Brain health · Sanctum

A postnatal collapse called ‘baby brain’

After your baby arrived, the organised you vanished. You could not remember whether you had fed her, the words would not come, the focus was gone, and you were told it was just baby brain, or postnatal depression, when it felt like something more.

The drop in oestrogen after birth is steep, and oestrogen is closely tied to the brain chemistry behind attention and mood. For a woman whose ADHD was always there but managed, that collapse can blow the lid off it, just at the moment she has least support and most to do. The struggle is real, and it is not a failure of motherhood.

Because new motherhood is expected to be hard, the specific, sudden loss of function gets folded into baby brain or treated as depression alone, and the brain underneath is never considered. Women carry the shame of not coping with something everyone says is normal.

We look at what changed and when, because a postnatal collapse often points to a brain that was compensating until the hormones shifted. None of this is a diagnosis. It is what we explore with you. If you are struggling right now, you do not have to manage alone. Your GP can help, and the Samaritans are on 116 123.

Written by Dr Asad RaffiConsultant Psychiatrist · Founder & Medical Director