28 | Jessie
“I kept telling myself that feeling low and fearful of what the future holds for me and my son was just part of adjusting to motherhood. But then it became a constant cycle of guilt. Feeling so scared and anxious when being a mum is all I wanted, and then adding intrusive thoughts and the sleep deprivation, it’s all very overwhelming. And I just don’t want that to be my story of being a mum. I know the only way to change my story is to ask for help.”
This is a story that begins in November 2022 when I received a message from a new mum who wanted nothing more than to change the trajectory of her motherhood story.
This is a story about a mum who’d just been diagnosed with depression and anxiety, who was experiencing vivid intrusive thoughts and panic attacks, and who couldn’t stop crying.
This is a story about a mum who made the move back to rural NSW to be closer to her family for support, but who was now struggling to find the right professional support for herself.
This is a story about a mum who advocated so hard for herself so she could finally say ‘that’s not my story anymore’.
This is Jessie’s story.
“So when I submitted my story, we were in the process of moving back to rural New South Wales… to have support and be with my family because that's what I felt I needed to heal. Like, I just wasn't going to be able to heal when all of mine and Matt's family lived 5 hours away. So, yeah, not a lot of support rural.”
“And so I was trying to find out how I was going to be able to get support, find out what options were actually available for me in terms of quality.”
“The stigma with rural Australia is that mental health itself doesn't get talked about, let alone perinatal mental health. So, yeah, there definitely has not been a lot of options, but that's why I wanted to advocate for myself.”
“For four months, I was on this high of like fight, fight, fight... But, yeah, then I crashed pretty hard.”
A big portion of Jessie’s early postpartum involved constantly advocating for her son, Carter, whom she suspected had cow’s milk protein intolerance.
“So we have a family history. Two young nieces… the same symptoms that my two little nieces had is what Carter had. And in my gut, I'm seeing these things happen with Carter, and I'm going, this looks just like his cousins. I'm so certain that this is cow's milk protein intolerance.”
“And so I was going to a separate GP for Carter, and he didn't believe that babies could have allergy and was, you know, ‘He’s eight weeks old. It's not possible. He hasn't had enough exposure to the world.’ On one hand, yeah, okay, I get that. But on the other hand, it's like, well, he hasn't had the exposure, so of course there could be an intolerance.”
“And so in the end, I was walking up to the emergency department at a much larger hospital - this is before we moved rural - saying, ‘please, I need some help.’”
“I'm thinking, this is what it is. He had this insane, insane rash that is eczema on steroids, like blisters, head to toe colic, like tummy pains, all day, every day, crying.”
“And they're going, ‘it's just colic.’ And I was like, ‘yeah, I understand that it's presenting as colic, but I think there's genuinely something causing it.’ And they're going, ‘no, it's normal at this age. He'll outgrow it.’ And I'd go home, ringing my mum, going, ‘they're not listening to me.’”
“And in the end, I got to one visit, I happened to pick the right doctor on the right shift. That was like, ‘hey, I think you're right. Here's a prescription formula.’”
“So I think that's where a lot of it stemmed from, like, this heightened stress. And then in the month that followed that, I kind of just crashed, like, for four months, I was on this high of, like, fight, fight, fight.”
“But, yeah, then I crashed pretty hard.”
“I went back to work when my maternity leave from Centerlink wore off. And I remember going to work and I rocked up, and my boss, who's my most amazing friend, I rocked up crying. She's like, ‘what's wrong? Is it Carter?’ I was like, ‘I don't know. He's okay. I don't know what's wrong. I just don't know.’”
“And she's like, ‘do you have anyone to talk to?’ I was like, ‘yeah, I've already rang PANDA. I'm just waiting for a call back’ - because that's what you have to do. They're busy. They help so many people.”
“I just remember ringing mum going, ‘I just want you and dad.’”
“I could not stop crying. So things got pretty hard.”
“All he could hear was my voice. And I think that if he had seen me in person, because he knew me - like he knew Matt and I, he was our GP! - that if he saw me, he probably would have been a lot more worried.”
