My wife tells me no one reads her eyes like I do. The slightest degradation in spirit shows up like a flashing red light even though the individual physical changes, taken separately, are virtually unnoticeable. These days it’ll be a weekend, typically in anticipation of the crying that will engulf our day like a high rise inferno. She’ll turn around after washing a dish and I’ll know immediately she needs time away from the melee that has become our life.
It wasn’t always this way. We led the DINK (Dual Income, No Kids) life for a few years after getting married in 2008. We traveled to Thailand, did a lot of binge TV watching, and settled into being married. One day my wife announced she was getting older and if this was going to happen, we needed to do something about it. We started officially “trying.”
Lori’s a scientist at heart so this meant ovulation tracking apps, specific times for sex, and, of course, monthly pregnancy tests. Six months in we’d had lots of fun but our objective had not come to pass. And because Lori was of advanced maternal age (37), it was time to get serious. After looking at various options we chose In Vitro Fertilization.
Prior to our journey I had thought of IVF as the joining of sperm and an egg in a laboratory to fertilize a baby. This is of course part of it. What was a surprise to me is the unbelievable strain a woman must go through to get to that point. As with most things involving making kids, the man’s job is simple: show up at the appointed time and jerk off into a cup. My wife’s job? A bit more taxing: give yourself a daily injection of a hormone that dramatically increases your egg production (oh, and it causes debilitating abdominal pain), take another larger trigger shot in your ass that must be timed to the minute, then undergo a general anesthetic so they can harvest you like a crop of wheat. Only then can they get to the mad scientist stuff. IVF sounds like no big deal when someone else talks about it, but when it’s you it’s an emotionally and physically draining marathon. In our case the marathon was ultimately successful. After two cycles, Lori was pregnant.
The first five months of the pregnancy went fairly smoothly. In month five, while having dinner on our babymoon in Maui, my wife fainted. This was the beginning of four tumultuous, agonizing months featuring strict bed rest, preterm contractions every five minutes (yes, for four months), and a totally rare disorder called cholestasis, causing subcutaneous and unstoppable itching all over her body. My wife made it through – just barely – but she had gone through a traumatic hell I wouldn’t wish for anyone. Although we didn’t know it yet, our dinner in Hawaii marked a demarcation line between old Lori and new Lori. In March of 2012 our first little princess Delaney was born.
Round 1
Four weeks after Delaney was born, I went back to work. The month had been brutal, as you would expect with a first baby. We barely slept, didn’t take care of ourselves, and tried to figure out how to parent a newborn. It was made even more difficult by our little girl’s colic, which is crying for more than three hours a day that lasts for several weeks. Toward the end of my time off, Delaney’s colic began. At first we thought she’d just had a rough day. Then it was several days. Then a few weeks. We took drives, played music, sang, swaddled, shsh-ed, bounced, fed, tickled, went on walks, and made total fools of ourselves trying to stop it. Absolutely nothing worked. It surpassed the minimum definition by several hours a day and ended up lasting eight months.
Additionally, Lori was killing herself trying to breastfeed our little angel. We went to lactation consultants, read books, watched videos, and just kept on trying. Later, after four babies, it was easier to understand that my wife just doesn’t produce quite enough milk. It was emotionally and physically exhausting to keep at it night after night, every couple of hours, with very few results. We’d weigh our daughter before every feeding and do it again afterward, hoping to God we at least got a few ounces into her. The relentless crying; limited success breastfeeding, despite Herculean efforts; and extreme sleep deprivation (she was getting about 1-2 hours per night for weeks on end) came to a head.
On my third day back to work she stopped me as I was about to head out and said, “You can’t leave today. You just…can’t.” I wasn’t yet expert in reading her eyes because I hadn’t been tested by the challenges that lay ahead. But for this first test I didn’t need the hours under my belt. I knew somewhere deep and instinctual that she would do something awful if I left. Her plan, that she believed was perfectly rational, was to drop Delaney off at the fire station less than a mile away and vanish.
My wife Lori is independent, exceedingly smart, and is the strongest person I know. She used to go camping alone for weeks, sleeping in the back of her truck. She has climbed some of Colorado’s most challenging 14,000 foot peaks. She completed a grueling graduate school program to get her CRNA (Certified Registered Nurse Anesthetist) master’s degree while working part time as a trauma ICU nurse, even though the program forbids students from doing so because it virtually guarantees failure. Despite suffering day after day through what we now know was postpartum depression, she soldiered on with our kids, reading and talking to them, trying to create a perfect world for her little ones until she just couldn’t do it any longer.
