I couldn’t bond with my son for weeks after birth trauma
The TV presenter and life coach tells OLIVIA BUXTON how she coped when her anxiety disorder returned just days after she became a mum
WHEN Anna Williamson landed the job of her dreams at the age of 25, presenting a new morning kids’ show on GMTV, she should have been on top of the world. But despite having a loving family and a wide circle of friends she says that inside she was in emotional turmoil.
“I had this constant tight chest and a feeling of dread, fear and loneliness that was compounded by insomnia,” recalls Anna, now 34, who is married to fitness guru Alex Di Pasquale and lives in London.
After suffering a breakdown at work Anna was diagnosed with an anxiety disorder and ended up taking a course of antidepressants and a combination of counselling and psychotherapy to help her recover. She went on to retrain as a life coach, became an ambassador for mental health charity Mind and hoped her battle with mental illness was behind her.
But when she gave birth to her son Vincenzo last September it triggered an episode of anxiety and the star, who is a regular agony aunt on This Morning, reveals the enormous impact it had.
“Having had an anxiety disorder in the past I was concerned that I might get some form of ‘blues’ after the baby and it didn’t help that I had a traumatic birth,” she says.
“In the end I had a 40-hour labour which ended in a forceps delivery and I lost two litres of blood. I was totally traumatised by the whole experience and all my plans for a serene birth went out of the window. I had felt quite relaxed about it all really. But the reality was far different from what I had been expecting.”
Anna reveals that although she had stopped taking medication in 2007 she had gone back on a low dosage a couple of years ago due to anxiety creeping back.
SHE says: “I stopped taking them when I found out I was pregnant, with the support of my GP, as I didn’t want to put the baby at risk but I was mindful of the fact that my depression could come back at any point.
“At around 36 weeks I started to feel a natural anxiety about having to get the baby out. But I am very good at knowing my coping strategies which are practising mindfulness, gaining perspective, planning as best as possible and talking through my concerns.”
Although Anna had excellent care throughout her pregnancy from the midwives and health visitors who were keeping an eye on her state of mind, four days after Vincenzo’s birth she felt overwhelmed by anxiety.
She says: “I burst into tears and had a ‘baby blues meltdown’. I was told that I had severe anaemia which can give very similar symptoms to anxiety.
“I spoke to my doctor and told him I was having these feelings and he diagnosed postnatal anxiety. I was put straight back on a drug called sertraline because it is compatible with breastfeeding.
“But it has horrible side effects and it made me feel spaced out. I was on it for three days before I agreed with my doctor to go on a low-dosage medication.
“Instead I started to take escitalopram which is a very common drug to treat anxiety and depression. It is very effective but the downside is that I wasn’t able to continue breastfeeding. Also because my anxiety had been at such a high level I wasn’t able to eat properly.
“A mother’s instinct is to provide for your child and I thought, ‘If I can’t feed this baby he is not going to survive’. I enjoyed the bond that breastfeeding created and it was hard to give it up.
“I allowed myself to grieve for a few days but I didn’t feel guilty for long because I saw how quickly he was thriving on formula.
“And the horrendous anxiety that had crept up on me started to ease and the pressure was off because someone else could feed our son.”
Two weeks after giving birth Anna says she was finally able to bond with her son.
“For the first 10 days I wasn’t madly in love with him but when you have a traumatic birth, oxytocin (the love hormone) isn’t released. Around week five I had this wave of love flooding through me and I thought, ‘I love this little boy’.”
ANNA says writing her new book Breaking Mad: The Insider’s Guide To Conquering Anxiety has been therapeutic too. “It really helped me to understand why things had happened to me.
“When I first started to get the anxiety disorder I was on a No 1 TV kids’ show but I was also in a dysfunctional relationship.
“I developed insomnia and panic attacks and battled behind those for months and eventually had a meltdown at work and burst into tears. I even fantasised about crashing my car to escape to the refuge of a hospital room where the world would just go away.
“But having my meltdown was the best thing to happen to me because I went on a mission of self discovery and became a counsellor, coach and acquired qualifications.
“I am glad I spoke out and said I was ill and exhausted because of my history and the traumatic birth. Intervention is key and poor mothers can struggle for months.”
Anna admits that she loves being a hands-on mum now but shares the responsibility of looking after her son with husband Alex, who is a personal trainer and nutritionist.
And although she is aware of the mental health risks, it hasn’t put her off having another child. “I can’t wait to do it again,” she beams.