Following that call with PANDA, Jessie sent a message to me which stuck with me for over a year. It said ‘I kept telling myself that feeling low and fearful of what the future holds for me and my son was just part of adjusting to motherhood. But then it became a constant cycle of guilt. Feeling so scared and anxious when being a mum is all I wanted, and then adding intrusive thoughts and the sleep deprivation, it's all very overwhelming. And I just don't want that to be my story of being a mum. I know the only way to change my story is to ask for help.’
“I remember messaging you and saying, ‘I'm moving, and I don't know where to get help.’ And I remember that bit, but I don't remember saying all of that. Obviously, I needed to say it at the time. And I don't know. As you were reading it, it literally put me straight back.”
“Like, I remember sitting in my lounge room. Yeah, I remember the lounge room being so dark because I just didn't want the lights on. And I typed that message, and that was when Matt and I had decided that, yeah, we needed to move home. Not necessarily just for me, but I hated every time we left visiting mum and dad, I would cry. I'm like, I felt awful. I felt so much guilt taking Carter away from his family.”
“I wasn't quite happy with the psychologist I had at the time either… She was good in terms of the depression symptoms themselves, but not with postpartum, like that other level of it.”
“And I had been listening to your podcast, and I literally think I had just finished listening to [Tegan’s story - episode 03] and thinking, I want that because you were talking about how great your psychologists and everything were, I was like, I want that. I need that. I'm not getting that right now. This is going to take forever if I don't get decent help!”
“And also, Medicare only gives you ten sessions. That's expensive. If I'm going to be spending mine and Matt's money on getting better, I want to be getting better. Like, I want to be seeing results. I want the connection with my psychologist.”
“So I remember very much sending that message, thinking, this needs to change. I don't want to be like this anymore.”
“And that was a lot of me trying to help myself in that as well.”
“I think I was back at work for like two weeks. So at that point I was like, maybe it was maybe five and a half months. And I booked the appointment with my GP, who was my GP, who was absolutely lovely. He was amazing. But he had relocated to Tassie and so it was all telehealth. So he couldn't even physically see me. All he could hear was my voice. And I think that if he had seen me in person, because he knew me - like he knew Matt and I, he was our GP! - that if he saw me, he probably would have been a lot more worried.”
“I rang him going, ‘I did the questionnaire with PANDA. These were my results. I need to start talking to someone. I need to work this out.’ Like, I didn't have any family around. It was just Matt and I. I didn't have time to see what was going to happen. I was at the point where I just did not want to feel like that anymore.”
“So, yeah, he put me onto my psychologist. That got rushed. He put a rush on that saying, like, ‘you need to get Jessie in ASAP.’ And they had an opening for me within a week, two weeks maybe, which was okay because I had people that I could talk to in the meantime and the distraction of work.”
“I had that session, my first session, and it didn't feel like me. Not every psychologist is right for you, like with anything. Not every personal trainer is right for every person wanting to train. But I thought I'd give it a go. Once isn't enough. So I kept going. Booked another one and that one was okay. But in between the two weeks, three weeks maybe, for my first and my second, that's when I dropped real low, like, I walked out of that first appointment thinking, this isn't even working.”
“And it was in that gap there that I rang my mum, bawling my eyes out. I just could not stop. I got into the shower crying. I cried all through my shower. I got out crying. I just ended up calling my mum. And she goes, Jesse, I think it's time that you get more help. I don't mean just seeing someone. I think it's time to think about medication. And at this point, I feel like I already knew that. And I have never been, I don't know, it's weird, but it almost felt like I was needing someone else to say, it's okay, even though I know it's okay… But I felt like I almost needed that last little bit of just do it.”
“So, yeah, I got off the phone to my mum. I jumped online, booked my appointment. I had a phone call with my same GP a couple of days later. I remember crying, going to him, going, ‘I need medication. I need something to be taking that's going to get me through to the point where the therapy is actually going to work’ and that kind of stuff.”
“So yeah, I started on - I never know how to say it properly - Sertraline.”
“And it's actually surprising how many people I found out were even on that particular one.”
“Once I actually had the confirmed, this is postnatal anxiety and depression, yes, here is your medication, that I was like, ‘yeah, this is what I have. This is what I'm doing. I am strong.’ Yeah, it's weird how much easier it actually was to talk about it once I had confirmation of it.”
“So that made a big difference. Yeah. It almost does feel like a weight lifted. Like, even though it is still a dark cloud, it almost feels like they've just done a little pin prick to relieve a bit of pressure.”
