POSTPARTUM PSYCHOSIS

Postpartum psychosis is a unique form of bipolar disorder. It affects the mothers of newly born babies. The disorder may start showing its signs from 1^st to 4^th weeks of baby birth. The general symptoms are being restless, agitated, having mood swings, behaving different from usual (of any form), finding difficulty in sleeping or not wanting to sleep at all. The major symptoms of the disorder are feeling paranoid, suspicious and fearful and having delusions and hallucinations ( a woman felt her child was a rat and wanted to bite her). The change in behavior and mood are very frequent. They may change from hour to hour or from day to day. The changes are rapid. The patient may be unaware of them but for the partners, family, friends the symptoms are quite visible. Women who are victims to bipolar disorder and schizophrenia are very prone to postpartum psychosis. In general, genetic factors have been found to be responsible. Menstural problems and menstural depression may also play there part of converting into postpartum psychosis. The main cause of the disorder is reduced amount of the hormone, estrogen. This hormone is in its minimum level just after baby birth or delivery. The symptoms may be misinterpreted with common post-delivery disorders like “baby blues” or “postnatal depression”. However postpartum psychosis is hugely different than these. Like said earlier, the characteristic feature of postpartum psychosis is paranoid feeling, delusions and hallucinations which is neither the case in “baby blues” nor in “postnatal depressions”. Hallucinations, delusions may or may not be of destructive nature. For instance, a 37 year old women jumped in front of a train with her 6-months old baby. But these are extreme cases. Suffering mothers can be easily treated by counseling. However, postpartum episodes are a psychiatric emergency.