Navigating the Baby Blues: What You Need to Know
The baby blues, often called the "third-day blues," affect up to 80% of new parents in the early postpartum days. Caused by hormonal shifts, sleep deprivation, and the overwhelming adjustments of life with a newborn, the baby blues can bring mood swings, tearfulness, and anxiety. While these feelings are normal and usually fade within two weeks, support and self-care can make all the difference. Discover practical tips for managing the baby blues, when to seek help, and why it’s okay to ask for support as you navigate this emotional phase of parenthood. Read on …..
Healing from PTSD: Tools, Treatments, and Hope for Recovery
Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) affects millions worldwide, disrupting daily life and emotional well-being. Recognizing the symptoms of PTSD—such as flashbacks, heightened anxiety, and emotional numbness—is the first step toward recovery. With effective treatments like therapy, medication, and support networks, individuals can regain control and rebuild their lives. Discover more about the causes, signs, and healing strategies for PTSD in this guide.
When Fatherhood Feels Heavy: Understanding Anxiety and Depression in New Dads
Becoming a new dad is a life-changing event. Even when change is positive, it can still be challenging. Having mixed and complex emotions as an expectant or new dad is completely normal, but these can be confronting emotions to manage. Along with feelings of joy, excitement and pride, the experience of pregnancy and birth can be accompanied by feelings of apprehension, anxiety and exhaustion. Keep reading….
Postnatal Depression - A Partners Perspective.
Welcoming your new baby is a time of joy, as well as a radical life adjustment for you both. Your partner is recovering from pregnancy and birth, you are both learning to meet the needs of your newborn, and throw in the lack of sleep, times can be trying to say the least! When postnatal depression is added into the mix, it can tip any sense of balance, and make the postnatal adjustment feel completely overwhelming. Keep reading….
Never Shake a Baby.
Shaken Baby Syndrome is a serious injury to the brain resulting from intentional head trauma which can occur when a baby is thrown, jogged, jerked, or shaken - often because the baby or child won't stop crying. It is the single most preventable cause of serious head injury in babies under 1 year of age in New Zealand. Babies, especially very young ones, have relatively large heads, and weak neck muscles, so any kind of violent movement will cause a kind of whiplash effect. A baby’s delicate, developing brain is much more sensitive to injury and serious damage than an adult’s.
Postnatal Depression - you are not alone.
Sometimes, parents have difficulty adjusting to the many physical, emotional, psychological and social challenges of parenting. We know that everyone experiences symptoms of perinatal anxiety and depression differently. The way it affects you can depend on a range of factors. Your own physical, emotional and mental make-up and stressful external situations may combine to increase the risk of you developing symptoms of perinatal anxiety and/or depression.
What happens to you during the '4th Trimester' (and is it a real thing)?
Just when you thought you'd reached the finish line of pregnancy, you discover there’s one more "trimester" to journey through.
We’re talking about the "4th trimester" - that hazy period where you’re recovering from pregnancy and delivery while simultaneously learning how to be a parent as you, your partner and your baby adjust.
Marking the transition from pregnancy to postpartum, the fourth trimester is the 12-week period of time following the birth of your baby. These first weeks are a time of change, learning, and new experiences for everyone.
