Deprivation/Depression

After having her baby, a good friend of mine said to me "I now understand why sleep deprivation is an Asian form of torture."

I think until you have experienced real sleep deprivation, it's difficult to understand why this is such a challenge for new moms. Many dads "just don't get it" and the entire topic of sleep can be a tricky one when couples experience their first child. Sleep becomes a scarcity, and it can be just as traumatic as farmers experiencing a drought, with many of the emotional and physical ramifications as well: concern over the future ("how long will this last?!") the present ("how am I going to make it through the day - I feel so weak!") as well as yearning for better times in the past ("I shoulda appreciated the good times when I could sleep/eat as much as my body needed!")

Recently, I read an article linking lack of sleep among medical school residents with depression (check out the final paragraph - fascinating!!!): http://www.yalealumnimagazine.com/issues/2010_07/findingsinterns033.html
Interestingly enough, there is ALSO a link between mothers who get little sleep and postpartum depression (go figure). Seems to me, it's not just a correlative connection, but a causal one: taking away sleep hours leads to depression. Clear and simple.

My advice? If you have a sense that you aren't getting the amount of sleep you need, don't let it get out of hand. Get help to get sleep. BE YOUR OWN ADVOCATE - if not for yourself, then for your child. You will not, CANNOT be an effective mother if you are teetering on the lines of depression. Your thoughts will be muddy, and you won't be able to take care of your child (and certainly not appreciate him) as you should. OR the alternative is to push yourself too far, then end up going to a psychiatrist who will prescribe medicines to alter your body chemistry to deal with the depression you're now in... why? Just get the rest you need and you have a MUCH better chance of thinking and acting with greater clarity.