Post Natal Depression: What No-One Told Me.

What I didn’t know after my first 2 births was that the real transformation doesn’t end when the baby is born- it’s in the days, weeks and months that follow.

After my first caesarean, I felt a darkness, a lingering fog of sadness, disconnection, guilt. I didn’t know this was the beginning of my Post Natal Depression. I thought maybe I was doing something wrong, everyone else seemed to be coping, smiling, bonding.

I didn’t feel like myself and I didn’t know how to ask for help.

My second birth, also a caesarean, brought more of the same.

I remember being in a room full of people and feeling completely alone. I didn’t have the emotional support I craved or the practical help I needed. I carried on silently telling myself, “ This is just Motherhood”.

I cried everyday, whilst continuing to do my best to care for my babies. I sank into a darkness and despair.

I remember thinking “Maybe they’d be better off without me.” Those thoughts terrified me-but they were real.

I didn’t know how to cope, so I poured a glass of wine in the evenings, hoping it would quiet the chaos. It never did. If anything , it made the darkness heavier, the next day.

It wasn’t until my third birth, my VBAC, that I experienced what post partum could be- what it should be. This time I had people around me who nourished me. Fed me, checked in on me. I learned how to ask for what I needed.

The birth itself was powerful, the after just as healing. There were still moments of exhaustion as I cared for 3 babies, but I didn’t feel alone, I felt held. And that changed everything. I rested, I recovered and I bonded.

So I left my profession as a nurse to raise my 3 daughters and now I work with women through their pregnancies, birth and post partum , sharing my wisdom and my experiences in the hope that they may have the best birth experience and transition to Motherhood whatever that looks like for them.

Every woman deserves to feel seen, heard, nourished and supported.

I’ve been there, the fog, the tears, the quiet ache of doing it all without enough support. It is why I became a Doula. I want women to know what’s possible when you are truly supported.