Every year many women are diagnosed with postnatal depression having looked forward to experiencing. This should be an amazing experience, a special time with their new child and even their partner. But for these women, it can be a nightmare. In many ways not only mentally and physically. But it can literally turn their whole family’s lives upside down.
The unfortunate side effect of post natal depression for many of these women. Is that the condition is not diagnosed properly. Some not diagnosed at all and often the intervention of having to take anti depressant drugs. More often than not ends up covering up even deeper/bigger problems later on that not only include MTHFR gene mutations. But also a number of other problems that almost always get missed. That can be life changing for these women and their families.
Symptoms of Post Natal Depression
Women experience post natal depression in different ways depending on their level of depression. How their genetics are expressing themselves, here is a common list of post natal depression…
- Feeling depressed
- Sadness
- Loss of appetite
- Crying
- Anxiety / Fear
- Thoughts of suicide
- Excessive worry
- Feelings of guilt
- Feeling of being overwhelmed
- Negative feelings about your future
- Worried for your baby’s well-being
- Panic attacks
- Low mood
- Insomnia (can’t get good sleep)
- General decline of mental and or physical health when compared to before the birth of the baby
- And many more
What Causes Post Natal Depression?
What you will be told about postnatal depression by most medical doctors. Is that you need to take SSRI drugs to inhibit your serotonin from breaking down. So over time, you should feel better. This unfortunately while it can be effective for some women really misses out on dealing with the underlying cause. Which can be even more destructive over the longer term. The risk of depression causing serious problems can even increase over time. Even while taking antidepressants and that why it is so important to understand what causes postnatal depression.What you should do about it?
The truth about what causes postnatal depression is that it involves a number of problems. We have seen in our patients, we will discuss each one below….
Methylation and Post natal Depression
Being pregnant and giving birth places a higher need on your body’s natural methylation. Methylation is extremely important to not only your health but also to the development of your baby. Including your ability to recover from being pregnant and giving birth. Many women have genetic mutations in the methylation pathway. That can cause them to become deficient in certain nutrients. This then goes on to cause changes in the way that your body uses its own resources. Because they are needed to maintain good levels of brain chemicals such as neurotransmitters. Without these vital neurotransmitters, depression is the result.
Post Natal Depression Genes
A big part of developing postnatal depression is often a genetic problem. Often the problem is that you have an existing gene mutation. So that becomes active as a result of becoming pregnant and giving birth. Then all of a sudden you are experiencing mental health problems such as postnatal depression. More often than not it is a lot more complex than just MTHFR gene mutations. Many of the genes associated with postnatal depression are those located in your neurotransmitters. This is actually good news because this enables us to support these. But now “active” gene mutations and significantly reduce or even stop postnatal depression.
Post Natal Depression & Nutritional Imbalances
Often one of the biggest mistakes that leads to postnatal depression lies in the nutritional status of the women. Prior to getting pregnant and during pregnancy itself. When there are functional nutritional imbalances this can place a great deal of stress on the pregnancy. Also in terms of stress on the woman and the development of the fetus. While these problems go unchecked and corrected it is easy for the entire pregnancy to become overwhelming. However, this can easily drive the mother to fall into depression. Essentially leaving her with very little resources to cope with the pregnancy and birth resulting in post natal depression.
Preventing Post Natal Depression
Prevention is always better than cure especially when it comes to depression and in many ways prevention can also be one of the best ways to make sure your pregnancy and birth is a much better experience not to mention the many benefits you will have giving birth to a much healthier child. Preventing post natal depression is all about discovering any susceptibilities you may have and providing the right support to lesson the likely hood of developing depression during pregnancy and after birth. We can help you discover you susceptibilities and provide optimal pregnancy support, just click on the below link to contact us.
Resolving Post Natal Depression
Wouldn’t it be good if we could just switch off post natal depression? Of course it would and you can, dealing with post natal depression the right way is critical and by the time you have it, it can all seem like too much and that’s why getting professional help to correctly diagnose the cause of your specific depression is vital. Contact us here for post natal depression consultations and treatments.
