Anonymous 1
World Mental Health Day 2019
I’d never had mental health problems until I became a mum.
My daughter was not a sleeper and by six months I was in a bad way mentally. She was wakening two-three sometimes four times a night for a feed and my body and mind were rebelling. It started with having difficulty falling back to sleep. If I could fall asleep everything would be okay – I could ‘cope’ with four to five hours broken sleep. But that started to change and by six months, I couldn’t fall back sleep in the night or nap during the day. I just couldn’t switch my mind off.
To cope with the persistent and cumulative lack of sleep, my body had entered a state of hypervigilance – a phrase I would later learn from the doctor. I didn’t realise at the time, but I was wired and hyper alert, unable to relax and full of anxiety. I would cry a lot. All I wanted to do was sleep. My family were there to support me, but my brain and body were fighting an internal battle and I just couldn’t turn it off.
I guess with many mental health problems, there’s a point where you realise that you need help. It took a while for me to get to that point – I battled with shame for a long time. Thoughts like, ‘plenty of other mum’s cope with no sleep, get over it and move in’, would enter my mind and so I’d just reach for another coffee and another coffee, until caffeine started to give me physical affects.
The turning point was another mum being open and honest about her mental health struggles. Her openly talking about needing to take medication for anxiety, empowered me to talk about how I was feeling. And although it seems obvious now, seeking professional help had never entered my mind until she said – “Go and speak to your doctor”.
My doctor was great and explained what was happening, labelled my symptoms and told me that it’s very common. He prescribed a short course of medication to relax me and over the course of a few months, combined with my daughter deciding to sleep better, I began to sleep again. And with sleep, my anxieties started to fade, and ease and my mind became my own again.
My advice to any new mums is, seek help. Get support from friends and family and if you are struggling with how you’re feeling, speak to your doctor, there’s always a way through.
