You are NOT Alone

My friend wrote this about 12 weeks into her pregnancy and gave me permission to share it. If you are struggling please know it is not your fault and you are not alone. I joined an online PPD group annonomously and that helped me feel supported and not judged. It also gave me a safe place to vent.

"Hopefully this will help someone else realize they're not the alone as well.  This pregnancy has not only been hard because I have been so sick but because the depression that I thought I had kicked after high school (coincidentally, that was also when I stopped taking birth control) suddenly came back with a vengeance.  It wasn't because this pregnancy was unwanted- we did fertility treatments and I took medications to make sure this baby stuck all through the first trimester.  I wanted this desperately.  So when I started experiencing depression again, just a few days after that positive test that I had hoped for for so long, I felt an overwhelming sense of guilt.  I was getting this baby I wanted.  Why was I and why am I still so unhappy?  But, that's how my body handles these hormones (the same hormones that are mimicked in hormonal birth control pills).  And it sucks.  But I have to continue to remind myself that I am not the only one.  I am not alone.  And this is temporary.  I just wish that people would stop expecting me and other pregnant women to be happy ALL THE TIME."