How my post-natal diagnosis actually made me stronger

I sat slumped against the end of my bed, the heaviness of my own mind making it almost impossible to get up and do what I should be doing - being their mama.

That responsibility on it’s own felt like too much for me to hold. I was stuck inside a twisted world of my own mind games, depression and anxiety. I longed to escape myself if only just for a moment, but in the same breath, anything else outside of me required effort. And it was effort I didn’t have. I’d lost motivation for almost everything in life, walking with a numbness I have never experienced beofre. Just hoping that perhaps today would be the day when the cloud was lifted, today would be the day when something changes, today would be the day when I get myself back again.

I didn’t know it yet, but one day not too far in the future I would be diagnosed with PTSD, Depression and Anxiety. Labels that explain things but never actually make you feel any better. In some ways it makes you feel like you’ve officially failed at motherhood. I remember the doctor handing me a prescription and telling me everything would be better, yet in that moment in her office I could not imagine feeling any further away from better. It felt more like the world was collapsing in on me and I had no way of knowing how to stop it.

Up until that moment I had convinced myself that this was a normal part of motherhood. Everyone told me that I would be tired when baby number 2 arrived, everyone said it would be hard. No one really looked me deep in the eye and asked if I was okay, so I never felt like I could utter the words that I wasn’t.

In everyone else’s defence, I probably looked like I was okay. I did a damn good job of keeping it together, partly because I had no choice to fall apart. I had two little humans at home with me who needed me and I would rather give them my everything and leave nothing for myself than leave them lacking.

But I also kept it together because I was so terrified someone would find out I was a bad mum.

Because good mums could not possibly feel the way that I had been feeling, way too consistently for the last couple of years.

Good mothers don’t long to be away from their children, and not just for a break, but to desperately esacape their reality.

Good mothers don’t feel empty inside no matter what joy and happiness is unfolding around them. Good mothers don’t look in the mirror and burst into tears simply because they can’t escape the pain that lies behind those eyes.

Good mothers don’t feel rage and resentment towards their children.

Good mothers don’t struggle, they thrive and no matter what and they just get on with it.

I did not feel like a good mother in any sense and it terrified me to think that anyone else would see my inner landscape and deem me a bad mother. I couldn’t bear the thought that they would see my truth, that they would see the weakness under the happy exterior I tried so hard to maintain.

But then someone did… and thank god he did. Perhaps it was less of what my husband saw, and more of what he didn’t see. His wife was escaping him and becoming someone she wasn’t. He is the reason I ended up in a doctors office facing the stark and frightening realities of mental illness, because without him I would have kept on keeping on, thinking this was a normal part of motherhood and things will get better tomorrow, or the next day. I was so wrapped up in fear of being a bad mother, of someone judging me, of failing my beautiful children and my partner that I kept pushing through.

Over the years I’ve seen so many sides of myself I never knew existed. I’ve been ashamed, embarrased, fearful of being judged, deeply guilty and regretful. But I’ve also seen a woman so lovingly devoted to her family that she will endure whatever she can to be herself again. I’ve seen a woman face many inner demons and build more courage and strength than she knew possible. I’ve seen a woman finally heal herself and become whole again.

Finally I’ve stopped fearing my own and everyone else’s perception of myself and accepted that this journey was how it was meant to be. Sure, it was painful and I wonder if battling mental illness is something I would undo from my life, but it has taught me so much.

Navigating mental illness in motherhood literally burned away every part of myself that didn’t serve me – the guilt, self-doubt, self-hatred, lack of confidence, unfulfilled dreams and fear of failure – all of it burned and raged in me until it turned to dust.

When that happens we are left with creating something new or finally being able to see what was there all along. The beauty can sometimes sit so closely next to the pain. I know my journey will continue and it’s long and bumpy at times, but I’ve found a strength in me that I never knew existed.

And I know if you’re reading this, it exists within you too.