Understanding emotional changes and challenges

Learn about the common emotional changes and challenges that can happen in the perinatal period.

Your emotions in pregnancy and early parenting

In the time before, during and after your pregnancy, you'll be adjusting to the role of being a parent. There's likely to be changes in all parts of your life during this time. Some of the most common changes are to your:

hormones
body
sleep
emotions
family and relationships.

You might also be thinking about changes to your living situation and finances.

Having a baby is one of the biggest changes you'll ever experience. When there's so much change, it's natural to feel a lot of different emotions. Pregnancy and early parenting are often times that bring feelings of joy and happiness, but it's also normal to feel scared, worried or sad. It can sometimes feel stressful or overwhelming thinking about the changes that will happen. It might seem like you're the only one having these feelings, but it's important to know a lot of other parents feel like you do. Understanding how you’re feeling and having ways to cope with your emotions can help you feel more confident as a parent.

Emotional wellbeing in the perinatal period

The perinatal period is the time before, during and after you're pregnant. It starts when you're planning for a baby and ends around 2 years after your baby's birth. It's an important time for you, and for your baby's development. You'll need to take extra care of your emotional wellbeing during this time. It's just as important as your physical health.

Having good emotional wellbeing means you:

feel positive about life in general
can manage your thoughts and feelings
can talk about how you’re feeling
manage stress
cope with normal challenges
maintain healthy relationships.

Finding ways to care for your wellbeing can help you prepare for the changes to your life that come with being a parent.

If you've had mental health challenges before, these can sometimes come back during the perinatal period. These can include things like eating disorders, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, and PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder). Knowing the signs and symptoms to look for and noticing if they come back can help you get support earlier. The earlier you get support the sooner you'll feel better. Talk to your GP if you notice anything that worries you.

If you already have a diagnosed mental illness, it's important to plan how you'll manage your wellbeing during pregnancy and beyond. Talk through plans to manage your mental health with your care team during pregnancy and following birth. It can help you be in the best mental and physical shape to welcome your baby. Read more about support for parents with existing mental health conditions.

Adjusting to pregnancy and parenting

Life can become very different with a new baby. It can take some time to adjust. Some of the changes include:

learning how to care for your baby
getting to know this new little person
being on parental leave with your baby
changes to finances
changes to daily routines
being awake in the middle of the night to feed, comfort and settle your baby.

Doing small things to maintain your emotional wellbeing will help you adjust to the changes and be the best version of you for your baby.

Around 5 to 10 days after your baby's born it's common to feel the baby blues. You might feel teary, irritable and sad or lonely. It usually passes after a few days. If the baby blues lasts longer than 2 weeks, it's important to talk to someone you trust. That could be your midwife, GP, or a child health nurse. They can help you understand what may be happening for you and how you're feeling.

Signs you might need more support

You can get support at any time in the perinatal period. It doesn't need to be for a severe problem. It's never too early to talk to someone.

Just as you might have good days and bad days in life, this can happen with pregnancy too and after birth. Using the checklist on the PANDA website can help you check in with how you're feeling.

Talk to someone about how you're feeling if:

you're having more bad days than good
the bad days feel never ending
your mood doesn't improve
you’re having negative thoughts about yourself, your baby and being a parent.

You might just need a little bit of help for a short time, or you might need support for longer. There are a lot of options, and a health professional can help you find the care that's right for you.

It's important to know:

the sooner you get help, the sooner you'll feel better
if you feel better in yourself that will help your baby
pregnancy and parenting is a big adjustment and there are services to help things feel easier
help and support can be tailored to you and your family
whether you need a little help or a lot, there are options for you.

Perinatal mental illness

During the perinatal period, 1 in 5 women and 1 in 10 partners will experience anxiety or depression. It’s also a time when you and your partner could experience a range of other perinatal mental health conditions.

Signs and symptoms of perinatal mental illness

Everyone's experiences of mental illness are different. Some of the more common signs are:

ongoing low mood or feeling sad or numb
worrying a lot more than you normally would
feeling restless or on edge a lot of the time
big changes to sleep, appetite, or eating significantly more or less
a constant feeling of guilt or shame, or feeling hopeless
finding it very hard to concentrate or make decisions
losing interest in things you enjoy
withdrawing from family and friends and not wanting social contact
unwanted and distressing thoughts about harming yourself or your baby
having thoughts of death or suicide.

