Partners’ Support for Perinatal Depression

Persons with postpartum depression need and benefit from social support from partners, family, friends, or peers (where appropriate).

• Types of support from family, friends and peers that help persons with postpartum depression to cope include:
  • informational (i.e., giving advice and guidance);
  • instrumental (i.e., helping and assisting with practical tasks, such as house work);
  • emotional (i.e., providing care, empathy, and compassion); and
  • affirmational (i.e., acknowledgement and validation of the experience of depression).
• Encourage family and friends to listen acknowledge persons’ feelings, reassure them that their experiences are not unusual, and offer them a sense of hope that they will get better with support and treatment. This can help postpartum persons to cope and reduce their experiences of isolation and anxiety.
• Persons with perinatal depression can experience further isolation and stigma when partners or family members demonstrate a lack of understanding and compassion, are non-supportive, or are abusive. This lack of support can be the result of various causes, including:
  • being unsure how to help;
  • normalizing or minimizing depressive symptoms in a belief that depression is not a mental illness that requires treatment;
  • being an abuser; or
  • having a personal experience of depression that renders them less able or available to provide support due to their own mental illness.