by Tara Shafer posted in Pregnancy

I wish someone had warned me that I was highly likely to get depressed after my rainbow baby was born. (A rainbow baby is a baby born following a prior loss). Post-partum depression with rainbow babies is real.
This secret must be told. I tell it in an effort to help others better understand what they may face following the healthy birth of a baby born subsequent to loss.
We are a society that reaches quickly for the happy ending -- especially where babies and birth are concerned. My son was stillborn at a little more than 7 months. When I became pregnant again, people rejoiced for me. Let me be clear: I rejoiced too.
My rainbows exploring.
But shimmering under the joy was true fear, and continued mourning for the child I had lost. Many mothers pregnant with a rainbow baby grapple with high levels of anxiety. When I monitored fetal movement, I felt continually like the mother of a cliff diver, waiting for my child to break the surface, come up for air. Only then could I resume breathing.
And still, around me, I was surrounded by such loving forces. All telling me how happy they were for me. It was such a generous chorus. I was so grateful. I was so scared. A thought crept in: if they were so happy, what was wrong with me that I was other things too"
I planned each moment of my redemptive rainbow baby birth. I felt as if I could just get to the end -- and have him live -- that this would constitute the happy ending I too had unconscio...