Postnatal Depression Video Transcription

Sarah:

Okay, great. We’re recording. So I’m here with Claire Murphy today talking about a really important topic, postnatal depression. We wanted to include this video call into your course because we want to raise awareness and also help give you some tips that might help you to support your students in classes. It might be that you’ve been through this personally or you know friends or family who’ve suffered, but whether you have experienced it or not, you’re sure to cover across this. So I think it’s a really important topic to talk about and sometimes a topic that isn’t talked about. So we hope this will help you give you some confidence and some knowledge around the area for moving forward. Okay, so we’ll begin I’m just gonna ask Claire to introduce herself. Hi, Claire.

Claire:

Hi. So I’ve been a yoga meditation teacher for about 27 years and it just never ceases to amaze me how wonderful yoga meditation can be in the many applications it can have in life. And I’ve been really blessed to work with lots and lots of fantastic teachers and studied with them. So it’s quite an integral part of my life.

Sarah:

Great. And so I believe you’ve suffered from postnatal personally and this is what inspired you to move forward. I wonder if you’d be so kind as to remind us of your personal experience, and also what you do professionally now to help people with it.

Claire:

I’ve got two girls, my oldest will be 20 this year and my youngest is nearly 13. So it seems a very long time ago, but it’s still very optimised in my mind. So when I was pregnant with my eldest, I cried all through the pregnancy and I just thought that that’s what happened when you were pregnant. You know, it was you read books, Oh, you’ve got some mood swings and your emotions are here, there and everywhere because of that. So I didn’t really question it much while I was pregnant, and we have to remember back then that the internet was only kind of just getting going. So Google wasn’t the go-to that we have now. And it wasn’t something that I felt I needed to ask anybody. And then after I had her, the feelings and the moods and emotions just got worse. And it wasn’t till she was about nine months that my health visitor actually picked it up. So that’s been a really long time, too, without any kind of diagnosis or understanding as to why I just felt rubbish the whole time. And back then all that I could be offered was medication, there really wasn’t anything else. And I saw I got through that and that’s fine.

And then seven years after having her I got pregnant again, and then I just thought I can’t go through how I felt before. So I spoke with my GP and I didn’t go on medication, but I had counseling throughout my whole pregnancy and up to a year after I’ve had my baby. And whilst it didn’t stop the depression, it kind of lessened the impact on me the second time around. And it was during my second experience that I thought, you know, something’s got to change here. There isn’t any support out there for me. So I need to do something. So, in 2011, I set up a local peer support group for women with postnatal depression. And what it does is it offers a safe space for women to come and talk to share their feelings and the intense isolation when they’ve got these kind of emotions, and so when they go along to baby groups or other classes, they kind of get the impression that everybody else is having the most fantastic time. Yes. Something wrong with them. It must be me I must be a really rubbish mum or “Oh, why did I have this baby?”. They have all these kind of thoughts and they can’t voice them because they fear judgments or the fact that they kind of get negated and they can’t really go to family and friends, especially if the baby’s been really longed for especially ladies that have had fertility treatment as well, they can often feel, I’ve waited this long for baby, I should be really, really happy. So the group, you know, it’s been going for just over two and a half years and it offers a very safe haven for women to be able to talk openly about their feelings. And what we try to do is offer coping mechanisms and toolkits to actually help them through the anxiety and the low mood that they experienced as well as being a signposting process to other support agencies that can help them.

Sarah:

Thank you and I think it’s a start. We’re really lucky to have you here in Watford Claire, so I know I have somewhere to refer people on to and some space to offer them. So as a teacher, obviously not all of you live in Watford. So that’s the first thing to try and discover different networks and places where you can just give these women somewhere where they can go, you know, and as you said, the support network is just perhaps as important as learning tips to deal with it on their own because often you feel so isolated. I can remember one time when I’d had a baby and I was driving my car and the baby was in the back and screaming away and I was just going “I hate this, I hate this” and then all the guilt comes in and like everyone else is happy and drinking tea and eating cake and got a lovely smiley baby. And yeah, you feel alone and you feel like you can’t voice that.

So yeah, definitely. Thank you. You mentioned that you were very teary through your pregnancy. Do you often see a link between pregnant students who suffer with depression or this teariness and then moving on to postnatal depression or how does that fit together?

Claire:

It is quite interesting really, because whilst there can sometimes be a causal link from pregnancy into postnatal, it can go into one of two categories really. So a woman might be feeling like myself, not right throughout the pregnancy but not really being aware that there is something wrong or there’s something underlying and it’s not until after she’s had baby that then it’s a bit like a jigsaw puzzle bits and pieces get put together and she thinks, “ah well I didn’t feel brilliant during my pregnancy” and then they can find a way of linking back, whereas there are some women that know immediately throughout the pregnancy something’s not right. My mood isn’t right, everything’s changed. I’m not the woman that I was. For some, it can resolve on baby being born so fantastic if that happens, but unfortunately that doesn’t happen every time or it goes through into the postnatal period. So there’s no given on that and it’s not really always hormonally based either. If there’s a history of depression, then that can sometimes be a trigger. But then also you’ve got to look at life events that are happening before getting pregnant. And pregnancy can trigger any unresolved issues. So it’s been a little bit of illness in the family or there’s been a personal crisis or I don’t know relationship problems, moving house, any number of things can act as a trigger for them to suddenly not feel 100% and emotional moods and coping mechanisms can change drastically.

