Many women experience a mild form of postpartum depression that is labeled “baby blues.” The symptoms are indistinguishable from depression. This syndrome is best seen as an adjustment disorder affecting 7-10 percent of women. The symptoms usually start in a day or two when you’re home alone with your baby and are self-limited, lasting two or three days. It’s not uncommon for the baby blues to last for up to 10 days. However, after 10 days research reports that the baby blues should diminish. Postpartum depression is thought to be caused by several factors experienced in the days after giving birth:

The emotional letdown that follows the excitement and fears experienced by most women during pregnancy and birth,

The many physical discomforts experienced in the few days following childbirth,

Fatigue from loss of sleep around birth and the early postpartum period,

Anxiety over the capabilities as a mother and caretaker for an infant, and

Fears that she has become less attractive to her husband.

The feelings you can experience are common—you are not alone. Encouragement and reassurance from family, friends, nurses, and physicians goes a long way. Sometimes the exuberance of birth has faded away, but the extra weight has not. Your sleep is interrupted, seemingly forever, by three o’clock in the morning feedings. The complex interplay of hormone changes, along with emotional changes associated with birth, further complicate the picture. Women experience high levels of hormones during the nine months of gestation; then the hormones rapidly cut off. It’s surprising that more women aren’t affected.

The most severe form of postpartum depression is called psychotic features. This means the patient may actually be delusional. This is probably caused by the sleep deprivation experienced by new mothers. Certainly, they are not thinking normally. This situation is an emergency and should be immediately assessed by professionals if postpartum depression last longer than 10 days or seems to worsen.