During this week I have been at a trustees’ meeting with my fellow trustees at the Joe Bingley Memorial Foundation. Two weeks ago it was the inquest into Joe’s death and Chris, her husband and founder of the charity, was talking about her death and how its impact spread not only to her family and friends but to those who witnessed her taking her own life. The ripples of postnatal depression spread far and wide.

This meeting also took place just two weeks before the launch of my book, “Journey to Chocolate” which is being held to raise money for the charity. Chapter 3 contains some of my thoughts and feelings of an undiagnosed but mild postnatal depression. Joe’s was clearly much more severe as it led to her decision to end her life. These are my experiences:-

“And I was alone, desperately alone. Yes I had and still have a wonderful husband who wanted to be far more involved but when it came to bringing up our daughter I had to do it myself. After all I was the expert wasn’t I? The health visitor clearly thought so .. she walked into our house and said in so many words that as I was a health visitor I obviously knew what I was doing. She never came to my house again. I went to the clinic week after week but she never spoke to me, never asked how Laura or I were. How many women long to be asked how they are in a genuine empathic way so that they can say how they really feel?”

“I created my own aloneness. I never asked for help. I never wanted anyone to know how useless I was. I had no family nearby and no close friends.”

“That time was one of loneliness and aloneness, the days during which I cried and she cried, the nights of trying to get her back to sleep”

“It wasn’t until years later when I learnt about post-natal depression that I realised what had been going on for me but there was no one there to recognise it at the time and of course I would always put on a brave front and say that everything was fine and I didn’t ask for help.”

What struck us when we were talking was that my experience was 30 years ago, the other trustees’ experiences were 20, 15 and 8 years ago and Chris and Joe’s much more recently. However the dreadful conclusion we came to was how little seems to have changed in terms of the help and support offered, the information given and the treatment received over that period of time.

A recent 4 children report entitled Suffering in Silence published some research looking at the plight of new mothers. It concluded that 49% of women who had suffered from postnatal depression had not sought help. That is about 35,000 women a year who are suffering in silence. Some did not realise they had the condition, others did not feel it was serious enough to seek help. Those statistics are frankly unacceptable. Our charity aims to give women the information they need and to give them a checklist of what they are entitled to so they can request services.

If you feel you want some help you can call me on my advice line which is 0906 400 6213 (£1.50 from a BT landline. Calls from mobiles & other networks may vary). Coaching may also help. Contact us if you would like to get involved with the work of the charity or book a place on the book launch on November 11th at Pryors Hayes Golf Club near Tarporley, Cheshire.

I think somewhere deep down we all want to make a mark in the world but do we know what we want that mark to be? We could call it our legacy. In particular do we know what our purpose for being in the world is? Because once we get that our lives become more meaningful and we know what we want that mark to be.

And that is why I wrote my book, “Journey to Chocolate” which is going to be launched on November 11th at an event in aid of the Joanne (Joe) Bingley Memorial Foundation, a charity set up a year ago to educate, inform and fight the stigma of postnatal depression. It is my very real privilege to be a trustee of that charity and I have a strong sense that that work will contribute to my legacy.

Many years ago I was doing a postnatal depression workshop to a group of Homestart volunteers and I found myself telling my story. I have never forgotten the response of one of the participants when she said that my story had inspired her. It was several years later when I was listening to a fellow personal developer speaking about his book that I recalled those words and decided then and there that I was going to tell my story.

So, yes, I want to inspire women to stop and reflect on their lives and look at what might be better in it. After all I don’t think any of us have that perfect life but we tend to accept what we do have in the same way we may accept a substandard meal in a restaurant. It’s not until something happens and we are pulled up short that we start to reflect and that can be the defining moment when we set out on our journeys to a life of greater fulfilment.

Here are the first 2 paragraphs of the introduction to my book and describes how that moment arrived for me:-

“It was in 11 years ago in the year 2000, that I hit my 50th birthday. I was quite happy to do that, it didn’t faze me in any way, I felt I had everything I wanted in my life; a lovely home, a wonderful and supportive husband and a daughter about to go out and make her mark in the world. I also had a challenging and rewarding career as professional lead for health visiting in the NHS, I felt it was a job for life and would serve me well for the next 10 years when I would receive my pension, a just reward for all those years working in the NHS.

What I didn’t realise was that a number of life events, ranging from the impact of going to boarding school, through mild postnatal depression, through secondary infertility, through a miscarriage had left me with the need to grieve but I had never allowed myself to do so. My way of coping was to keep busy, that way I never had to feel those intensely painful feelings which were stuffed down in the bin of my mind. But inevitably the time came when the emotional bin was full and the lid burst open, and I had to face those feelings. I had to confront the guilt, the lost confidence and low self-esteem and most of all the pain of those losses.”

Over the next few weeks up until the launch day I will be posting more blogs containing extracts from my book. I hope you enjoy them.

For more information on how I help women set out on their journeys through my life coaching programmes or you want to know more about my book click here to send an enquiry or call me on 07787 568699.