Perinatal Stories Australia

After her dream physiological labour and birth, Amelia’s world was turned upside by a sudden postpartum haemorrhage that whisked her away from her husband and daughter.

From the moment she awoke from the surgery, Amelia was consumed by mania and insomnia. Over the next eight weeks, her postpartum psychosis escalated but Amelia was able to hide most of her delusions and hallucinations from her care providers. That is until finally s...

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 f...

Birth trauma permeated much of Claire’s story and it impacted her mental and physical health in ways she could never have imagined. This was only exacerbated by the border closures and a tumultuous feeding journey.

‘Failure to thrive’ was a label that was applied to her son, but ultimately became a label she applied to herself.

In this episode, Claire @ma...

I really didn't think I'd be back here behind the microphone telling my own story again. I didn't think I'd have anything to share because I had many hopes that things would be different this time. I hoped that I would be different this time.

But here we are.

For many reasons, for so many of us, pregnancy is not always the most joyful time of our lives. L...

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 ...

With a background in child development psychology and extensive experience working with thousands of babies, Siobhan was, what she thought, going to be off to a running start in motherhood.

That was until she was confronted by a traumatic birth and intense sleep deprivation at the height of the pandemic lockdowns.

Siobhan’s sense of self was challenged an...

‘Are you feeding your baby?’ These are the words that confronted ICU nurse, Elyse, at a week postpartum when she was told her newborn son was starving, despite her strict three-hour feeding regime. In her words, a diagnosis of insufficient glandular tissue (IGT) or breast hyperplasia caused her world to fall apart.

For weeks, Elyse tried everything to increase her supply but was instead left enviously watching the bond between Patr...

In this episode, I’m joined by Gemma - a recovering perfectionist, accredited social worker, perinatal counsellor, podcast host of @postpartumlikeaboss, and mum-of-two. From the moment she fell pregnant, Gemma experienced an immediate sense of identity loss and anxiety that lasted until postpartum.

While the anxiety and unknowns disappeared after birth, the relentlessness and challenges of early motherhood left Gemma at her lowest....

When Sarah was discharged from the mother-and-baby psychiatric hospital, she felt both refreshed and proud. Her recovery from postpartum anxiety and OCD became a badge of honour.

But that wasn’t the end of Sarah’s story with maternal mental ill health. Severe depression, a medication change, a presentation to the emergency department, and a second and third MBU admission filled pa...

We’re all familiar with the adage ‘healing isn’t linear’ but we don’t often talk about the way a non-linear recovery ambushes the way we see, and feel about, ourselves. This attack on her perceived sense of self is something Sarah was continuously forced to confront with every lapse that she encountered on her recovery from postpartum anxiety, OCD, and depression. Postpartum progressively broke down any deep-rooted misconceptions...

Monique’s birth may have been quick, but its complications and long-term impacts were anything but. From a 3rd degree tear, prolapse, severe postpartum haemorrhage, a full levator avulsion on the right and a partial levator avulsion on the left, a near death experience, and a stay in the ICU, she paints a picture of the pain from her birth trauma and postpartum PTSD as a ‘storm’ - one that she is still weathering.

But thanks to tal...

As a psychologist, Gen was familiar with psychiatric wards, but with no history of mental ill health or any risk factors she certainly never expected to be on the ‘other side’ - admitted as a patient to an acute ward shortly after the birth of her son, Arlo.

Following a relatively smooth pregnancy and delivery, Gen’s early postpartum was fraught with mastitis and the eventual development of sepsis. However, the life-threatening inf...

With a history of anxiety and depression, Jess and her care team went into pregnancy with a plan to protect her mental health during postpartum. Unfortunately, serious and sudden medical diagnoses for her son, Jasper, immediately after birth meant Jess’s mental health was neglected amongst relentless surgeries, a two-month NICU admission, and full-time caretaking for a sick baby.

The NICU experience cast a long shadow over Jess’s m...

Between a PCOS diagnosis, fertility struggles, and several rounds of IVF, it was not easy for Emma to bring her three boys into the world. Unfortunately, trying to conceive was only part of the mental and emotional battles she faced. Serious health complications in pregnancy, antenatal anxiety, guilt about not loving pregnancy, and a traumatic birth with her first son, only compounded the mental health struggles that Emma was alre...

When mum-of-two and mental health peer worker, Taegan, was first diagnosed with bipolar mood disorder, she didn’t believe motherhood and her mental illness would mix. So in the lead up to starting a family, Taegan spent years preparing, learning, getting second opinions, asking questions, and researching - everything she thought to best navigate motherhood with her diagnosis. After a manageable pregnancy and postpartum with her fi...

Like many mothers, Sarah from The Pesky Placenta Society struggled to decipher whether her pregnancy symptoms were ‘normal’ or something more sinister. But with a pre-existing chronic illness, Sarah also had to confront her complicated relationship with health anxiety. Unfortunately, the concerns she raised were proven to be more than ‘just anxiety’ when at 35 weeks pregnant, Sarah nearly died from pre-eclampsia - or what she refer...

As Jade says, she has never shied away from sharing uncomfortable stories, and her story of bringing a baby earthside is no exception. While the birth of her daughter, River, seemingly gave her the ‘happy ending’ she so desperately wanted, her journey with uncomfortable stories did not end there.

Instead of the new-born bubble she envisioned for so long, Jade had to walk on eggshe...