Risk Factors:  Perfectionist and highly independent personality, family history of depression, anxiety and clusters of panic attacks since 1991, parents threatening divorce, family over an hour away. Did any doctor ever ask about these factors? No.

I was unable to get pregnant. It was so frustrating because our neighbors decided to try for a baby and they were pregnant within the month! The necessary testing revealed that I was not ovulating, so I started on a regimen of Clomid. It worked! I was finally pregnant after 8 months of trying. The pregnancy progressed well and I had no major problems. My doctor asked me if I'd like to induce labor on March 1, 1999, and my husband and I said yes.

Labor was pretty typical. I was induced at 7:30am and had my daughter at 2:58pm. There were no major complications, and I had a vaginal delivery with the assistance of an epidural. I was flying high for the first hours after delivery. I was superwoman!! That evening, exhaustion took over and I fell asleep in between feedings and vital sign check-ups. The next day I started feeling anxious. Breastfeeding wasn't going well and my doctor was nowhere to be seen to discharge me. I had a lactation specialist come and twist my breasts and manhandle my baby, but things were still rough in that department. That night, I was unable to sleep at all. I called the nurse and asked for a sleep aid, but since I was breastfeeding, all they could give me was an injection of Benadryl. It made me sleepy, but sleep never came. I asked the nurses to keep the baby in the nursery. The anxiety kept building as random thoughts swirled in my head - most of them related to "what if" situations: what if I don't know what to do when I get home? What if I can't figure out how to breastfeed? Finally, at 5:30am, I called a nurse in and told her that I wanted to bottle feed. That was one worry off my extensive list, though the guilt that replaced it wasn't much better.

A few hours later, I couldn't sit still. I was fidgety and anxious, ready to go home. I thought that if I got into familiar surroundings, I would feel better. My parents came to the hospital to sit with me as I paced the room and complained about my doctor not being there to discharge me. Around 3:00 that afternoon, I was released. We took our little bundle home - me in the back seat holding my daughter's head up in her car seat. We walked into a place that was supposed to be my home, but it looked different. Everything was as I had left it, but something was just not right. I was unsettled as I tried to settle in.

Things just got worse from there. I would try to go take a nap while my mom was there watching the baby, but just couldn't fall asleep. I even took prescription sleeping pills that guaranteed me 7 - 8 hours of sleep, but I only got 1 or 2 hours. My heart and mind were racing. I was sweaty all the time. I had no appetite at all. The nights blurred with the days even though my husband and I were taking turns with nighttime feedings. I would be awake all night even if it wasn't my turn. My husband had to go back to work and my mom had to go home eventually. I kept up the façade of "I'm fine" to the outside world, but was totally falling apart inside. I felt guilty that I wasn't overjoyed about the baby we had wanted so desperately. I didn't feel anything for her at all. No love, no hate - just numb. I took care of her needs in a robotic way, and she spent most of her time either in her swing or bouncy seat. I spent most of my time on the couch, staring at the television without seeing a thing.

One Tuesday, my husband was getting ready to leave for work and I just begged him to stay home. I was afraid that if I had to endure one more day of this agony, that I would either run away or find some way to do myself in. I never, ever thought I would have suicidal thoughts - but there they were. My parents came back to the house and helped me get an appointment with a therapist and a psychiatrist, which was no easy feat. We went through my insurance booklet just to find that most of the numbers had been disconnected. I left frantic messages on several machines, but only one person returned my call. Thankfully, she could see me the next day. It took me a good 6 months of therapy and medication to be able to say that I felt about 90% back to "normal" - whatever that is. I did lose my identity in my illness, but when I finally found it again, it was more defined, stronger and resilient. If you take away one thing from reading this, I hope that it's that there's a light at the end of the tunnel, even if you can't see it now.

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