Pain in Childbirth & Postpartum Depression
“To the woman he said, ‘I will surely multiply your pain in childbearing; in pain you shall bring forth children.’”
– Gen 3:16 (ESV)
Among the several harsh punishments meted out to Adam and Eve in the Garden, we regard this as womankind’s particular share. One of the many unhappy consequences of sin passed down to us through the limbs of our twisted family tree. And we’re all too familiar with the larger gist of this biblical narrative. We build so much of our theology and theodicy around it. The curse of The Fall. The root cause of all our earthly miseries. And we women jokingly shake our fists at Eve for “cursing us” with our unpleasant women’s woes because they’re another nuisance that have become part and parcel with our broken human experience.
But this verse only refers to the physical act of childbirth, right? As a woman, you go through the unprecedented physical agony of labor (rightly named) and your sorrow is immediately eclipsed by the joy of a baby in arms. We pay our dues to the curse in the hospital room and then go home to our hard-earned happily ever-afters.
And yet, this curse is not necessarily a time-limited event. We see the brokenness of our fallen world in so many of its unfair and unanticipated manifestations… disease, death, addictions, miscarriage, accidents, poverty, violence and so on. And I’ve learned, first-hand, that the Fall extends the pain of childbirth beyond the delivery room; it extends it in Postpartum Depression, as well.
So many women feel like they can’t talk about their experience with this very real illness. Even though it’s not her fault. Even though it’s the last thing she would have ever wanted for herself and her family. Even though it’s not some latent character defect crawling out the postpartum version of herself to condemn her, but rather a perfect storm of hormones, brain chemicals and physical depletion wreaking havoc on the organ of her brain. We are ashamed of this illness. We feel we need to stuff it down and storm ahead. We don’t want to identify ourselves with this condition because we fear the associations.
- What if people think I’m going crazy?
- What if they think I don’t love my baby? That I’m an unfit mother?
- What if they worry that I will harm my baby (like the tragic news stories on TV)?
- Will the police or CPS try to take my baby away?
- What if it looks like I’m just trying to get attention?
- What if this labels me?
- What if people think I’m being ungrateful and should just snap out of it?
- Will people think I’m divulging too much personal information? Should I remain discreet?
- What if the church thinks this makes me a bad Christian? That I don’t have enough faith?
- What if my family thinks less of me? That I’m weak? That I’ve failed? That I’m less of a woman?
What if, what if, what if…
And so many women suffer with this in silence. Yet it’s more common than we realize. 70-80% of women will experience the “baby blues” after giving birth (moderate moodiness that usually clears up within a couple weeks after delivery). One in 10, however, will develop a mood disorder more lasting, severe and clinical in nature: Postpartum Depression. I had no problems with conception (sorry, TMI?), a healthy and comparatively comfortable pregnancy, a painful but uncomplicated delivery, and a gloriously beautiful baby girl to take home. I was getting off easy! And yet, completely unexpectedly and unwillingly, four days after our sweet baby was born, I became one of the ten.
And I want to talk about it now. I want to use this blog as an honest, vulnerable, rambling attempt to do so. I want to dispel some of the stigma, shame and secrecy, at least in my own small circle of women and young mothers, so that they can know that they’re not alone and that they can reach out for whatever help and support they need. Even if someone’s just feeling moody, stressed or worried, and perhaps not “technically depressed”… we can talk about it.
More than anything, a depressed mother wants to be happy and to be well again. Taking your baby home to embark on the adventure of motherhood is supposed to be one of the most blissful, blessed times in a woman’s life; and yet, due to the distorting influence of the Fall, it’s sometimes one the darkest and scariest things she’ll ever encounter. I hope my messy story and my humble availability can let any struggling momma reading this know and FEEL what she most needs to hear:
You aren’t alone. This is not your fault. You will be well again.
(Postpartum Depression recovery mantra)
