What is Postnatal Anxiety? Signs, AU Help, and Hypnotherapy

What is Postnatal Anxiety?

Postnatal anxiety is persistent, hard-to-control worry, panic, or tension after birth that interferes with daily life. COPE estimates it affects around 1 in 5 Australian women. It often co-occurs with postnatal depression (up to half of cases in some reports).

Baby blues are short-lived. Postnatal anxiety lasts and can include racing thoughts about the baby's safety, SIDS, feeding, household control, or whether you will cope. Intrusive thoughts should be assessed by a GP; having them does not automatically mean you will act on them, but they deserve professional care.

Money page: postnatal anxiety. Hub: /parenting. Related: what is postnatal depression.

Signs

• Worry most days about the infant's safety or your ability to parent
• Panic, restlessness, or feeling constantly "on"
• Sleep difficulty even when the baby sleeps
• Checking, reassurance-seeking, or avoiding leaving the house
• Physical tension, heart racing, nausea

Fathers can experience perinatal anxiety too (PANDA: about 1 in 10 dads for depression and/or anxiety overall). See hypnotherapy for new dads.

Help in Australia

GP or maternal child health nurse; PANDA 1300 726 306; Lifeline 13 11 14; 000 in emergency. Hypnotherapy at Norwest Wellbeing complements this care. It does not diagnose and is not a crisis service.

Hypnotherapy

Clinical hypnotherapy targets automatic fear loops and body arousal. Treatment article: postnatal anxiety hypnotherapy. Rebecca Smith leads perinatal hypnotherapy. Book postnatal anxiety or /appointments.