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Kelsey is a clinical exercise physiologist, committed to helping Christian women dominate their health. With more than 10 years of experience, she worked at one of the top hospitals in the world and has persevered through many fitness trends. Kelsey combines science and biblical truth to create a manageable blueprint for long-lasting health. The Bible guides every area of life, she highlights the scriptural truth surrounding your health.
Today, we’re talking about a topic that a lot of moms have come to me and asked me to cover on the podcast…postpartum depression. We’re going to be covering all things related to postpartum depression including self-soothing with food and how to be healthy… body, mind and soul. This topic is for everyone who may be struggling with postpartum depression right now, or maybe you have in the past, or maybe you just want to learn more about this topic so that you’re equipped to walk your sisters through it who may be going through the same thing.
I was very excited to bring Kelsey on the podcast to talk about this topic because it’s something that she has personally walked through and I’m so thankful that she was willing to share her story.
Postpartum depression is something that is talked about more these days. It’s something that has come to the forefront more and more as we dive into mental health and it’s so helpful in knowing that not only are you not alone if you’ve walked through this before, but also knowing that there is no shame in having walked through it.
Expectations
Kelsey shared that depression for her really started while she was pregnant, and it just kind of snuck up on her. For her, it all started with unrealistic expectations…expectations around motherhood and what she thought it should look like. Kelsey had this idea of what she expected her life to look like. She thought she would be this career woman and then maybe in her 30’s, she would start having children. But with her husband being 9 years older, he was ready a lot sooner and she ended up getting pregnant in her late 20’s. When her life went differently than she originally expected it to, that’s when the depression began to set in.
Typically, when we talk about postpartum depression, everyone just automatically thinks like a hormone dump, which is happening and absolutely can be a very triggering part of that. But when she mentioned expectations, I feel like that just opens up a whole other world that’s applicable to every woman everywhere in every walk of life, because we oftentimes set ourselves up for failure with unrealistic expectations, don’t we?
Kelsey shared that she often found questioning if her life was supposed to look a certain way…until she realized that her life gets to look the way that works best for her and her family. Breaking those unrealistic expectations is what allowed Kelsey to have more fun in motherhood, better adjust and just go with the flow as she learned to navigate it all.
Man, I relate to that so much! I think we have to ask ourselves the question, whether we’re going through pregnancy or whether we are in our early motherhood journey, or even if our kids are a little bit older, we’ve got to ask ourselves…How can I set myself up for success? How can I set my family up for success? How can I plan ahead, how can I shift my expectations so that I’m setting my whole family and myself up for success instead of failure?
Like Kelsey, my husband is 9 years older than me, and we got married pretty young. I was 20 and we had our first child when I was 21. I think I teetered on the line of postpartum depression, but I was honestly almost shameful and I think that’s pretty common. I did not want to admit that there might be a problem and that I couldn’t shoulder it all alone. I kind of sat in that shame and that loneliness. I also remember thinking like, what is going on? You know, there’s three of us now and I’ve never felt this lonely in my life. And I think a lot of moms experience that too where they feel a little bit lost. They feel like they don’t know what they’re doing and that imposter syndrome sneaks in. They’ve got all these unrealistic expectations weighing on their shoulders and they just kind of sit almost paralyzed at home with their baby, with the weight of the world and this depression and this guilt on their shoulders. For me personally, it’s like, I kind of noticed it was a problem, but not really. I also think maybe it was pride. I felt like okay, I’m just going to shove this under the rug and power through instead of working through it.
Awareness and Recognition
For Kelsey, she didn’t recognize it was a problem until after she had her babies. She shares that during her first pregnancy, she didn’t really know what to expect. And then it just felt so difficult. As a nursing mom, she mentioned that a lot of the demands were on her physically too. And with 12 weeks at home with her daughter, she had this expectation that she was going to spend time tidying up the house and being this perfect little housewife. But in reality, there were a lot of times where spent the day in this cycle of nursing and then sleeping. She was letting that guilt and shame kind of pile up because she was thinking that she should be doing more. She was playing the comparison game as she watched all of these moms on TV and on Instagram who looked like they could do it all. She was feeling overwhelmed by the whole idea of motherhood. It didn’t feel right or good and that’s when she really started seeing the signs of depression.
Kelsey shared a story about comparison and something she noticed when she became a mom was other mom’s infatuation and love for their children. When Kelsey didn’t have those same feelings, it was another sign for her that she may be experiencing postpartum depression. She knew that she was a good mom, her kids had their needs met, but she didn’t have this overwhelming feeling that being a mom was what she was born to do. And I think that’s something that so many moms can relate to. If you feel that you’re not the same as other moms, that doesn’t make you a bad mom. You’re not any less if you’ve had postpartum depression or if you’re currently walking through it, you can still be a great mom and have feelings of loneliness or feel like there is something missing or not right. Just because you have those feelings does not mean that you’re not meeting your children’s needs. And most of the time, they won’t even know or remember that this was a stage for you.
