Articles and Information
Articles to validate your experiences and to empower you to understand and navigate the world of perinatal mental ill health informed by research, lived experience, and reflection
For informational purposes only. For medical advice, diagnosis or support, please consult a professional.
Let’s not forget about bipolar disorder in motherhood.
When you think about maternal mental health, does bipolar disorder even come to mind? Pregnancy and postpartum include an increased vulnerability to the onset (or recurrence) of bipolar disorder, yet screening in antenatal and postnatal settings tends to only focus on depression. This is a missed opportunity, meaning BD remains underdetected and undertreated in the perinatal period.
More than postpartum: mental health in pregnancy.
As the host and founder of Perinatal Stories Australia, I have the honour of interviewing mothers about what is often the hardest time of their life, during what is supposed to be the best time of their life. Something I hear far too often is how the symptoms of mental ill health in pregnancy were largely ignored - even by mothers themselves. It's just hormones, right? Maybe birth anxiety? This will all go away when the baby is here... won't it? And yet as a society and in health circles, the focus is usually only on postpartum. This needs to change.
