Postpartum depression, also known as postpartum blues is a kind of depression which can affect both the mother and the father after childbirth. There have been a few people in the entertainment world who have openly talked about the experience and how they went through with it. Bachelorette alum Emily Maynard Johnson openly talked about her journey to motherhood and how she dealt with the condition.
In her latest interview, Johnson openly discussed how, when everybody at 19 years old were choosing their colleges, or partying hard, she was a new mom who had to deal with the death of her fiancé. "The first couple of years were so hard," the " I Said Yes!" author described to People how life was after the death of her fiancé Ricky Hendrick. "I didn't know if I was coming or going. At the time, I didn't know it was postpartum. I had never heard of that."
Maynard Johnson found out she was going to be a mommy days after Hendrick died of a plane crash. She recalled reading online that having intense emotions can harm the baby , so she suppressed all those feelings as best she could and looked forward to the future and her due date. She also described how it felt after the baby was born.
According to Celebrity Baby Scoop, Maynard Johnson immediately knew something was missing as soon as she saw her daughter. "I was like, Ricky's not here. I knew something was missing from that moment. Holding [my daughter Ricki] I thought, this is the closest I'm going to get to him in this lifetime and it brought all these emotions I never thought I would feel. It opened up this whole bag," she recalled.
She admitted going through depression and jokingly told that she would go to see a therapist in Charlotte. But she also admitted that nothing a therapist can say will make her feel better. The only thing that will is if Ricky walked through the door.
Now, happily married to auto management consultant Tyler Johnson, they happily welcomed the birth of their son Jennings Tyler last July. "I had postpartum high with Jennings!" gushed the mom-of-two. "That's such a testament to where I was in my life. I love Ricki so much, but I was young and I didn't know what I was doing."
Maynard Johnson also said that she never really saw the joy of motherhood during her first child. But now, she says she wants to remember everything because it goes by so fast.
