25 | Ashlee - pregnancy and postpartum anxiety, depression, medication, talk therapy, helplines

Perinatal Stories Australia

When Ashlee entered motherhood, she expected the transition to be easy from her many years of working with children. What she didn’t expect was the severe anxiety she experienced in her first pregnancy or the depression that overshadowed her postpartum. As a perinatal and infant mental health psychologist, she also didn’t expect to miss her own red flags.

Sleep, feeding, and health complications with her daughter also diverted any attention away from Ashlee’s wellbeing, and left her blaming motherhood and expecting her mental health to get better only when circumstances improved. Ashlee finally reached out for support and even moved cities for a fresh start, but two weeks later, she found out she was unexpectedly pregnant with her son.

This is Ashlee’s phenomenal story - about the benefit of hindsight, about grieving her first postpartum, about navigating motherhood with a diagnosis of autism, about the importance of being listened to, about seeking psychological help as a psychologist, about the challenge motherhood caused to her identity, about the difficulty in deciphering the difference between mental ill health and the ‘normal’ challenges of motherhood, about redefining what a ‘village’ means, about rejecting the shame of taking medication, about overcoming depression and having faith that things will get better, about learning to look inwards, and about embracing her own humanness.

Expect to be blown away when listening to this episode.

You can find Ashlee on Instagram @wells_psychology where she raises awareness about perinatal and women’s mental health. Please note, this episode discusses the lived experience of anxiety, depression and an unwanted, unexpected, pregnancy. Go gently.

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MADE WITH LOVE by Rebecca (host, founder, storyteller) x