“It just balled and balled and balled until I wasn’t breathing properly. My chest was tight. And that was my first proper panic attack.”
“I've always been someone that worries, pretty much since I was a teenager. I get to the point of stress with exams and stuff, that I have a stomach ulcer. It's insane. But it was all very situational, so it wasn't constant. It was just like, ‘oh, my God, these exams’: stomach ulcer, bang! Or cold sore! But I'd never experienced panic attacks.”
“I've never experienced the tightness in my chest, the breathing. And they were always at night!”
“Obviously for reasons with Carter's health, like, he had spent two weeks at daycare. Bang! Then had two flu viruses in one go. So then Matt and I both got sick. And so I had this fear that Carter would stop breathing. Like, every single time I put him down for a nap, I was worried that he was going to stop breathing, and I wouldn't catch it and I would lose my baby that I longed so hard for.”
“I had this fear that I was going to lose Carter, that somehow something was going to happen and he was going to be taken away from me. And getting through those viruses where he did experience respiratory distress. Like, we were rushing to the hospital at 2 in the morning because the sucking in under his ribs and all that kind of stuff.”
“And at this point, he was healthy. Like, when I had my first proper panic attack, he was healthy. Like, we were all on the mend. But I just remember the tightness in my chest. Like, it started as just intrusive thoughts. And normally I could breathe through it, going, ‘no, he's here. He's fine. He's breathing. Look, you can see he's breathing. We've got the sensor mats.’ But I was worried that the sensor mats weren't going to work, that they, for whatever reason, would not pick up that he was going to stop breathing.”
“And it just balled and balled and balled until I wasn't breathing properly. My chest was tight. And that was my first proper panic attack. I think I had two that I can really remember that were that bad.”
“Matt was always my grounding, as in, if he was laying beside me, I would hold on to him and do the deep breathing and sometimes he would even squeeze me back and that kind of thing. But, yeah. That is so scary. The panic attacks. Oh, my goodness.”
“I'm so grateful that I only experienced it those couple of times. I couldn't imagine that being a constant or often occurrence.”
“What if I’m walking down the hallway and, for whatever reason, what if something happens to me and I let go and I drop him? ...that was a constant fear I had as I was walking down the hallway. The worst part is I could picture it happening in my head. I wasn’t just thinking it, I could picture it.”
In addition to panic attacks, intrusive thoughts were also a vivid part of Jessie’s pregnancy and postpartum experience.
“A lot of it was that Carter's going to stop breathing.”
“But a lot of times if I was driving in the car with Carter, anytime I'd be coming up to a roundabout - Like, I have never been in a crash in my life. And this is even when I was pregnant. I was having these kinds of things - Like I would drive up to roundabout pre-empting that I was going to get t-boned.”
“They can get wild, the intrusive thoughts.”
“So there was that one. There was the one where anytime I was going through an intersection, even if I had a green light, I was worried someone's going to run this red light.”
“Or because I'd have to walk down the hallway from our lounge room to put Carter into his bassinet or to his change table, what if I'm walking down the hallway and, for whatever reason, what if something happens to me and I let go and I drop him? And it'll just make me hold on so much tighter.”
“Obviously, I have then since found out that for the most part, the intrusive thought is protective, that it's making you like hyper vigilant, which feels crap to have them! You almost got to be like, ‘okay, so it's just making me be more careful.’ But also there are nicer ways to make me be more careful!”
“I've already got him bundled up. He's not going anywhere. Don't worry! My arms aren't just going to all of a sudden have a spasm! But that was a constant fear I had as I was walking down the hallway. The worst part is I could picture it happening in my head. I wasn't just thinking it, I could picture it.”
“I was then getting ready to catch him! That's how so vivid it was in my head that it was going to happen. Those are the two that were very vivid for me: the car and when I'm carrying him that I'm just randomly going to drop him.”
“I obviously had to drive myself to work. I couldn't not drive… But any other chance that I could get, I would not drive! Matt will listen to my episode and find this out, but that is why.”