Sarah:

Yeah, I think in some ways, there’s also a rejection of those things because you’ve moved into, you’ve got your new baby and you want it to be perfect and you don’t want any problems or issues or challenges from the past to impact upon that. But of course, you can’t just push them away. Because also at that time, you’re very vulnerable. And yeah, because I was I was thinking as well, I’d say that probably 99% of women experience some sort of almost depression because it’s just such an overhaul of everything and it changes your own personality and you lose your purpose in a way, but how would you distinguish between someone who has those days which are completely normal and then moves into a state, which, you know, they need more support with? What do you have any sort of idea for the bridges, you know, what, what’s the difference? Or how can we as teachers spot that difference?

Claire:

That’s a really good question. Because as you say, for some you get days, some you will get bad days. Yeah, a mother will have bad days. I think that’s it. I think it’s sort of like a stick of rock from the seaside it would say we all have bad days. So part and parcel of life. But the differences for those women that kind of don’t have that rebound, they’re not able to bounce back. So an example I often give is you have two women who have been breastfeeding their baby. And for one reason or another, they both get told you need to now go on to give your baby formula you need to feed your baby. One woman might be very resilient and go, “Okay, that’s fine”. And she immediately does that without any question without self doubt or without beating herself up. Whereas the other lady might find herself internalising that, “Oh, I must be a really bad mum, Oh, I can’t feed my baby, or I’m no good at this”. So that that’s where you can sometimes spot differences. Some are able to choose, a bit like being Teflon coated, it just floats off of them. It’s not a problem. And others are almost like Velcro and the emotions stick and they can’t rationalise their thoughts. And the difficulty is when you then get these recurring thoughts that then leads to more anxiety, which then feeds more thoughts. And those ladies tend to then trickle into but don’t immediately drop into depression. And it starts with a low mood, it doesn’t shift. It’s just this underlying sense of something’s just not right. I just don’t feel myself and then the anxiety will start to come in because you have these thoughts so often catastrophise that thought, something bad is going to happen to baby. This is going to happen, that’s going to happen. And then they start to sometimes become very OCDish. And you know, very obsessive about how things need to be done. And lots of list making. List making can be quite phenomenal with women with postnatal depression. That’s my experience with the women that I work with as well.

Sarah:

No I can relate to some of that, and I’ve seen that before that’s, that’s helpful.

Claire:

In a class it’s quite tricky, really, because you wouldn’t normally have a woman coming along to a general yoga class after having a baby if she’s in that state. It’s quite complex. The last thing she can think about is getting outside the front door and going along to a class to be there on time, let alone make sure that she even feels ready for it. So it’s quite a difficult thing for her to cope with. A postnatal the baby class would be quite different because those women might think, “I’ll go along because my friends going along” or “I know that this is supposed to be good for me”, they might rationalise it like that.

And I think for teachers to be able to spot it is quite tricky. If they’ve known the woman during pregnancy, they might be able to recognise that she’s not herself. She’s not as chatty as she would have been normally or she’s not engaging in the class the way I would have anticipated she would, based on prior experience, or otherwise women tend to if they’ve managed to get into class, those kinds of things come out during either the meditation or the relaxation part or in sessions they might become quite tearful or they might stop and find emotion starts to come up. And so they might then start fussing their baby, it’s too much for them to cope with. So they’ll immediately sit up and think, “oh, I’ll do something else while everybody else is lying down”. It’s just too much for them. But it’s quite tricky to spot because women with postnatal issues are really good actresses, we can cover up everything. There’s an amazing facade we can put on everything is fantastic, as well. And it’s bulletproof. You’re not gonna be focusing on that mat. So it’s quite difficult to, to pick up on that. But there’s subtle clues.

Sarah:

That’s really helpful. Again, I can relate to some of that. So in terms of us as teachers, I suppose we have to recognise as well what we can and what we can’t do. So we’re giving the gift of yoga, that’s a support mechanism in itself, but then what would you suggest doing – I know it maybe easier for you because you can refer people on to your class – but say for us if we spot a teacher and she’s teary, she’s obviously struggling, and from your personal experience as well, or even a friend, we know is struggling what can we do? What would you suggest we can do?

Claire:

Loads, there’s absolutely nothing I do as a teacher myself, I wouldn’t suggest your teachers doing the same because as you say, not everyone’s based in our area. So you’ve come to me, having said that please do recommend my website to your teachers.

Sarah:

What we’ll do when you’re watching this video, there’ll be some text next to it that will give details of Claire’s website so you can get all this information from her.

