“I’m a clinical psychologist so I referred many women to PANDA throughout my career. I did a lot of work in trauma response and with women who were grieving after loss but I’ve always been really passionate about making the biggest impact on the mental health and wellbeing of Australians and there’s no better place to start that than with new parents. I’ve been at PANDA for five years and I’ve loved every moment of it; it’s a privilege to have conversations like this.

“I would love to say the stigma of mental health has improved but it hasn’t. We have people on the helpline everyday who are backward in sharing their experience because they’re scared that the concert of them failing as a parent may result in their baby being taken from them, or they’ll be judged.

“We really encourage people to trust the red flags they’re experiencing. As a psychologist I would say the moment that something doesn’t feel right is the moment you should put yourself first. There are lots of things in early parenthood that dampen our ability to notice those red flags – competing pressures, parenting expectations, exhaustion, hunger – so it’s really important that if something doesn’t feel right, even if you can’t explain what it is, that you reach out for support. PANDA has a checklist on the website which means you don’t have to find the words but you can work through some questions to figure out your concerns and experiences and what support can help you.

“We know that there isn’t a linear path to identifying your vulnerability. A lot of mental health challenges have physical responses and this is particularly relevant to neurodivergent parents. PANDA has been thrilled to do work this year with parents who are neurodivergent because we were noticing the consistent challenge these parents have with sensitivity to crying, for example. The way we appear as new parents – and the concept of masking – is something we see unitedly across all women in early motherhood. We’re taught to repress our experience in many ways; I should be okay, I must be a good parent. It’s important to recognise that we’re often our worst critics because we put our needs last.

“When you do reach out for help, you’ll be asked to do the Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale (EPDS) which is done via the COPE app. Screening is a wonderful thing but it needs to be the catalyst for a conversation to unpack each person’s experience. We need to empower everyone that if you’ve been screened and you need issues addressed, you need to advocate for yourself to get further support from a health team.

“We have a health professional referral form on our website and we get lots of referrals from midwives, GPs and child health nurses, always with patient consent. People can also come through our website, our chatbot and our helpline. Sometimes you won’t get through initially but we aim to return your call within a day.

“Part of delivering a free service is that we ask a bit about yourself, we’ll ask your age and location but nothing identifiable. Where possible we ask your name so we can continue having a personalised conversation but some people choose to use a pseudonym. We will do a risk assessment because if we hear that a parent is struggling, we need to ensure the parent and their children are safe. We’ll then explore what it is they’re ringing about; some people explain exactly what they’re experiencing and others skirt around the issue but everyone on the PANDA helpline team are professionals with lived mental health experience and mental health training. They’re really skilled at being able to get to the bottom of what’s going on; they hold and support each caller. Some people will only need one call or we’ll link them with community support or refer them to a GP for a mental health care plan. For some people we’ll offer a wraparound care model where we continue to engage with them. We also have an intensive care and counselling service for people with existing mental health conditions or psychosis.”

To connect with PANDA:

Free support is available via the PANDA Helpline on 1300 726 306 (9am-7:30pm Monday-Friday and 9am – 4pm Saturday) or panda.org.au

PANDA also offers an online mental health checklist for new and expecting parents to check for possible signs of perinatal anxiety, depression, and well-being concerns.