I didn’t go to work that day in 2012. I sat with her for for a bit, assuring her it was going to be OK, that I would get her help for what I suspected was postpartum depression. Even as I was saying these words to her with as much confidence as I could muster, I had no idea whether it was true. As a new parent I barely knew what postpartum depression even was and had no clue where to get help. I recall my hands shaking with barely controlled panic as I holed up in our spare bedroom and jumped on Google. I also called her doctor, who told me to bring her to our local emergency room. This was an option, yes, but more like an atomic bomb rather than the targeted strike I was looking for. After 20 minutes I stumbled upon an outpatient program called MOMS (Maternal Outreach Mood Services) within 30 miles of our home that specializes in postpartum depression. I called and just happened to get a live person, who also just happened to be the admissions coordinator. She had a program opening, she said, but I would have to wait a week for an entrance interview. I told her my wife might be dead in a week. She made room for us that day on her lunch hour.
The program was a two pronged approach: group and individual counseling coupled with medication regulation through a psychiatrist. As we progressed through her care I realized how important both of them were. The counseling started to help her understand and slowly adjust her thoughts, while the medications helped her both sleep and counteract the disease.
We got into a routine with the program. At first Lori wasn’t well enough to drive herself anywhere, so I had to shuttle her for the first two weeks. Once our newly hired nanny arrived each day I’d drop her off at the hospital, go to work, then get off a bit early to pick her up. Lori started to show signs of change within about two weeks. During our entrance interview she had cried from beginning to end. Now she was able to talk about her feelings a little without the all consuming tears. She was only 5% better but it made a difference.
Over the period of the first month she began to show even more progress. The therapy work she was doing at the clinic seemed childlike to me, but it was making an impact. She would bring home a picture she painted and say that it depicted the way she felt about being a mother. Another time there were magazine cutouts that showed what society says mothering should be like to foster a conversation on how it really is in the trenches.
Reading here that she made progress you may have an image of a steadily rising line chart, like a sales projection with a big red arrow headed up. It doesn’t work like that. It’s jagged, inconsistent, and filled with relapses and breakdowns. It’s more like an uphill race with countless switchbacks, some of which go downhill again before rising, and feel sharper than all that came before. She might get somewhere near the top eventually – and maybe all the way – but there is nothing linear about it.
Through her therapy we also learned more about how postpartum depression (PPD) is triggered and why my wife was so susceptible. I asked Michelle Sonnenschein, Program Therapist at the MOMS Program, about PPD risk factors. Many of the women they treat at MOMS have some kind of previous trauma (which could include a very difficult pregnancy or difficulty getting pregnant), have experienced a previous mood disorder, and often are used to having a high degree of control of their world. Quite a few are very high achieving professionals. A simple online search reveals other risk factors as well: a history of depression or bipolar disorder, having postpartum depression previously, and a host of others. In our case, my wife both times had unbelievably difficult pregnancies and, in the first case, difficulty getting pregnant. And as a nurse anesthetist, she is used to planning and delivering anesthesia during surgeries, requiring a highly disciplined approach to help keep command of potentially life threatening and volatile situations. In short, she had previous trauma, is high achieving, and is used to total control.
She continued to make incremental but steady progress, and four months into her therapy she graduated from the program. Graduation meant a resumption of normal daily life. By this time she was only about 50% back to normal. Her full recovery would take more time, we were told, and would happen gradually. I knew she was nowhere near her old self, yet they were telling us she was done with the program. I remember my fear when I realized how much work she still had ahead of her to get to some kind of normalcy. At this point she was able to be with Delaney and me in small bursts but was still sleeping or resting on the weekends while I took on most of the baby care.
Two months after Lori stopped the program she was happy enough to take a weekend away in Santa Cruz and, to my delight, have sex with her husband again. Due to medical reasons on my side, we didn’t think we could get pregnant without help. We were wrong. Here we were six months into severe postpartum depression with a baby who still cries off and on for six hours a day and, voila, we find out we’re going to have another one.
