Singer and presenter Stacey Solomon talks to TV Times magazine about her battle with Post Natal Depression ahead of her BBC Three documentary Depression, Teen Mums and Me (Tuesday)…
When you gave birth to your first son Zac at 17, you fell into a deep depression…
"Everyone says that having a baby is the happiest time of your life, but it wasn’t like that for me. When I had Zac, I thought my life was over. I was depressed. I had a form of mental illness."
During the making of 'Stacey Solomon – Depression, Teen Mums and Me', you go back to King George’s Hospital in Ilford where you had Zac…
"Going back there is strange as I haven’t revisited since I gave birth. I remember looking at him wriggling in a box next to me and I didn’t feel any kind of bond. I felt helpless and all I could do was cry."
When you found out you were pregnant, you were already five months' gone and were in the middle of a performing arts course at your local college.
"I had high hopes for a future in music and finding out I was pregnant was devastating. Abortion wasn’t an option, but it felt like all my dreams had been shattered. I thought that if I became a mum, I couldn’t be anything else. I couldn’t have a career or go to college. When Zac was born, he slept in my bedroom with me at home. I remember feeling really trapped in there. I’d wander around the house hoping that eventually he would stop crying."
Does any one moment stay in your mind?
"One time, I was making some toast and it burnt. I remember sitting there, crying my eyes out and thinking, 'I can’t make toast, how am I going to look after a baby?' I didn’t want to tell anyone how I felt because it wasn’t supposed to be like that. I felt like I was the worst mum in the world."
Your mum threw you a lifeline when she sent you off on holiday with your friends for a week while Zac stayed at home with her…
"At first it felt like a week away from my misery, but then I started to miss Zac and when I got back, I felt that bond."
During the show, you meet young women like 20-year-old Emma, who was diagnosed with Post Natal Depression but who is now part of a group offering support and a chance to talk to other young mums in her position…
"I would love to have had contact with other mums like me. It has been a real relief to meet women going through what I went through. I always thought I was the only person who felt like that."
You now have a second son, Leighton, with fiance Aaron Barham. And during the documentary, you had a session with a psychotherapist…
"I can look back and see why I was feeling like that and I don’t feel so guilty. I can leave that bit of my life behind."
