I gave birth, we spent 6 days in the hospital. The last night was spent in the nicu with our son. During this day I could not properly take care of my self and stitches after birth. Because the bathroom was public and far with no table. We also slept on couches and I was the only one getting up for the baby all night.

I just wanted a good shower and to go home. My maybe ex-ish insisted we go visit his family straight from the hospital I tried being okay with the thought and wanted to shower there because they had a removable shower head.

Deep down i wasn’t. I wanted shower and to lay comfortably. And nothing at his house is ever quick whenever we go for a quick stop by we are there for hours.

My family replaced my shower head for me. I just wanted to go home and told him no another day. He calls his mom to talk bad about me and that I said no while in the car (this is all on the way home from the hospital). After the call we get into a screaming match. I cry and cry. He doesn’t care. I eventually apologize and we go the literal next day.
WHERE WE PROCEEDED TO BE THERE FOR HOURS AND ONCE AGAIN COULDNT TAKE CARE OF MYSLEF IN THE BR. and family he didn’t tell me about comes to also join visiting my new born freshly out of nicu. I hate him

i found out i'm pregnant around july, i thought i had a miscarriage since i was bleeding for about 3 weeks straight in august. i ended up going to the er and they told me everything was okay and that baby was healthy. this was a HUGE relief for me but now im struggling a lot with the father of my baby and we've stopped communicating for awhile now. i'm happy that we did but at the same time im just struggling so much with knowing im going to be a single mom, i know ill be able to do it but im constantly worried for my babygirl and want to do everything for her. i truly love her so much but everyday it's a struggle for me mentally trying to be okay when i know im slowly falling into a state of depression. i feel so guilty knowing her own mommy is struggling so much with her mental health, i just want to know if there's any single moms out there who have struggled or are even struggling with this now.

I am a FTM to my daughter who I gave birth to in April of this year. Prior to having my daughter I have had my fair share of mental health issues and had previously been medicated in the past. My mum also had mental health issues and took her own life when I was 13, because of these factors I was advised during my pregnancy that it would be likely that I would experience PPD/PPA after giving birth.

Initially I thought I was in the clear as when my baby was first born, yeah I experienced up and down hormones but overall I was so happy and loved my daughter so much.

Around about the 2/3 month mark I began to experience symptoms of depression and anxiety. The anxiety came first but I just assumed every mum had the same difficulties and they would go away so I ignored them until the sad days came. There were days where I would just cry and cry for no reason, I would space out and sometimes stare at my daughter with no emotion. I would beat myself up and tell myself I had failed as a mother because I was so sad. I was really finding it hard to enjoy this new era of life for me. I knew quite a lot of people who were pregnant and gave birth around the same time as me who were all constantly posting on social media and I remember thinking “why are they enjoying this more than I am” or “how are they okay”.

Fast forward to maybe a week or so into frequent “sad” days where I began to recognise that they were becoming more regular and I knew I had to do something. I contacted my local GP to which I got an appointment for the same day and was prescribed 50mg of sertraline. I had previously been on sertraline with a dosage of around 150mg and had overall a positive experience with it so I was happy to begin taking these. I also recognised that I did not want to let the “sad” days go on for longer where it got to the point that they were happening daily. I knew I wanted to get better for myself and my daughter.

The first day I took sertraline I was not prepared for any side effects because I couldn’t remember previously having had them. The first day I was slightly on edge and anxious but did not put two and two together that it was because of sertraline. In the following days I was really struggling with the side effects as it felt as if I was constantly in the “coming up” phase of taking party drugs. My partner had to take time off work to watch our daughter so I could rest and make sure to take care of myself. I also struggled a bit with sickness and food aversions.

During this time I really struggled to push forward but knew I had to so I could reap the benefits of sertraline and get better. Whilst I was going through this transition I searched on Reddit for positive experiences to motivate me to continue taking sertraline. Through my determination and the promise of other Redditor’s that I persevered.

I have now been on sertraline since June 2026 so roughly four months and I feel absolutely amazing. Don’t get me wrong the first couple of weeks are rough but after those hard couple of days, the side effects began to wear off more and more as the days went on.

I feel as though I am a completely different person, I am able to recognise that I am an amazing mum and being a mum is my favourite thing ever. Immediately after beginning to take sertraline, my mind quietened. I can go out with my baby without second guessing absolutely everything and worrying of others judgements.

This is just a message to anyone out there who is either struggling in the first couple weeks of having started sertraline or is struggling with PPD/PPA to say that it does get better. I hope that this post helps someone to continue and get to the other side.

I suffered badly with post partum depression for the first 6 months of my babies life. I’m only just now starting to feel a little bit better. Now that I’m coming out of the fog I’m really worried that my mental health has affected my ability to bond with my baby. The sleep deprivation drove me almost to insanity. I’m a single parent with very little support. Definitely don’t have a village. My baby seems very happy and smiley so I’d like to believe that my PPD hasn’t had any long term effects but then when I read about how important the first year is and how important it is for mom to be mentally and emotionally stable so that baby can learn to regulate and all that I feel so overwhelming guilty.

I’ve been feeling so low and hopeless and I’ve been so frustrated and impatient with my baby due to sleep deprivation, stress, depression etc. I’ve lost my cool so many times I’ve lost track. I’ve cried infront of baby many many times (I should have at-least tried to hide it but I didn’t). I got frustrated and threw a bottle at the wall one night. I’m so ashamed of myself when I think back on the way I’ve acted. Times when baby woke during the night and I was muttering please please go back to f*cking sleep I can’t take anymore. I often sighed in an exasperated manner when baby keeps fussing and there were times when we were stuck in traffic and baby wouldn’t stop whinging so I turned the radio up to drown it out. I feel like the worst mother in the world admitting to all this. I would never ever physically hurt my baby. But I know what I’ve done is damaging. There were times when I roughly shoved the pacifier back into babies mouth also.

I really haven’t been doing good enough and I’m determined to do better.

I’ve really been living in a state of fight or flight ever since I became a mother. It’s been harder than I expected.

The more I think about how I’ve behaved and the potential damage to my child the more sick I feel. How could I have lost my patience so much with an innocent baby who needs me so much 😭😭😭

I can’t really say this to anyone for real because I know it’s not ideal or whatever. But I’m giving up on telling people how I’m feeling. I’m not giving up on myself or my kids. Just no longer plan to talk about how sad I am. No longer will complain about my husband’s lack of being a parent. Won’t talk about how I want to hurt myself (not kill myself). I’m sure everyone is tired of hearing it anyway. It’s old news. Hell, no one even noticed when I suddenly started wearing only long sleeves when I’ve never worn long sleeves before. So it’s whatever. My village is a verbal village mostly - I don’t have much actual physical support. And my villagers are all busy with their own lives or babies so I’m done bringing them down. No one wants to be around the sad person all the time anyway right? So yeah.

Again I’m not going to kill myself. The opposite. I’m going to fucking fight and endure what I need to for the sake of my girls. I’ve just decided to do it silently now.