Claire:

On my website, there’s a list of resources of local organisations and UK wide organisations as well as reading lists and things like that. But with regards to the teacher in the class, what I do and what I would recommend teachers do is make up a little leaflet or flyer and do some research of what I’ve got in my local area. So within the UK, we have things like children’s centres, and things like that. So jot down where the local children’s centres are, put the contact number and if there’s a website, put in details of anything you can find locally that is something that could support this woman. And I would also strongly suggest that they seek help from a health professional, that they consult their GP or health visitors because it’s really important. As yoga teachers we can’t give advice. We really can’t give advice on this, but we can refer and we can offer support. And what I do to lessen that sense of singling women out is I give the leaflets to everybody who comes to my classes. And what I say to them is, this might not relate to you personally. So just pop it in baby’s nappy change bag you might need to give it to women who might need this help, and the amount of women that found that really, really useful either for themselves someone else because everybody’s got one it doesn’t look like. When women meet for coffees and all of that that’s when those conversations start. And then that’s when the little light bulb moment goes on, “Oh, actually, maybe I do need some help”. As teachers, I will give the caveat at the beginning. If anyone’s got any issues, wants talk to me personally in confidence then please do see me at the end of the session. So again, that they’re not having to sort of like put themselves out at the beginning of the session as well. Yeah, and I think also, postnatal teachers with all the best intentions, can sometimes not be aware that the language they use in sessions might actually ostracise women that have been difficulties. So whilst we want to celebrate that we’ve had this beautiful baby, and we may have had the most fantastic pregnancy or birth experience, a lot of women haven’t and so hearing about things like that, or having it talked about, they need to be aware of the language they use around that because for some women, they begin internalising that I couldn’t even get that, right. I couldn’t manage the way I wanted to birth my baby. Definitely. Same issues with feeding and breastfeeding not to make one seem more superior to the other. And it’s easily done and without any intention, but it’s surprising how many women come back to me and say that they’ve been to different groups and felt, you know, really ostracised by the dynamics within the session itself. So I think that’s really important for your teachers to understand.

But I also think should a woman in class have the bravery to let the tears come and she’s been able to let the tears flow, allow her that space, you know, don’t immediately rush in to try and soothe her because that can actually cut off her process, you know, just maybe sit next to her, offer her some tissues. And then once she’s allowed that to run its course ask her what she might need rather than immediately cutting in and thinking you’ve got to try and fix it. Because for that woman, that might be the only time she’s had to really let go of that emotion that she’s been holding on to.

And the other advice that I would give to teachers is, especially if you’re teaching pregnancy and before going into postnatal work, to remind women tha in the UK, I’m not sure about international students, that we have the six week check. So and remind women that it’s not just about their babies, the six week check is about family just as much as it is about their babies. So there’s something as simple as a still not feeling right after the stitches, episiotomy or something like that, that can really bring a woman’s mood down especially if she’s not feeling particularly great in such a sensitive and private areas just to really remind women to use that appointment time wisely, rather than just saying, “Oh, I just get baby sorted out, I’m not important”. Women need to understand the importance of self nurturing and nurturing the baby. Really simple things. But it’s about getting that message across to allow, I guess a more open way of sharing with women so that they feel, I guess more confident to talk about what’s really going on and what’s really real for them at that time, rather than that sense of shame or embarrassment that they often feel.

Sarah:

Thank you. I’ve really been listening to what you’re saying and especially like the points about your role as a yoga teacher and watching your language and making sure that essentially we’re allowing our vulnerability to come into play so other people feel comfortable to allow theirs and then when theirs comes, albeit through pain, being okay for them to sit in, that not feeling like you have to rescue. I also like to how you were mentioning about our culture the way it’s that the focus is on the baby but if the mum has been through a massive transition too. In other countries, they have the fourth trimester and this is recognised in its own right, but here, we’re expected just to grab the baby and get on with it and make life perfect, and it’s really hard thing to do.

I’m really, really thrilled that you came and talked to us today, Claire. I’m noticing the time so I’m just starting to wrap up, but was there anything else you wanted to mention before we close?

Claire:

I think the other thing is, I mean, I don’t know how your teachers might run sessions. Yeah. Like I don’t know if they do assessments after the session because that’s a really key time for them to be able to really get to know the women that attending their postnatal sessions. And sometimes if they’re worried about the loss, you cannot go out to women and ask directly because that would be too intrusive. And but a really good tip that I have that has always worked wonders is if you’ve got an inkling in the back of your mind that something’s not right is the quickest way through to women is to say to her, “well, how are things with baby, how’s baby sleeping?” That’s a universal question that you can ask any woman and most women won’t even feel on guard about that because it’s not about them, it’s about the baby. But what you then find is the language they used to talk about how baby may or may not be sleeping allows them to open up and start a bit more of an open communication. So you then sense if they need some more support. That gives the yoga teacher a little inroad, how to broach the subject. A bit more sensitively.

Sarah:

Thank you. All right, then. Okay. Well, thanks so much for joining us today giving us some extra insights and definitely more awareness on how we deal with something that’s going to come into our lives through friends, through classes, and is a really important topic to engage with and try and increase awareness on. So keep up the brilliant work, Claire, we’re so happy for the work you’ve done in Watford and all the good that you do. Okay, so take care and hope to speak to you again soon. Thank you. Bye