“Sharing the Journey: Life After Postpartum Depression”

http://www.unexpectedblessing.wordpress.com

I blog to share the journey after Postpartum Depression. It is important to me that other women see Recovery is possible – and more importantly, thriving after tripping into such a dark dark hole is possible.

I started blogging a week after discovering our third pregnancy. Totally unplanned, I collapsed in tears the day of the positive test. But then I picked up What Am I Thinking? Having a Baby After Postpartum Depression by Karen Kleiman and became inspired to start blogging in an effort to reframe my pregnancy and shed a first person point of view on what it’s like to journey through pregnancy after severe Postpartum Depression.

Everything that is Postpartum Depression and family related. You can find the latest research on PPD as well as the latest fumbles and joys occurring at our house – There’s definitely never a quiet moment happening here!

Postpartum Progress: http://www.postpartumprogress.typepad.com

The best advice I have for blogging newbies is not to let your blog interfere with your relationship with your family. Keep it going but not at the risk of missing out on those cherished moments with your little ones – they only happen once (and so quickly!). Your blog can wait. I try to only work on blogging when my kids are asleep so I can truly enjoy their company (and insanity) while they are awake!

I do – I haven’t had a lot of comments up to this point but I am certainly open to chatting with visitors! I love nothing more than a good conversation with folks about a topic I love!

Yes. My mom, my husband, and a few others all read my blog. They’re all very proud of how far I’ve come and how many people I’m reaching with my blog on a daily basis.

I do.

I am the Community Leader at iVillage’s PPD Board

I also am on the moderating team for the Online PPD Support Page forum.

I blog with wordpress. It’s easy and you don’t have to really know a lot of technical stuff to get things done. I love it!

As I said earlier, I try to blog when the kids are asleep so I typically blog either mid-afternoon or at night and then schedule my blog posts to go up around 5a EST. (I am usually asleep when my posts go up that early!)

I have no idea. I am on the computer quite a bit but don’t track how much of my time is spent blogging. If I had to guesstimate, I’d say oh, 10-15 hours a week?

Absolutely.

I use Technorati, StumbleUpon, Digg, Google Blog Alert, and a few others that I can’t remember right now.

I don’t remember, really. It’s been awhile and I never thought of myself as a blogger until the other day when my husband so obviously pointed out that I am now an official blogger with regular readers. Yikes. How’d that happen???

Probably Postpartum Progress by Katherine Stone. It’s the most widely read blog about all things PPD and a terrific source of information and resources. I have met Katherine and she is very very wonderful.

I wake up each day with the same mission.

To help at least one woman/family with their journey on PPD road. And each day that has happened.

I am inspired to keep going through the knowledge that there will always be women out there who are feeling alone and suffering in silence just as I did with my first episode. And in good conscience, I cannot let that happen if there is something I can do about it. This is what drives me to spend all of my free time dedicated to helping and learning everything I can regarding PPD.

Yes, I do. My other website is http://www.ppdacceptance.org and is for my local PPD organization. We’re undergoing an image change at the moment so there’s a very basic page up right now. We provide local support (Athens, GA) for women suffering from PPD and are hoping to host a family group soon.

It has absolutely impacted my life.

I’ve never been one for journaling on paper but somehow this blogging thing has been terrific for me. I find that if I am having a difficult time with something family or kid related, once I blog about it, I feel much better and am able to put things into a more positive and upbeat light as well as truly let them go.