Postnatal depression often goes undiagnosed and untreated. Learning to recognise the signs and symptoms can help you get the support you need to look after your perinatal mental health.
Preparing for parenthood is a huge shift in life and can change even the most unexpected things. It’s natural to be more worried, nervous, or sad than usual. Your perinatal mental health might not be at the top of your list of priorities but, as you prepare for the birth of your child, try to notice how you are feeling. It's OK if you might need a bit of extra support.
According to the NHS, the perinatal period covers the antenatal/prenatal period (during pregnancy before birth) and the postnatal/postpartum period (after pregnancy and birth). Typically, this refers to the time of conception to around a year after the birth of the baby. It is a time of significant emotional, social, and physical change.
Postnatal depression affects many women, and some men, after the birth of a baby. Around 15-20% of women experience depression or anxiety in the first year after birth (NICE, 2025). This has become more common in the last few years, following the Covid-19 pandemic.
Antenatal depression is similar, but happens exclusively during pregnancy. It is often not recognised until after the baby is born. One study found that almost nine out of ten women (88%) go undiagnosed during pregnancy (Faisal-Cury, Rodrigues, & Matijasevich, 2021).
Perinatal mental health and relationships
Because perinatal mental health problems are often misunderstood, they can lead to growing problems within your relationships. If you are experiencing depression and your partner or family and friends don’t offer the empathy and support you need, it can cause even more distress. You may feel more alone, and arguments can start to creep in.
A lack of support can be frustrating, but it often comes from a lack of understanding. It’s not always easy to tell the difference between low mood and depression – at a time when mood changes are expected, depression can be written off as part of the normal experience of pregnancy and birth.
What does perinatal depression look like?
Most women feel more emotional than usual during the perinatal period. However, if you’re feeling unhappy more than half the time, it could be a sign that something more serious is going on for you.
Recognising the specific symptoms of perinatal depression can make it easier to seek help. If you have a partner, it can be helpful for both of you to be able to recognise these symptoms. These may include:
- Feeling sad or irritable, with a persistent and marked depressed mood.
- Losing interest in activities that used to be fun.
- Having trouble concentrating or making decisions.
- Overwhelming feelings of hopelessness or responsibility.
- A sense of worthlessness.
- Guilt, or the feeling that you might be a bad parent.
- Withdrawing from friends or family.
- Worrying a lot about the baby or other things.
- Trouble sleeping, even when the baby sleeps (NICE, 2025).
Perinatal depression doesn’t always come on immediately. Even if you feel fine for the first few months, you may still experience depression later on.
It’s also normal to feel guilty about the fact that you are depressed. As a new parent, you might be feeling the weight of expectation to be filled with the joys of parenthood. If you aren’t feeling this way, it can be very distressing.
How to get help for perinatal mental health problems
Talk to the people in your life that you normally rely on – your partner, friends, or trusted family members. Explain how you’re feeling, and clarify that you think this has gone beyond the normal changes in mood you expected.
Seek professional support. Contact your midwife, health visitor, GP, or counsellor and let them know that you need help. If you have a partner, invite them to join you in your treatment journey. It’s important that they understand your illness and are willing to learn how it affects you and what you need.
If you find it uncomfortable to use words like ‘depression’ or ‘depressed’ when discussing this with the people in your life, it might help to open the conversation in a more general way. Rather than trying to explain your symptoms, try simply asking for support. If someone has a different idea of what ‘support’ means, you may have to be specific about what you need.
You partner, family, and friends can help by talking things through with you and offering practical support. Let them know what you need help with. Hand some responsibilities over to your partner or ask a friend to help out. People often love to feel like they are helping, but sometimes need to be given specific tasks to be truly helpful. Ask them to pop to the shops, look after the baby for an hour, or just water your plants when they come over.
Self-help for depression
As well as talking to professionals and loved ones, there are a few things you can do to give your own mental health a boost.
Try to eat as healthily as possible, do some gentle exercise, and rest whenever you have the opportunity. Getting regular sleep can have a positive impact on your mood.
If you can, take a little time out to focus on yourself and do something you enjoy, even if it’s something small. Look for local parent and baby groups, or other support groups you can attend. Sometimes a bit of community support can make a real difference (NHS, 2025).
If you are worried about other areas of your life, such as finances, housing, or your relationship, look into the support available for these specific issues. Getting external factors under control can help make it easier to cope with the feelings you are juggling.
Relationship support
Relationships between couples can be fraught before and after the birth of a child. Studies have shown there is an increased risk of depression for both mothers and fathers in the first year of birth of the child’s life (NICE, 2025).
Your mental health is linked with your partner’s. When things get harder for one of you, it will likely get harder for both of you (Thiel, et al. 2020). Try to go easy on each other, and recognise that you both might be struggling and might need to seek help together.
Where possible, it’s a great help if you have support from your partner during a period of depression. Research shows that when mums feel happy with the way their partners are involved in looking after the baby, it can reduce the symptoms of postnatal depression. Likewise, a lack of support can make symptoms worse (Fagan & Lee, 2010).
Keep talking to your partner, family, and friends. Help them to understand what you’re going through, what you’re doing to try and make things better, and what kind of support you need at home.
Remember – everything changes when a baby comes into the picture. It's a time of adjustment for everyone, but it doesn't mean you have to do it alone.
References
Fagan, J. & Lee, Y. (2010). Perceptions and satisfaction with father involvement and adolescent mothers' postpartum depressive symptoms. Journal of Youth & Adolescence. 39(9): 1109–1121. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10964-009-9444-6.
Faisal-Cury, A., Rodrigues, D. M. O., & Matijasevich, A. (2021). Are pregnant women at higher risk of depression underdiagnosis?. Journal of Affective Disorders, 283, 192-197.
NHS. 2025. Postnatal depression. Available from: https://www.nhs.uk/mental-health/conditions/postnatal-depression/
NICE. (2025). Depression - antenatal and postnatal NICE. https://cks.nice.org.uk/topics/depression-antenatal-postnatal/
Thiel, F., Pittelkow, M. M., Wittchen, H. U., & Garthus-Niegel, S. (2020). The relationship between paternal and maternal depression during the perinatal period: a systematic review and meta-analysis. Frontiers in Psychiatry, 11, 563287.
Further support
NHS
https://www.nhs.uk/pregnancy/mental-health-in-pregnancy-and-after-the-birth/mental-health/
Pandas Foundation
https://pandasfoundation.org.uk/
