still scared and still anxious and was still having panic attacks no matter how hard I prayed. I was so defeated and dark but with the help of counseling, medicine and sharing my feelings daily with Brad I finally experienced my Isaiah 9:2. I realize some people will read this who don’t believe in Jesus so I want you to know that being a Christian doesn’t mean we don’t have struggles and it doesn’t mean that bad things don’t happen. What it means is that there is a hope for the future and from experience I can say that there is a different hope that things will get better even when they suck in the now.
Isaiah 9:2 says:
“The people who walk in darkness will see a great light;
Those who live in a dark land, the light will shine on them.
My PreJesus life (0-21) was darkness but once I started to fully trust in Him (around age 23) my life was turned into light. My Postpartum journey has also been darkness but once I learned what tools and medicine could help me, I’m back in the light.
Being in the light is a journey, it’s not a destination.
If you or someone you know is struggling through the Postpartum Phase or the pregnancy phase, feel free to reach out to me via email at ValerieWienersArt@gmail.com and I will give you the details and some of the Homework i’ve had from my counselor that has really helped.
**If you’re on the other side of PPD and found something helpful please send me an email so I can share the helpful tips with other readers.
It’s ok to not be ok but it’s not ok to stay that way.
-Photos by Karri Wieners Photography