First Person - Pasifika journalist Sela Jane Hopgood was sceptical when offered medication for perinatal depression, but, she writes, saying yes saved her life.
Sela first went to a dark place in the weeks before her son was born.
Photo: RNZ / Claire Eastham-Farrelly
A few weeks before I gave birth and during the first year of my son s life, I often went into a dark place where I was intensely worried about my baby, my appetite was all over the place and I was severely irritable and angry at people around me.
It got so bad that I felt like I was changing as a person. Some of my behaviour was odd - I became obsessed with the way the washing had to be done. When my husband did not do it my way, I would raise my voice at him.
First Person - Pasifika journalist Sela Jane Hopgood was sceptical when offered medication for perinatal depression, but, she writes, saying yes saved her life.
Sela first went to a dark place in the weeks before her son was born.
Photo: RNZ / Claire Eastham-Farrelly
A few weeks before I gave birth and during the first year of my son s life, I often went into a dark place where I was intensely worried about my baby, my appetite was all over the place and I was severely irritable and angry at people around me.
It got so bad that I felt like I was changing as a person. Some of my behaviour was odd - I became obsessed with the way the washing had to be done. When my husband did not do it my way, I would raise my voice at him.