Postnatal Depression

If pregnancy is the big bang that precipitates postnatal depression (PND), then surely if you don’t get pregnant, you can’t be at risk  for this kind of depression. Right? Wrong

- Lisa Lazarus

When James held his daughter for the first time,he knew he wanted to give his little girl the world. Suddenly, work took on a whole new meaning. He needed that promotion now that he had to provide financially for his larger family. The burden was intense and he took to working long hours away from home. The pressure, combined with the sleepless nights of parenting, eventually broke him. He became irritable and anxious, and his libido declined until it was nonexistent. Was he suffering from male PND?

It’s more than likely. A study in The Journal of the American Medical Association reports 10 percent of men suffer from prenatal and postpartum depression. And, that number climbs in the three- to six month postpartum period. Depression, the study found, has a greater probability of occurring if the mother also experiences PND.

WHAT ELSE CAUSES PND IN MEN?

There are other risk factors that are more likely to predispose men to PND. Linda Lewis, a research psychologist who specialises in the area of postnatal distress and author of the book When Your Blessings Don’t Count: A Guide to Recognising and Treating Postnatal Distress (Metz, 2011), mentions the following factors:

Is the relationship between you and your partner strained?

Was this an unplanned pregnancy?

Are there financial difficulties? The onus of being the sole breadwinner can, for obvious reasons, be very daunting to men.

Have you previously experienced depression?

Even though the risk factors of PND in men are fairly well known, the diagnosis is tricky to make.

IT’S NOT SO SIMPLE