We love our daughter Mia more than I can ever communicate in words, but the thought at this point of another one, given the darkness we were still going through, was stunning. The wonderful finish to this portion of our story is that Mia saved my wife. She experienced no depression with Mia; it was quite the opposite. Mia was a normal baby with no colic. Additionally, Lori didn’t have to experience the extreme sleep deprivation she did with Delaney for a variety of reasons, but mostly due to the medication regimen she gained from her time at MOMS. With Mia we enjoyed a more normal experience. It was damn hard with two but at least my wife seemed to have recovered from the depression. Most importantly, she felt connected to Mia and was happier than I’d seen her in 15 months.
For almost the next two years we enjoyed our girls and our family. We did all the things parents of two young ones do – long stroller walks, trips to the park to watch Delaney play and Mia take in her new world, and even family trips to Hawaii and the midwest. Our lives were pretty stable – so stable that Lori began to think about a third child.
We had never spoken of more than two kids before. In fact, my wife had told me after we were engaged that she would do nothing other than have sex with me to try to get pregnant. If we had kids, great, but if it didn’t work out then that was that. But now because she was 90% recovered from her depression and Mia had not triggered it again, the possibility of a third felt less risky. We obviously knew there was a chance of it happening again but we also felt we were far more ready this time. We knew the signs, we had much more support, and we had an outpatient program we could go to, should it come to pass. So we took a plunge and she went off the pill.
Two months later she was pregnant. With twins. Holy shit. And yep, the postpartum came back. This time it was playing for keeps.
Round 2
Round 1 was the hardest thing either of us had ever gone through. In Lori’s words, the depression in round two “came faster, went deeper, and was much, much darker.”
Lori’s first bout with postpartum depression was no joke, but her second one was far more serious. There were several factors that may have contributed. First, two babies meant she had double the hormone levels than the first time around which meant a more severe drop in estrogen and progesterone following our twins’ birth. Second, this was by far her worst pregnancy yet. After month four she was in almost constant pain due to extreme abdominal pressure; she again had preterm contractions every five minutes for four solid months; and she again was on bed rest and experienced the unstoppable itching for 16 weeks – all of which were multiplied by two with double the bodies growing inside her. Finally, the C-section was flat out medieval. During the procedure, Lori could actually feel much of the surgeon’s cutting and pulling due to a botched anesthesia. That simply doesn’t happen to anyone. But it happened to my wife. By the time these babies were born, Lori had already been through a civil war in her body and mind. After an extended stay in the NICU, our boys came home. My wife had already begun to slide, but we’d had Grandma’s help for a month or so, band-aiding Lori’s affliction. Once she left, the dam broke.
I’d like to say it was more obvious this time but when you’re so deep in the weeds caring for newborns, you miss major warning signs. Lori had stopped eating for about three days after her Mom had completed a month with us. She was sleeping less and less with the twin feedings, as was I. Whereas I could go back to sleep after each feeding, getting the bare minimum for survival, Lori was again struggling to eek out two hours per night. This time, we would find out later, she was also suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), triggered by the volume of crying we were enduring with twins and connected to her first go-round with baby number one. Additionally, and most frighteningly, she started talking to people who were not even there – something known as auditory hallucinations. I recall several times when she answered imaginary questions from her Mom as if she was right next to her, but she had flown home a week earlier. I can still see her sitting on our couch, turning and talking to no one at all, then pausing with a vacant look on her face to wait for an answer that would never come.
The seriousness of her second bout with the disease, coupled with the nonlinear, long recovery impacts the whole family in ways I never would have imagined. For example, we couldn’t plan anything socially. In my wife’s case her postpartum depression both times was accompanied by severe social anxiety. But this second time it has been pronounced. This has meant that for the first nine months of this latest recovery we saw only the close friends who selflessly helped us with childcare and meals. And by “saw,” I mean I hugged them and thanked them profusely when I dropped off my infant boys or toddler girls to let Lori sleep away her depression in peace. Somewhere about month nine we started making plans here and there to hang out with friends. Most of these we had to cancel last minute due to Lori’s anxiety and generally poor well being. It’s only been in the last six months that we have had some success sticking to planned get togethers with friends.
