Apologies for this being my first post after only lurking for some years but I could do with some opinions from the mn community.
I had a traumatic birth 15 months ago (caesarean by general anaesthetic after a 4 day 3 night labour with no sleep) and still really struggle with the day to day of looking after a baby.
My husband and I have no family support. His family live nearby but have never helped with childcare they are "too busy" and won't drive to our house. My parents live 100 miles away and my mother has slow terminal cancer so I feel I cannot ask them to do any baby care given that my Mum is not able to pick up and carry etc our baby and my Dad is already full time carer for my Mum.
My husband is now a stay at home Dad as he had to give up his self employed business last year when his epilepsy returned. I work full time. I struggle to keep up with the cleaning, laundry shopping and cooking. My husband works very hard on doing up our house whenever he can but he cannot cook and prioritises the DIY as our house needs a lot of work. I can't really afford a cleaner on one wage.
Our baby has been a very bad sleeper since I went back to work so I frequently sleep 4 or 5 hours in 2 to 3 cat naps. I can't catch up with daytime sleep as it is always too noisy to sleep in the day at weekends. My husband has only taken our baby out without me and left me to rest in the house 3 times - he says it's too hard for him without being able to drive. The only time I get for any "me time" is going to work.
I am finding that I have a screaming fit tantrum around once a fortnight to once a month and I am beginning to worry that it's not good for our baby for him to see this. I am beginning to think that it was perhaps a mistake to have a baby as I don't seem to be strong enough cope with my life. I feel that I don't have a chemical unbalance that needs to be rectified with anti-depressants. I am just totally knackered with what life has thrown at me and need to find ways to cope. When I have had sufficient sleep I feel like a different person.
But am I wrong? Should I be able to cope? Should I therefore go to the doctor for ADs to get through?
Is this what other people are able to cope with? Or do other people feel like this and not say so?
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Antenatal/postnatal depression
How much should I be able to cope with? Or should I go to the doctor for ADs?
12 replies
roalddahl · 27/05/2012 18:38
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