“And I know a lot, like anyone that has experienced intrusive thoughts, you don't even have to try and justify it. But for people that have never had, it's not because you want. It's not because you're thinking of doing any of that at all. It is so hard to explain how it's just this random ‘oh,’ here it is in your head, taking up space when you could be thinking about anything else. It is there and you have to combat that of it's not going to happen. You are okay. He is okay. It is a flat surface. There is nothing for you to trip over. It's a green light. You can see all the cars have stopped. It is okay. It is insane how the willpower it takes to combat it as well.”
“And I felt a lot of guilt. I knew that I was not going to hurt Carter. Like, at no point did I have the urge to hurt him. But I felt bad that like, ‘oh my God, my brain, somewhere in my brain is thinking that something is going to happen’. And it took having a conversation again with my amazing friend where we talked about it is as a protective thing. And it was at that moment that I was really able to counteract it.”
“I am very thankful, very thankful for the people I had...”
“I am lucky that I had the people I had.”
“And this is a memory I have from listening to one of your other episodes. I can't even remember which episode, but one of the mums said something. They said, ‘you remember the people that were there for you, you remember the people you had.’ And I remember listening to that episode and my first thought was my boss. She was the first person and then my mum and obviously Matt.”
“But the first person that came to my head was my boss when I heard that line. She was a big part of getting me through those couple of weeks of getting in to see the psychologist and starting the medication and all those kinds of things.”
“So I am very thankful, very thankful for the people I had. It makes me tear up.”
Following her diagnosis, starting medication, and moving back home to rural NSW, Jessie was on a mission to find a new therapist.
“After I listened to episode five - Ella, I started following her on Instagram and she had openings for free 15-minute consults, and I was like, ‘oh, my God, this is my sign.’” Ella happens to be a perinatal mental health occupational therapist.
“So I booked in for that 15-minute consult. And even in that, it felt like I could be my most honest, true self with her.”
“I can't fully blame the psychologist that I started with, I just got a vibe straight away that I couldn't be my fully open, honest self. So I was a little bit of a hindrance to myself in that. But I did not get that at all with Ella, even though it was only 15 minutes.”
“I remember getting off that call and the first thing I did was I texted Matt and I said, ‘yeah, this is it. Ella's the one. She's the one that's going to help me heal.’”
“I don't even know if I could find the right words, to be honest. And this is going to hit her as hard as it's about to hit me, but she genuinely saved my life.”
“I remember messaging you when you said, ‘is there any one of my guests you want to do a shout out to?’ And I had to thank you for the podcast, for bringing her into my world, like, of knowing that she exists, because she genuinely saved my life.”
“And I say, ‘saved my life’ in the sense that I just felt so empty. Like, my life feels so full, my heart is so full now. To think about where I was, to where I am now…”
“The medication - it was just to get me working through the situational stuff. So I'm not on my medication now. Like, I weaned off it. But at one point where I thought I was just going to be on the medication always. Which I didn't have a problem with. It's fine. If that's what I got to do, that's what I got to do. If that's what makes me being happy, then that's what it is. But the end goal was always to come off it, to at least get to a point to try and come off it. And I definitely wouldn't have been able to do that without her, among other people, but without her.”
“So I started off doing individual consults with Ella, which was absolutely amazing in itself. There was a lot there, I've always known that I'm a bit of a people pleaser… If someone needs know within my circle, I'll do anything and everything for the people that I love, even if it's at the detriment of myself, which is something I had to really work on with Ella.”
“It comes to a lot of boundary setting, which is not as easy as it sounds, but yes, a lot of boundary setting, a lot of working through the guilt of people are going to come to my house and see that it's not completely spotless. And Ella had to keep reinforcing, ‘who cares? You have a twelve to 18 month old that lives there. They aren't clean. You're going to drive yourself nuts vacuuming ten times a day, thinking that you're going to be able to keep your house clean’. Not that I was vacuuming ten times a day, but I had this thing in my head that I wanted to be able to vacuum every night and pack away his toys every night.”
”I'd do that and then I'd be doing all these things, trying to keep the house clean and sit down and go, did I play with him enough today, though? Did he see that I was giving him attention? Did he need more attention from me? Like the whole present verses productive - I just sound so much like Ella now!”