As the newly appointed primary caregiver, you also don’t realize how much help you’re going to need. When Lori got sick the first time I was basically able to manage my daughter in the mornings, evenings, and even on the weekends (essentially for the hours outside of daycare). But with the second trip down postpartum lane I now had four kids to manage: a four year old, a three year old, and two infant boys. I was living in a sea of crying and no amount of effort on my part could make the pieces fit. Even then I didn’t know enough to ask for help. One evening three of our now dearest friends in the world came to our house and rang our doorbell. I answered with what I’m sure was a cacophony of tortured cries in the background and a look of total helplessness on my face. One of them had a glass of wine for me and the other two had meals. Most importantly they told me “the village” had been activated. As I write this sentence at a Starbucks in Palo Alto, California, I’m tearing up just thinking about that moment. Without hyperbole, I didn’t have to make dinner for the next five months. Nor did I have to worry about long weekend days with four kids on my own. The village set up a Meal Train for us that also included childcare help. Where there were any gaps in childcare I would ask a friend if I could hang out with them for some portion of the day. Usually this meant they would feed me, share a couple of beers, and help by holding babies or monitoring my girls and their kids. If I had a gap of more than about three hours, I would hit up another friend for some hang out time. I had friends texting me for months asking if they could help. All told, well over 100 friends and family helped us through these very dark times. It remains the most amazing human kindness I’ve ever experienced firsthand.
Since insomnia is a major postpartum causal factor, I also officially became the owner of the night shift in our parenting arrangement. This meant 100% of the night feedings and various other wake ups to care for kids became my job. This started with her first bout and has continued to this day through all four of our children. I work full time in a leadership position in Silicon Valley and doing this has made my professional life very challenging, as any working Mom will readily validate. However, I’ll also admit there have been positive impacts to my efficiency as well, which is a separate topic I’ll explore in a future post.
There is also the financial toll. If you don’t have immediate family close by, you inevitably end up having to pay for even more help beyond what your friends can provide. The cost can be crippling, as it has been with us. Five years after her first bout and 22 months into her second, we’re still trying to manage our unreal childcare costs in one of the most expensive areas on the planet. Additionally, Lori’s time off work has meant a loss of her income for 50% of the last five years and an accompanying stagnation in her retirement plan. We each contribute equally to the family income so the loss has been exceedingly painful. We will be paying off a second mortgage for a couple more years to make up the gap.
Lori went back to the MOMS group again this time for treatment. She went through the four months or so, just like last time. But this time the damage was so much deeper. My expectation was that it would be easier this time, not harder. I thought that because she had been down this road before, she knew what to expect and her mind would recover faster. I couldn’t have been more wrong.
Today
If this was a story of the sort I read to my daughters virtually every night, I’d end this with a glowing picture of the six of us, smiling in front of our “castle,” clearly and unambiguously victorious over our demons. But this is real life.
With her first bout, the four months at the outpatient clinic were enough to send my wife on the right arc that she more or less kept until she was mostly depression-free. With this second tour the four month stint kept her alive and our family together, but it wasn’t nearly enough to cement her path to wellness. She has had to work hard outside the program consistently, and even went back for a two-week tune up.
As I write these words my boys are 22 months old. I’m stealing time to write while Lori is napping with my daughters. Even now, over a year and a half later, she still needs double the rest I do and will often take five hour naps on weekends. During the week she still excels at her very demanding job, leaving by 6am and returning at 8pm. But on weekends, she struggles with being an active participant in our family’s chaotic existence. In the past month she has started to take on much more with our kids, but it’s still very difficult for her. She gets sick much more often than she ever used to, which I think is caused by the abuse her body and mind have taken over the last five years. We see our friends when we can, but she often struggles with social anxiety at most gatherings.
When I first met her, I was dazzled by her self confidence and coolness. This was a chick who did guy stuff better than most guys. And she’s still cool – the coolest girl I know – but she is quieter, shyer, and a little more inward than she ever was before. She’s still the beautiful girl I couldn’t take my eyes off at that party in 2003, but her smile doesn’t come quite as easily as it used to and the contours have changed with the evolution she has undergone.
On the flip side, she has started baking again, kindling an adolescent love. She makes bakery-quality sourdough bread and gifts loaves to colleagues and neighbors a couple of times per week. She has also indicated interest in rowing again, something she loved doing on her team in college. What we’ve been through (and particularly what she has been through) could have easily torn apart our marriage. Couples have fallen for far less. But I feel like we’re even stronger because of what we’ve gone through.
I’d be lying though if I didn’t admit to feeling momentary flashes of resentment for the sacrifice I’ve had to make to keep my family together: mostly the total lack of any personal time, unless I carve it out of work or sleep, and the sheer exhaustion in having to manage four kids on my own so often. But the second I have these thoughts, I see a montage sequence in my head of all she has survived – and still suffers through – to give us these amazing little people. I could never have done what she has and I am in awe of her courage. My wife is truly a warrior who keeps fighting, day after day, to get back to a self she knew before three pregnancies and two bouts with postpartum depression.
