A New Explanation of Postpartum Depression and Postpartum Psychosis ?
My work suggests that people, who are prone to infections, are low DHEA.
The decline in DHEA of the first birth could result in increased
infections. Since the immune system will compete with the brain for the
available DHEA, the infections could aggrevate already low DHEA and
possibly induce postpartum depression or psychosis.
At the MSNBC Health Bulletin Board, I was asked if my work could explain
postpartum depression and postpartum psychosis. I was able to generate
an explanation of these phenomena, and my explanation was posted there
in "Frontal Lobe and Violence." Since I think my answer may explain
these phenomena, I thought it should be posted here, in case anyone is
interested. The following contains the question posed to me and my
explanation..
'I do research on woman who go through postpartum depression\psychosis
and some of the infanticide cases I have studied. Most of these women
were either very atletic or had male babies. The majority had to be
induced with pitocin in order to deliver. I would think that the culprit
could be that these women carry more androgen or testosteron and in
return lower their progesterone and estrogen --and that would be the
cause of a lack of oxytocin. These women also had lactation problems-
again pointing to oxytocin. Could this be why some mothers go through a
severe postpartum and have trouble bonding with their child? And could
this be why they have aggressive thoughts and feelings towards their
newborns. And quite a few women who get infections of some kind seem to
experience this illness to. Most of the mothers I talk to--suffer from
Postpartum Obsessive Thought Disorder- and I would think that the
intrusive thoughts would be due to a lack of serotonin- and the presence
of infection and possibly a decrease in estrogen/progesterone and
increase of androgen\testosterone or a combination of something.
Unexplained hirsuitism is another symptom. I'm sure that the hundreds
of women who commit neonaticide and infanticide are not cold blooded
murderers! When I say this I get clobbered by the general public and
I'm not trying to defend or excuse their behavior but considering a lot
of these mothers are religious and pro-life--this is the only thing
that would make sense to me! I belong to an organization-Postpartum
Support International- are you familiar with this group?'