Harmony Psychiatry Clinic

Symptoms of Postpartum depression and ways to deal with it!

Hi, my name is Dr. Armaan Pandey and this talk that I'm going to have maybe very beneficial if you are a to be parent or you are a new parent. So I'm going to tell you about three aspects of postpartum mental health. Postpartum refers to post delivery, as a lot of you might know. The first thing I want to talk about is a very serious medical condition which is called as postpartum depression. So right before or after the birth of a baby a mother's body suffered through a massive hormonal changes and often these hormonal changes can result in depression. Like we see in depression too the symptoms are very very similar like loss of interest in everything, feeling sad all the time, doesn't want to take care of the babies also at time, doesn't feel like worth living, disturbance in sleep, disturbance in appetite, crying spells, suicidal thoughts and sometimes even thoughts of hurting the baby. So yes your hormones can do this to your brain. Solution is quite simple. A short course of anti-depressant therapy is very very helpful, very efficient in taking away these symptoms. The symptoms go away very quickly and it is quite safe as well.

Another aspect that one must be aware of when it comes to postpartum depression is a milder form called as postpartum blues. Here the woman experiences mood swings, often crying jags, easy irritibality, but these are very short lasting. So most of the days the woman is fine, the mother is fine but sometimes she may display these things and usually postpartum blues gets better on their own, you don't have to do much about it. But it is advisable that you go to a doctor, get yourself checked out and if it is depression then get treatment and get better. The second aspect of mental health, when it comes to mothers, usually when new mothers are concerned is that you have to be aware of something called as mother's guilt.

Now this has got more to do with how the society treats new mother's than what biology does to you. When you deliver your first baby, or even second child for that matter, you are loaded with a barage of instructions, you are supposed to do this, you are not supposed to do that. And these instructions comes from every corner of the world. Your spouse tells you something, parents tell you something else and your in-laws tell you something else, your doctors are also advising you, your neighbours, your relatives and even your maid servants at times. What do you do in that case, and sometimes the advises are contradictory. So, the mother has the burden of making small, tiny decisions for the baby. And every tiny decision she makes she feels guilty that maybe what I'm doing for my child is not right. You need to be aware of this, there is nothing like a perfect mother or a perfect parent. All you have to do is be a good enough parent, a good enough mother. You cannot make sure that your baby is 24x7 happy or comfortable. Your baby is going to cry when she is not comfortable, when she is hungry, when she has some pain and this is going to continue till she can vocalise or verbalise her feelings better. So, do not feel absolutely guilty if you are not able to soothe your baby immediately or if someone tells you otherwise. You have to make a decision, sometimes you have to be assertive with other individuals. Don't be aggressive, don't break into a fight but do not take everything passively too.

The third aspect that is important when it comes to mental health, especially for new parents is that you lose focus of your relationship at times. Because the baby is the centre of the family now, you start ignoring your relationship with your spouse, probably you are more engaged in taking care of the baby for the first two years, which is required, it is inevitable. But during this time a lot of couples experience distancing and people who have problems later on in their marital life often report that this was the turning point. So one has to be mindful. What I can advice you is like you treat your relationship with your partner as your first child, because your relatonship is something you both have created together. It requires constant nurturing, it requires constant attention from you. So if you have another child after your first child you are not going to ignore this first child because you are having another baby.

Of course you can't pay as much attention but you can't neglect it. So for your partner also take out some quality time, do certain small things for them that makes you happy and whenever you can find time do spend quality time together bonding with each other. Remember this fact that you are becoming parents because you are together so you have to take care of this relationship as well. If you are aware of these few aspects of mental health and a lot of other things as well pertaining to parenting I'm sure you are going to enjoy parenthood rather than be stressed about it.

For any further advices or consultation you can book an appointment through Lybrate.com .

Things you shouldn't say to a Depressed person!

Hello, I am Dr. Armaan Pandey. I am a consultant psychiatrist and I am going to tell you something about Depression today.

Now, we all know that depression is a very common illness and its very likely that you have come across someone who has suffered from depression, maybe a friend, a family member and an acquaintance. I am going to tell you three things that you should never tell a person who has depression. The first and foremost, never ask them why are they depressed. We often feel that a person has depression due to certain problems in their life, like a bad relationship or some problem at work or some issues with someone, financial issues. Now, these problems can be a factor in depression but they are not the cause. Depression is a very biological disease. it happens due to some neurochemical disturbances in the brain. In the same kind of stressful environment, not everyone is going to get depressed.

When we ask this question, “Why are you depressed?” we are implying that you should not be depressed. Sometimes, it may be misinterpreted as I am too weak and therefore I am depressed. I am not able to handle my situation, therefore, I am depressed. This may make the person more miserable, so refrain from asking this question. Instead, what you can ask or rather what you can do is to educate yourself about depression from authentic sources. Consult the doctor and ask the psychiatrist that what are the causes and what you can do about it and help the patient understand these causes because they might be blaming themselves for the condition that they have. This is how you can be helpful.