These days I don’t look too far down the path. I just take each day and assess how we’re doing as a couple and as a family. It’s still hard as hell but my wife is alive, my kids are well, and I’ve got more love in my life than I ever thought possible. That’s enough for now.
Advice To Partners
If you think your spouse or partner is suffering from this terrible disease, seek medical help as quickly as you can. If there is imminent danger she might hurt herself or others, bring her to your nearest hospital. If the situation is not quite that acute, go online to look for local resources. This can be tricky, as there are not that many specialized clinics nationwide. Start with a Google search for “postpartum help” and your zip code. You can also try Postpartum Support International to find local resources. Worst case, you can call your partner’s OB or simply go to a hospital.
Once your loved one is diagnosed and has begun getting professional help, you will need to step up through a very dark time. Your significant other has an injury that may prevent her from doing even the smallest child care tasks. Whatever roles you each play in your relationship, they may need to evolve with her illness.
OK, you say. Now what? What do I do?
Here are some suggestions:
- Give her the opportunity to sleep. One of the leading causes of postpartum depression is lack of sleep. New mothers need to wake up every two to three hours to breastfeed newborn babies. If she has to pump after feedings this frequency is more like every ninety minutes. Figure out how you can take over some or most of these feedings. It may mean weaning the child from the breast, introducing bottles, introducing formula, or some combination of all of these. The La Leche League and other pro-breastfeeding organizations will make you think giving your baby formula is tantamount to child abuse. I’d argue a dead or severely mentally damaged mother is quite a bit worse. I can tell you from experience that feeding your baby (breast milk or formula) and giving Mom her sleep back is a foundational building block to recovery. Without sleep, her recovery will be much slower or impossible. You might ask, “How the heck am I supposed to wake up two or three times a night, then go to work for 10 hours a day?” Great question. I have three responses. First, you get used to it. It’s typically only for the first 6-8 months for most babies and, in all honesty, you can do almost anything for that amount of time. I’ve done it for all my kids and you can too. It will give you a sense of pride and connection with your children that you never would have imagined. My second response is that every working, breastfeeding woman who has ever walked the planet has done this. How do they manage to get up several times a night and get a total of five or six hours of sleep, then go to work every day? It’s incredibly hard. It’s monotonous and you live your life in a fog for months at a time. But that is what it takes so they do it. And you can too because the mother of your children needs more support now than she ever has in her life. Last, if the potential career impact is too risky for you (which is totally understandable), you can seek help from outside the home. If you have the financial means to pay for night nursing, that may be a great option. Care.com and Nextdoor are great resources to find caregivers. If you have any family nearby who are willing to take a portion of night feedings, that would work too.
- Do pick-ups and/or drop-offs. Does she pick up any kids at school or daycare? Offer to take that on a few times per week so she can sleep in or get her nails done. Will it impact your work schedule? Absolutely. But you will both win in the end as she gets better and better. And I’ve found that if I declare a few limits at work due to my family responsibilities, most people tend to respect them.
- Take on meal preparation. Does she manage meal preparation for the kids? Add that to your task list to give her a few minutes to shower or keep up with friends on social media. Daunted by cooking dinner for the family? Make it easy on yourself with a Costco chicken, takeout meals or delivery services like DoorDash, or preparation assist services like Blue Apron or Gobble. If you have a bit more time and the inclination, pick one day a week to cook something more culinarily interesting. You can put a good meal on the table in under 30 minutes if you pick the right recipe. Search “15 minute weekday meals” online and you’ll get several links like this one with lists of recipes.
- Tidy up where you can. Does she typically own the cleaning? Volunteer to take some of it on yourself or hire a cleaning service to come in. Cleaning is not an area I usually do very well in so we have a service come in twice per month (we originally did once per week but it got costly so we scaled back).
- Go grocery shopping. Does she usually do the food and pantry shopping? If so, you may be able to save her some time here. If you like to shop (yes, some people actually like going to the grocery store), then make this your own. If going to Target or Safeway is akin to someone punching you repeatedly in the face, then look at online options for automatic fulfillment like Amazon Fresh, Google Express, and others. Once you set them up for your household staples, you can configure repeat orders to save you time. There are costs with some of these but those charges, if you have the means, may offset the time you don’t have to spend schlepping around town.