If you’re feeling any of these symptoms, it’s important to talk to a health professional you trust as soon as possible.

If you're having thoughts about harm or death you need to get urgent help from your GP or the nearest hospital emergency department. It might help to have someone close to you support you while you get help. The sooner you get help the sooner you’ll feel better.

Perinatal mental health conditions

Perinatal anxiety

Perinatal anxiety is different to the natural stresses you feel when you’re adjusting to being a parent. It can be mild, moderate or severe. The symptoms might begin:

during pregnancy
suddenly after birth
gradually in the weeks and months after your baby’s born.

If stress or anxiety are becoming a constant part of your life, it’s important to talk to someone.

Perinatal depression

You might experience perinatal depression as a combination of:

low mood
sadness
feeling hopeless and isolated
a sense of slowing down
losing interest or pleasure in the things you love
having no energy
eating more or less than usual
having difficulty with thinking and concentration.

If you're experiencing any of these feelings, it can help to talk to someone.

At its most severe, perinatal depression can lead to thoughts of death, self-harm or suicide. If you feel that you're in a crisis situation, there's help available.

Perinatal obsessive compulsive disorder

Some women develop perinatal obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) for the first time either during pregnancy or shortly afterwards. Others may find that they’ve had OCD symptoms before, but they become much more challenging to manage during pregnancy or following birth.

Perinatal OCD has 2 main symptoms:

obsessions – intrusive thoughts, images, urges or doubts that distress you and keep returning to your mind
compulsions – thoughts and actions that you repeat to reduce your anxiety.

Obsessions might look like intense fear that something is contaminated by germs, or worries about things you’ve forgotten. Some women may also experience fears of harm coming to their baby or themselves. Compulsions might include rituals like continually cleaning or sterilising in the same way each time, even though objects are already clean. You might also find yourself constantly needing to seek reassurance from others or avoiding things that activate obsessions and compulsions. Read more about perinatal OCD on the PANDA website.

Postpartum psychosis

Postpartum psychosis (PPP) is a rare but extremely serious mental illness, which affects about 1 to 2 new mothers in every 1,000. Women with PPP experience:

delusions (strange and irrational beliefs)
hallucinations (seeing or hearing things that don't exist).

Postpartum psychosis is a medical emergency. It’s important to get urgent medical attention and treatment for it.

Read more about perinatal mental health conditions on the Gidget Foundation website.

Other events that can impact your mental health

Birth trauma

If your birth doesn’t go as planned, it can lead to feelings of distress, grief, and disappointment. Recovering from a difficult birth or a birth experience you didn’t expect can take time. For some people it can trigger birth trauma.

One in 3 women in Australia describe their birth experience as traumatic. Birth trauma can involve a physical trauma or it can be psychological. Often it’s both. It doesn’t have to be life threatening or medically traumatic to have a psychological impact. Anything that’s experienced as traumatic by a parent is a birth trauma.

It can be caused by things like:

emergency situations, for example being rushed into hospital for an emergency birth
birth loss
your baby being born with a disability
feeling powerless, out of control or not listened to during birth
the birth not meeting your expectations
a past trauma being triggered during birth.

Partners or other support people can also experience birth trauma.

A small number of parents develop post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) following birth trauma. Birth trauma can also lead to other perinatal mental health conditions so it's important to talk to someone if you're having difficult feelings about your birth experience.

Read more about birth trauma on the Birth Trauma Australia website.

Perinatal bereavement

Perinatal bereavement is the loss of a baby during pregnancy, birth or shortly after birth. It involves unimaginable feelings of loss and grief that affect parents and their support networks.

Grief is a personal experience. You might feel numb, devastated, isolated, helpless, angry or shocked. Any emotion you feel is okay.

The grief of losing a pregnancy or baby can have lasting impacts on your emotional wellbeing. It can also lead to other mental health conditions. Compassionate care and support can help you feel less alone.

Where to get help

You can find a support service on our perinatal service directory.

The ForWhen helpline can help put you in touch with perinatal services in your area.

If you need to talk to someone, the PANDA (Perinatal Anxiety & Depression Australia) helpline is available Monday to Saturday on 1300 726 306.

In a crisis or emergency

If you're having thoughts about harming yourself or your baby, or you feel unable to cope, call:

Last updated:: 15 September 2026