Spit-up On My Shoulder

This is an entry from the journal I kept during and after the time I experienced postpartum depression. When I wrote this entry I was feeling better, but I still found myself needing lots of time to reflect on the experience and process what had happened. I felt haunted by it at times.

5/25/96 - 8:31 p.m.

My postpartum depression experience was incredibly horrible in retrospect. I truly thought I was losing my mind. I also was so afraid to tell anyone because I thought they would send me off to the loony bin. Especially when we went to see the counselor and she suggested either drugs or a stay at a mental hospital–although I’m sure that is what I needed.

Mental illness is so misunderstood in this country and probably everywhere. I remember having days where I thought there is just no way in hell I can keep going on. Then I would be driving to tutor or somewhere else alone and all I could think about was how I could crash the car so that I would die, but no one else would be hurt. I remember too being so angry at Mark for not seeing how much pain I was in even though I was using every ounce of energy to cover up how I felt.

Also, when we talked to the counselor she said to Mark, after I had divulged a lot about how I was feeling, that she was sure it was painful for him to hear it. I wanted to scream, “No one is in as much pain as I’m in! Why are you talking about his pain?” Even though we had been talking about my pain for the whole session up to that point. You get so twisted about how you perceive situations and the balance of something as basic as a conversation.

Even though it appears that the depression has subsided I still am doing things that frazzle me and aren’t healthy for me. I am so tired and have no immunity to getting sick.

Once you have experienced depression you never again will be unsympathetic to hearing of someone going through it. It really changed me and how I view life. I don’t think I will ever take for granted being able to feel positive emotions again. That flatness you feel with the depression is the worst thing–you don’t care about shit.