- Own (or share) the bedtime routine. Get the kids to bed. Any parent knows that putting kids to bed can be a two hour ordeal. Maybe, just maybe, it doesn’t need to involve both parents all the time. Maybe you can split this up or take it on entirely on some evenings. I’m the first to admit this one can be daunting. The only reason I ever stepped up to this one was out of necessity due to my wife’s work schedule (nurses tend to work quite a few 12-hour shifts). While at first this was VERY difficult, it has become easier and easier over time, aided no doubt by the fact that my older kids have matured a bit. Although we have much more help now, I am still frequently called upon to put all four of my kids to bed myself. It’s hard. The 22-month olds go down fairly easily. With my four and five year old girls it’s a little more laborious and often there is heavy crying and a crumpled child at my feet at some point. It gets done in the end though, and I’ve come to really value those times with my kids reading books and talking about life.
- Last – Take care of YOU. This sounds cliché. It’s not. It’s absolutely vital that you take care of yourself so you can take care of your family. Michelle at the MOMS Group gave me two pearls of wisdom around monitoring my own health. The first is that having postpartum depression is not a “get out of jail free” card. The MOMS Group program stresses getting Mom back on her feet by equipping her with strategies for her daily life with her children. Their aim is to reintegrate a healthy Mom, not to “fix” her in an unrealistic, kidless bubble. In fact, very quickly after starting the program participants start bringing their babies in with them. Although I am clearly advocating taking on more to help your mate recover, it’s a good reminder that, over time, the balance should even out as she gets her old self back. The second piece of advice (that goes hand in hand with the first) is to keep some bit of focus on yourself, even during the darkest periods. What does this mean? It will be different for every person. It may mean you try not to miss guys’ night out. It might mean you commit to 30 minutes of exercise a few times a week. Or maybe you just want 20 minutes each night to read before bed without kids yelling at you. Whatever it is, make sure you get it. This is a piece of advice I’ve only recently started to take to heart and I’m sorry it’s taken this long. I’ve suffered by not focusing a bit more on what I needed and, at times, my family has suffered as a result. Recovery will happen, but it will take time. You need to be in shape for the long haul.
Thank you for reading. I hope you and your family never have to experience postpartum depression firsthand. If you do, may this piece help you in some small way.
Genio
Resources
Dear Genio and Lori
Your “hood” has been watching for the last 4 years. We have watched you go from a family of 3 to 6. We have watched you and Lori complete a remodel and we have watched you go up and down the stairs 6-8 times getting everyone in the van.
We watch you from our kitchen windows, from our driveways and as we drive by as we set off on our day.
We hear crying and we see you and Lori comforting the kids, we hear the sound of laughter as the boys chase Delaney on her bike on the deck. We see the beautiful family that you have become.
We watch as the lights dim in the evening letting us know that Delaney and the boys are asleep and hopefully Mia (bless her heart) will soon follow suit.
We are here and will continue to be her for you, Lori and the kids.
I can’t wait until the “Incredibles II” comes out so I can get you all matching outfits.
Mia and Delaney – who have really risen to the task of becoming big sisters.
Liam and Lucas – who are the sweetest, funniest, little boys who have accepted us all as family.
Lori – for being the most incredible woman. She has fought and continues to fight everyday. We love when she can join us for family dinner and we understand when she gracefully excuses herself when she has had enough.
You – You Genio Borghi are a man with super powers. I’m sure you would say “I just do what I have to do, everyone would do the same”!
No everyone would not or could not. You have been strong, brave, caring, you have ridden the bucking bronco till it hurts. You have accepted help which is never easy. You are a loving Husband and incredible Father and the most wonderful neighbor.
Thank you for sharing I hope that getting it down on paper was therapeutic for you and I know it will be helpful for others going through similar situations.
Love,
B
I love your blog Genio. As a mom that suffered postpartum depression it Makes me realize What My husband had to go through durante that time. He never said a word.
But i managed to get out of it and it made me stronger .
Iwas not brave enough and I never had the second child I would have loved to.
Congratulations to you for been able to realize what was going no and find help and Congratulations to your wife for been able to go through it,
All the best
Thanks for reading, Loreta. I am so sorry you had to go through PPD. It’s such an awful disease. Congratulations to you for coming out the other side of it. And your husband sounds a great guy. Take care, and thanks again reading and commenting.
You write beautifully about these times that you lived with grace, wit, wisdom and love. There is nothing better than to love and be loved in return. Bless your heart my darling son.
Love, Mom