The second thing that you should completely avoid while interacting with a person suffering from depression is telling them what to do. Often, I hear family members tell the patient that go for a walk, start exercising a little bit, take a vacation, or go engage in some activity, do work, eat this, don’t eat that. Now, of course the intention is very good, you are trying to help out this person and a lot of times these things do help us make feel better. So these activities do make us feel better and this may release the symptoms of depression a little bit but this is not the cure. The second problem is that, a person who has depression has very low motivation and energy to do anything, even routine things.

For them, getting out of the bed, brushing their teeth, getting a bath, getting ready for work, going to work itself is a big task, and top of that if we add morning walks, it becomes a further burden on them. When they are not able to accomplish that, they feel even worse about themselves. So, refrain from doing that. Instead, what you can do is ask them how can you help them and ask them, “What can I do for you?” instead of telling them what you think they should do. This definitely would be very helpful. The third thing that you should be very careful about is never tell them, “Just forget about it” or “get over it” because depression is not like a switch on our brains which can be turned on and off and we can decide to depressed today and tomorrow I will not be depressed. Just like a person who has physical illness is advised to take treatment, to take some rest, and then get better. This is exactly what you say to a person who has depression or for that matter any kind of illness, to take treatment, to take rest, and get better. Do not ask them to just forget about it.

I hope these tips are useful to you. You can contact me through lybrate.com.

How to maintain a Healthy Relationship?

Hi, my name is Dr. Armaan Pandey. I’m a consultant psychiatrist and today I’m going to tell you something that maybe very helpful to your relationship. Now, we all know that we have one of our very basic emotional needs is to feel loved. When we are children this need is usually fulfilled by our parents and as we grow older various people make us feel loved and especially when we get into a relationship it is either our spouse or partner who fulfills this basic emotional need.

Often I get couples who have some marital issues and when I speak with them individually I feel that both the partners love each other but either of the partners don’t feel that the other one loves them. According to Dr. Gary Chapman who is a marriage counselor and who has authored several books on marriage. He introduces a concept called as ‘A love tank’. We all have a love tank which needs to be filled by our partners.
Now the problem is that this love tank gets filled by a particular way, which he calls as a love language. He elaborates that we basically have five different love languages. The first language is that of assertion; that is verbally expressing your love for your spouse. For example saying things like “I love you”, “I miss you” or “I like a certain thing about you” or simply texting them and saying that “I’ve been thinking about you” with a smile. This may make your partner feel loved.

The second way that we express love or we understand love is through physical intimacy. So, acts like kissing, hugging, holding hands or sex may make a person feel loved and wanted by their partner. The third type of love language is by giving gifts. So, when you surprise your partner with something like a bunch of flowers or a gift which may not be very expensive or expensive in certain cases your partner may feel that you think about making them happy and this makes them feel loved. The fourth love language that Dr. Gary Chapman elaborates is called as quality time. Spending quality time with your partner as in going for a movie together, doing some activity together like cooking in the house together or learning a new hobby together. So, this may make people feel like they love and care for each other and this brings people closer.

The fifth and final type of love language is acts of service; that means doing something for your partner. For example, holding the door open for them, bringing them a glass of water or doing some chore with them. That may make your partner feel loved and cared for by you. Often this happens in couples that we speak or understand two different love languages. So a woman does not feel loved by her husband when he says nice things to her but she feels extremely loved and cared for when he gives her expensive gifts. But the husband, on the other hand, may feel that she needs to understand that he loves her when he says nice things about her. So, these two individuals speak and understand two different love languages.

Now, how can this concept be useful to you? I’ll give you a little exercise that you can do with your partner which will make use of this concept and probably help you in your relationship no matter at what stage your relationship is. The first step is to make a list of the love languages your partner listens to or understands. You should take the help of your partner to make this list. Usually, there would be two or three items on this list. Now the second step involves writing down eight ways in which you can speak these love languages. So, the exercise to help you speak your partners love language. Not to make them understand your love language because it is easy to learn a new language yourself than to teach another language to someone else.

So, after you’ve made these eight items on the list, comes the third part which is the most interesting. You practice one of these items every week. So, for eight consecutive weeks, you will be speaking your partners love language in one way or the other. After eight weeks I’m sure your partner is going to feel way more loved by you than before. And even if you’re not doing this together, at the end of eight weeks if your partner feels loved and happy they are sure to return the favor.

I hope that this is very, very helpful to your relationship. For any kind of marital advice or for consultation, you can contact me through lybrate.com