WHAT IS MATERNAL DEPRESSION?

Many people use the term ‘depression’ to describe feelings of sadness and loss. These feelings often pass within a few hours of a few days. During this time people are able to carry on much as usual. The illness which your doctor calls depression is different from this. You feel sad much more intensely and for longer. It is common to lose interest in things you used to enjoy and can interfere with family and social life and work. When it occurs in pregnancy of after a baby is born it can take the pleasure out of motherhood and make it difficult to cope with the demands of being pregnant or having a baby. Depression should not be confused with baby blues or other postnatal illnesses.

Baby blues occurs in up to 80% of women at around three to five days after delivery and lasts up to 48 hours. It is a brief episode of tearfulness and is a time when emotions can be very ‘up and down’. Treatment is not required. For some women Baby Blues are more severe and last longer. We know from the research that when this happens women are much more likely to develop postnatal depression.

Postnatal depression affects 10 to 15% of women after having a baby. This is little different from the number of people affected by depression at other times in their lives. What makes it different is that it occurs at a time when women are particularly vulnerable and when there is a baby to look after. In women who have had a previous episode of postnatal depression, there is a 30% chance of recurrence. It usually develops gradually and can vary in its severity. In up to a third of women, their depression begins in the antenatal period. However, being depressed before the baby is born does not mean a woman will necessarily be depressed after the birth. Half the women who get postnatal depression develop it by three months after delivery and three quarters develop it by six months. Postnatal depression resolves over time but without any treatment it can persist past the baby’s first birthday.

Antenatal depression affects roughly the same number of women in pregnancy as those who experience postnatal depression. It can be very distressing to feel this way when you are pregnant. But having depression before the baby is born does not necessarily mean that a woman will go on to have postnatal depression.

Puerperal psychosis is a much rarer and more severe postnatal illness, occurring in one to two women in every thousand births. Because of its severity, it is usually dealt with as an emergency. It usually develops within days of giving birth and always by the third week. The symptoms are quite different from the symptoms of Baby Blues and postnatal depression, for example, loss of contact with reality (delusions, hallucinations and abnormal behaviour and speech).