I love that Kelsey shared that and it makes me think of hot mess mom culture. We hear a lot about hot mess mom culture and you know that it drives me absolutely crazy. It’s this mentality of just getting through it, you know because I’m just a hot mess mom. You do have to give yourself and your family grace but there are things that you can do. You can recognize there’s a problem, shift those expectations, and gain an understanding of what actually fills your cup. We hear a lot about self-care culture, like, oh, just go soak in the bubble bath and that’ll make everything better and if that’s what fills your cup, that’s great. But maybe it’s not. Do you even know and recognize, what fills your cup? We have to gain an understanding of what that looks like for you and then we can go take part in that thing. I think that awareness and recognition is a huge part of moving forward out of postpartum depression.
Coping through Postpartum Depression
There are a lot of ways that people choose to cope with postpartum depression and for Kelsey and many other women, it’s through food. When we’re overwhelmed, we might run to the pantry or the freezer and find our ice cream or snack of choice and get kind of lost in that because it gives us those endorphins right away. It fills us up and gives us that fullness and feeling of satisfaction. And we think that’s where our comfort lies so we easily can get lost in that cycle of going to food when we start to feel overwhelmed and just want to feel better. For Kelsey, she mentioned that she was easily finding herself going down that track to where at the end of the night, she didn’t want to connect with her partner to help soothe her. And she didn’t want to sit and rock the baby. She wanted to kind of disassociate and just get lost in the feelings of eating.
I found myself doing this same thing during COVID so I find this so relatable and convicting. I would get to a point where I’m like okay, I’m overwhelmed, I’m stressed out…this is going to give me a temporary shot of happiness. But it wasn’t right and I think instead of turning to food for comfort, it’s those times where we can make the conscious choice to turn to God instead of food. He can comfort us in a way that food never can and never will. He comforts us to the very depths of our inner being when we turn our hearts and minds to Him. I think that’s why fasting is such a powerful biblical principle because it’s in those moments where you’re craving something with your earthly flesh, your body, and instead, you’re really choosing to turn that craving and that time to the Lord instead. And it’s just a really sweet process. If you’ve never fasted before, it’s pretty cool.
This was something Kelsey learned as she walked through this process. We’re all born with this God-shaped hole in our hearts, and the only way to fill it is to bring Him into it. Kelsey was trying to fill that hole with food and afterward, she had a full belly, but she still had the same feelings. And that’s because she wasn’t pleading to God. She wasn’t turning to him to say hey, this is how I’m feeling. What she really wanted was peace and thought she could find that with food. But she didn’t. She had to turn to the Lord who was calling her in and was giving her that identity that we need not only as a child of God, but he was also giving her permission to kind of shape how motherhood is meant to look for her and her family. Yes, it’s built on biblical principles, right? She follows all of those things, but she didn’t always subscribe to what society thinks that motherhood should look like. And God’s given her the permission to make it work for her children and for herself.
Kelsey talks about how it’s so important to give yourself grace as a mom. No matter whether you’re sitting in postpartum and you’re holding your little infant now or you’re three or four years postpartum. Just continue to give yourself some grace and connect to the Lord and just ask Him what it is that you need right now to be the healthiest version of you. Just lean on the Lord and then follow His guidance as He leads you to that.
I feel like Kelsey provided such great insight because I really think sometimes we don’t take the time to sit with the Lord in prayer, to actually open our Bible and search and ask the Holy Spirit to speak to our heart. Oftentimes, I think he speaks to us through other people. He speaks to us through the Word, He speaks to us through nature. But you know, we were not meant to do this life alone. So, I would also add to that to reach out to a trusted friend, to your mom, to your sister. It’s absolutely okay to reach out to a doctor. I think the Lord works through many people in many ways, but I would say do not sit there alone in suffering. Partner with the Lord, partner with a friend, reach out to someone and connect and be in community because we were not meant to do this thing alone.
As we come to a close, I have a few powerful questions to think about and answer as you walk out this journey of life and motherhood. Write these down as these are great things to have in your back pocket:
What’s most important here?
How can I let this be easy?
What is God trying to show me in this?
That last question is so important because every season and everything that we walk through holds a piece of wisdom.
This conversation with Kelsey was so fun and insightful and I love that she really brought a whole different perspective to postpartum depression. Be sure to tune into the podcast to hear my full conversation with Kelsey and go ahead and share it with another mama who may be walking through postpartum depression right now, or even someone who is pregnant, because there is a whole lot of blessing inside today’s conversation.
Connect with Kelsey!
