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State of the mental health.
I followed up with my psychiatrist today for my postpartum anxiety disorder.
I've been on meds for three weeks. They are helping some. The big difference I notice is that when I have a crazy thought I can recognize that it is an irrational product of anxiety and not, you know, a real thing. That doesn't actually make it go away, but it nonetheless represents an improvement over before, when I would have crazy thoughts without realizing that they were crazy.
For example. When our previous nanny quit I developed the conviction that whatever she might say about being offered a full-time job doing something else, the real reason she quit was that she thought we were disgusting and awful. I was entirely convinced of this. It wasn't until I sat down at one point - after days and days - to marshal my evidence for that conclusion that I realized that, um, I didn't have any. Before that it never occurred to me to doubt my belief. I still kind of think it might be true.
In contrast, the new and improved Prozac Rivka took Colin to an infant story hour last week. As I wheeled the stroller up to the library, I saw another mother with her infant in a front carrier. I immediately thought, "I bet she thinks I'm a terrible mother for using a stroller instead of carrying my baby." But immediately after that I thought, "Wow, that was a crazy thought. I bet that's the anxiety talking." I still thought there was a chance that she despised me, but I was also able to understand and accept the possibility that I was being irrational. That's an improvement.
What hasn't gone away is the anxiety itself. I have periods usually lasting at least a couple of hours during which I feel very anxious and tense and keyed-up and have a tendency to think irrational things along the everyone-thinks-I'm-terrible spectrum. In the last week or so it's been increasingly possible for me to label those periods as brain-chemistry-related. It doesn't make them go away, but it sort of helps me ride them out.
We're going to start titrating the Prozac levels up until I stop having these anxiety episodes. The other thing that may help, hormonally, is that I'm starting to cut back on how much milk I'm pumping. I had pushed myself into overproduction so that I could build up a stash of milk in the freezer, and now I'm going to back that off so I'm not making more than Colin actually drinks. To the extent that my anxiety disorder is hormonally mediated, making less milk will probably help.
So that's where I am. Your continued forbearance is very much appreciated.
I've been on meds for three weeks. They are helping some. The big difference I notice is that when I have a crazy thought I can recognize that it is an irrational product of anxiety and not, you know, a real thing. That doesn't actually make it go away, but it nonetheless represents an improvement over before, when I would have crazy thoughts without realizing that they were crazy.
For example. When our previous nanny quit I developed the conviction that whatever she might say about being offered a full-time job doing something else, the real reason she quit was that she thought we were disgusting and awful. I was entirely convinced of this. It wasn't until I sat down at one point - after days and days - to marshal my evidence for that conclusion that I realized that, um, I didn't have any. Before that it never occurred to me to doubt my belief. I still kind of think it might be true.
In contrast, the new and improved Prozac Rivka took Colin to an infant story hour last week. As I wheeled the stroller up to the library, I saw another mother with her infant in a front carrier. I immediately thought, "I bet she thinks I'm a terrible mother for using a stroller instead of carrying my baby." But immediately after that I thought, "Wow, that was a crazy thought. I bet that's the anxiety talking." I still thought there was a chance that she despised me, but I was also able to understand and accept the possibility that I was being irrational. That's an improvement.
What hasn't gone away is the anxiety itself. I have periods usually lasting at least a couple of hours during which I feel very anxious and tense and keyed-up and have a tendency to think irrational things along the everyone-thinks-I'm-terrible spectrum. In the last week or so it's been increasingly possible for me to label those periods as brain-chemistry-related. It doesn't make them go away, but it sort of helps me ride them out.
We're going to start titrating the Prozac levels up until I stop having these anxiety episodes. The other thing that may help, hormonally, is that I'm starting to cut back on how much milk I'm pumping. I had pushed myself into overproduction so that I could build up a stash of milk in the freezer, and now I'm going to back that off so I'm not making more than Colin actually drinks. To the extent that my anxiety disorder is hormonally mediated, making less milk will probably help.
So that's where I am. Your continued forbearance is very much appreciated.