It was an average night at the Maharaj household in Calgary: Two-year-old Jaden was begging his exhausted dad, Jason, for attention.
But then Jaden bit him on the back, which triggered an out-of-character outburst.
“I jumped up and turned around and yelled at him,” the usually mild-mannered Mr. Maharaj, 36, recalls. Jaden, terrified, buried his face in the couch. But it was Mr. Maharaj who was even more shocked by the eruption. He’d reached his breaking point.
“I went for a drive and completely broke down for about half an hour, 45 minutes. I went to my parents’ house and cried with my mom there for a while. I said, ‘Nobody understands,’ ” he says.
For months, Mr. Maharaj had felt exhausted, stressed, and in a rut. He was battling undiagnosed postpartum depression – a mental illness that is normally associated with new mothers.
The answer I got from the counsellor was, ‘Now is not the time for you. Now is the time to take care of your wife.' — Jason Maharaj
But it is also common in fathers, though not widely accepted in the mainstream, according to a report in the Journal of the American Medical Association.
The meta-analysis of 43 studies on the subject, published Tuesday, suggests 10 per cent of men suffer from prenatal and postpartum depression.
One of the most significant findings is that men whose partners have experienced postpartum depression are at heightened risk to develop it themselves, says lead author James Paulson, assistant professor of pediatrics at Eastern Virginia Medical School in Norfolk, Va.
“When one partner becomes depressed, that causes stress and strain on the relationship,” he explains. It can affect how intimate they are with each other, how they handle household tasks, and trigger arguments.
Mr. Maharaj’s wife had complications in her pregnancy and when Jaden was born fell into severe postpartum depression. After she returned to work following her maternity leave, she struggled with her multiple roles and was hospitalized for a few months, Mr. Maharaj says. He was saddled with taking care of his wife, his son and working.
“The pressure built and built and built to the point that I was unable to concentrate and focus and I was losing sleep.”
But Mr. Maharaj sat on his feelings of stress, anger and resentment for months. He felt guilty about them.
“The answer I got from the counsellor was, ‘Now is not the time for you. Now is the time to take care of your wife.’ ”
“There is a cultural myth that men don’t get depressed,” says Will Courtenay, a psychotherapist in San Francisco who has researched and written about postpartum depression in fathers. “Because there isn’t any public discussion about it, most men don’t know to identify what they’re going through as being depression.”
The meta-analysis found that fathers experienced the highest rates of sleep deprivation three to six months postpartum. Sleep deprivation, one of the leading contributors to postpartum depression, accrues over the first few months and its negative effects often set in after that three-month period, Dr. Courtenay says.
While little research has been done on the subject, he also suggests men’s hormone levels change after the birth of a child. Their testosterone levels drop and estrogen rises, which can greatly affect their mood.
Symptoms of postpartum in men can be different from those seen in women. While many women with postpartum depression complain of exhaustion, men often exhibit aggression and violence, and adopt impulsive behaviour such as gambling, taking on extra-marital affairs and abusing drugs and alcohol, he says.
Chris Hale, who lives in Bogart, Ga., felt “emotionless” when his daughter was born four years ago. He used marijuana to escape from his anxiety.
