Brooke Shields details 'terrifying' episode while suffering from postpartum depression
By Nikolina Koevska Kharoufeh |
A?ctress Brooke Shields has spoken out about the 'very bad' postnatal depression she experienced after becoming a mother, which nearly lead her to drive her car into a wall.
While promoting her new documentary Pretty Baby on the WTF With Marc Maron podcast, Shields recounted the 'terrifying' situation she found herself in back in 2003.
"I thought I was going to drive my car into the wall on the 405," she told listeners explaining how she had to call her doctor from the car as she was in such a state.
The mum revealing she had just stopped taking her prescribed medication for postpartum depression right before the incident.
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In the revealing podcast episode Shields ?explained to host Marc Moron that after welcoming her daughter Rowan in 2003 she entered into a 'very bad' state of depression.
"I was just so unhappy. I was exhausted I had gone through IVF seven times," she said.
Also speaking about the traumatic birth experience she had, "I lost so much blood when I gave birth to her, I thought I was going to die."
The combination of that experience and her struggle to adjust to motherhood led her to her doctor, "I'm depleted and I am completely biochemically imbalanced. You just feel so helpless and scared. So, I told the doctor and he said 'oh its the baby blues'."
Shields expressing her disappointment ?in society at the time for not recognising postnatal depression more and allowing women to be more open and honest about their experience.
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Her doctor did eventually ?take it more seriously and prescribed the actress medication to help. Shields initially refusing to take it, "I said no. I never had to take medication to be 'fixed' before. I fix myself."
It was family and friends who eventually encouraged her to? take it, "It was just so bleak. And everyone said please. So I finally said okay. So I could get everybody off my back I'll take a pill."
After a few weeks she finally felt 'normal' again, which is when she made the mistake of going off the medication 'cold turkey'.?
"I had a very bad episode. I thought I was going to drive my car into the wall on the 405," she recalled.
The mum had to call her doctor at the time and she stayed with her on the phone until she got home.
?Though after this, she managed to get herself back on track and finally felt like she was connecting with her daughter after feeling like her baby was a 'stranger to her'.
Something she says came much later than her ?husband and father of her children, Chris Henchy. "They have a very strong relationship and I beat myself up about that all the time," she told host Marc Moron.?
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This isn't the first time Shields has spoken out about her experience with postpartum depression.
The actress wrote a book about her experience in 2006 Down Came the Rain: My Journey Through Postpartum Depression. following the birth of her second daughter Grier.
?You are not alone. To find the right support for you, or a loved one visit www.pmhweek.org.au.
If you need immediate help please call Lifeline on 131114 or call PANDA on 1300 726 306.
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