It’s Hard to Forgive My Self for Being a Depressed Mother
Mood disorders take a toll on motherhood, but the guilt is undeserved
Daughter, mother, grandmother
I just signed off from a Face Time session with my daughter and my six-month-old granddaughter, Maxine. They live in Sweden, and the only time I saw her, in person, was a few days after birth when she was being prepped for open heart surgery. The rest of my relationship with the “girls” is through the miracle of the internet.
My granddaughter has to be the sunniest child I’ve ever seen. Granted, one of the downer aspects of being a clinical child therapist is that most of my patients aren’t even marginally happy. So, it’s not really a fair comparison.
Even with early challenges from surgery and resulting feeding problems, she is resilient and joyous — matched by my daughter who struggled to get pregnant, stay pregnant and get through a high-risk delivery.
Because of my history of depression and my daughter’s adolescent brushes with anxiety and depression, I monitored her pregnancy like a hawk, steeling myself for the emergence of postpartum depression, which can begin even in pregnancy.
