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Post-adoption Depression
What You Don't Know Can Hurt You By Ninotchka Beavers
"Being unprepared and unsupported, new adoptive mothers who become depressed often try to 'tough it out' without asking for any help whatsoever," McCarthy says. "Many mothers worry that if they advise their agency or social worker (the ones they have spent months or years convincing of their superior parenting skills) that they are experiencing difficulty, those same agencies and social workers will think of them as unfit parents and, in the worst case scenario, remove the new child from their care. Consequently, a bad situation becomes worse because of lack of understanding and support.
"First line extended family support available to new birth mothers (and fathers) is often totally missing for adoptive parents,"McCarthy says."In many cases, after enduring years of disappointment with infertility, family members don't understand why the new mother isn't completely happy and content now that she finally has what she's wanted for so long. Rather than disappoint and confound her family, many new adoptive moms simply suffer in silence, filled with shame and guilt, feeling themselves imperfect or selfish."
Nothing could be further from the truth. As Dunnewold explains, post-adoption depression, like postpartum depression, is categorized as an adjustment disorder with mixed emotional features the operative word being "adjustment," or lack thereof. Clearly, parenthood requires making tremendous adjustments in one's life. The entire dynamic of the family changes. Any previous personal history of depression or anxiety disorder could make an individual more vulnerable to the stress, thereby manifesting itself as PAD. If there is any marital conflict, the effects of the depression are often heightened. "...We all know babies don't fix marriages," Dunnewold says.
