The National Health Service in the UK will roll out an anonymous helpline for fathers dealing with Post-Natal Depression (PND); the service has the so-upbeat-it's-disheartening title, "Fathers Matter."
Although some psychiatrists--and at least one cranky farmer--dismiss the idea of PND, other experts say 3-7% of men may suffer from it, undiagnosed. [via the excellent weblog, Dreambaby]
um...why wouldn't fathers suffer from postnatal depression? While it would make intuitive sense that some of women's ppd is hormonal in nature, an awful lot of ppd is from the fact that YOUR ENTIRE FREAKING LIFE HAS CHANGED OVERNIGHT. You know, incredibly needy newborn, a shift in everyone's roles, parents getting even less time for their own sanity measure, sibs getting less time with parents. Stands to reason that many people, esp. those who are emotionally on the fragile side to begin with, are going to get depressed under the circumstances.
amy