Perinatal Mental Health

Oct 23

Perinatal mental health encompasses a person's emotional and psychological well-being throughout pregnancy and the first year after childbirth.

This critical period involves significant hormonal, physical, and social shifts that can trigger or exacerbate conditions like depression, anxiety, obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Affecting roughly 1 in 5 birth parents—and often non-gestational partners as well—perinatal mood and anxiety disorders (PMADs) are common, highly treatable medical conditions, yet they frequently go unrecognized due to stigma and the false expectation that parenthood should feel purely joyful.

Early screening, peer support, therapy, and medical care are essential to ensuring healthy outcomes for both parent and child.