“That was a lot of it. But also not burning myself out in, you don't have to say yes to that extra shift. It is not your problem that you can't work when someone else is supposed to work, it's okay. And a lot of not wanting to have other people looking after Carter in quotation marks ‘too much’ that it's like, if he's happy there and they're happy with him because it's his family, they're going to love seeing him. If they don't want to look after him or that they don't feel like they can, they will say no.”
“And until they do, it's okay. Take that half hour for yourself. Take that hour for yourself. You need to look after you to look after your family. Like, your priority is you and your family, not other people. Like, they are their own priority. And if they get offended by it, you can't control how they're going to react when you say, ‘well, actually, sorry, I really just want to be able to have a shower. No, I won't do this for you’ or those kinds of things.”
“Because that's literally what it was coming down to, is that I was picking really inconvenient having showers really late at night and being tired all the time because I didn't want to rely on other people to be able to have a shower, like straight after work and things like that. So that's where a lot of that came to.”
“And then I did group sessions. So because my ten individual sessions of Medicare ran out, I got group ones as well because of my location.”
“I participated in Project Me, which in itself, my individual sessions were great and I think it definitely helped having them first. But Project Me, that was where it all really came together for me. There's these workbooks, like, there's content that you do. That is a lot of reflection.”
“It's a lot of ‘what kind of mum do you want to be? What kind of person do you want to be?’ It looks at that people pleasing component of ‘how do you feel when you set boundaries? How would it feel if you did set your boundaries and you did stick to your boundaries’ and, yeah, looking at your routine of giving yourself me time and just a lot of ways to look after you that don't actually require you putting that extra effort.”
“For ages, I was like, I know I need to go to the gym because I know it'll make me feel better, but that's a whole other effort. Like, Matt was working shift work and it would be like, ‘oh, I'm going to have to drop Carter off’ and all that kind of stuff. And Ella was like ‘so do it.’”
“And now I do it all the time and I don't care. It's not that I say I don't care, but it's just that built-in now that that's what it is. Yeah. It's just how my routine is. I go to the gym this day, this day and this day. And if Matt's home, great. If not, then I have plenty of family that are like, ‘yeah, cool, go do that. We've got him. He can stay here for an hour.’”
“You're not always the best at holding yourself accountable. So that's what Project Me really did for me. It was like, well, the other mums in the group, they're doing it, so I can't slack off and, like, I've got to stick to what I've said I'm going to do. And then it became a routine and habit and now I don't even give it a second thought.”
“So, yeah, that's a lot of what Ella does, actually coming back to the main question. It's looking at ways you can do the things that make you happy or look after you so that you don't feel so low or you don't have the constant cycle of being overwhelmed, overstimulated mum rage and then guilt.”
“So, yeah, there's a lot of different strategies that Ella has in her toolbox that I now have in my toolbox that even when I am having my low days, that before where it'd turn into two, three weeks of, ‘I just feel like crap’. It's maybe a day… I go to sleep and I wake up and it's another day. It's not the same as yesterday. It could end up the same as yesterday. But I now am able to pick myself up out of my own hole. I can remind myself of what I need to do. Like, I'm falling off my own wagon here. I need to get back on it. So she helps you develop a toolbox.”
“I was lucky I had the other mum in my group was, like it was a mirror reflection of myself, as in, we were very similar people, we spoke a lot the same… to have the conversations with another mum who is going through a similar struggle right in that moment, like in that day, in that week or whatever, that cycle, that roller coaster that you're on, that adds another level to it itself. It's that genuine proof of I am not the only one that is going through this. So that is definitely the biggest benefit of group therapy, I think.”
“That would have been the crux of my story. But that’s not my story anymore.”
“If it wasn't for the podcast and finding that next service, finding Ella, that made me aware of what else is out there. And that is what was for me. Obviously, it's not for everyone, but it's what was for me. I'd already hit my bottom before I started listening to the podcast. That's how I found your Instagram page.”
“I sit and reflect when I see Carter doing something just so cute and going, ‘oh, I'm so glad I can enjoy this moment’. Like, I'm so glad that I'm at a point where I genuinely am here enjoying this moment and I get to enjoy this moment. Like, if I did this podcast like twelve months ago, I wouldn't have had anywhere near as much good to share. I would have been like, ‘yeah, it's been crap’. That would have been the crux of my story. But that's not my story anymore. I mean, it is a part of it, but it's not my whole story.”
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