Perinatal & Postpartum Therapy in Natick, MA

The perinatal period (pregnancy through about the first year after birth, often stretching further) can bring a range of mental health changes that are common and treatable. We see clients for:

• Pregnancy mood concerns: anxiety, depression, irritability, and intrusive worry during pregnancy. Untreated pregnancy depression and anxiety often continue into the postpartum period.
• Birth trauma: the experience of a birth that felt frightening, out of control, medically traumatic, or that did not match what you hoped for. Birth trauma can show up immediately or surface months later.
• Postpartum depression (PPD): persistent low mood, hopelessness, difficulty bonding, exhaustion that is more than the expected fatigue of new parenthood.
• Postpartum anxiety (PPA): racing thoughts, hypervigilance, difficulty sleeping when the baby sleeps, sense of dread.
• Postpartum OCD: intrusive, distressing thoughts about harm coming to the baby, often accompanied by compulsive checking or avoidance. Often missed and misunderstood. Most parents who experience postpartum OCD will never act on the intrusive thoughts; the thoughts are a symptom, not a wish.
• Postpartum rage: intense irritability and anger that does not fit who you usually are.
• Partner depression and anxiety: non-birthing partners experience perinatal mood and anxiety changes too. Often overlooked. We work with them.
• Pregnancy loss and infant loss: miscarriage, stillbirth, neonatal loss, termination for medical reasons. Grief that the world around you often does not know how to hold.
• Infertility: the months or years of trying, the medical treatment, the cycles of hope and grief.
• Adoption and surrogacy adjustment.
• Identity shift: the experience of becoming a parent reshaping who you are, what you want, how you relate to work, to your partner, to your own parents.

How we approach this work

Perinatal and postpartum experiences happen in bodies and in households, not just in minds. We work with what is present: the new sleep deprivation, the recovery your body is doing, the feeding situation, the role shifts at home, the financial pressure, what your support system can and cannot do, the parts of becoming a parent that are unwelcome or surprising.

Approaches our clinicians use:

• Evidence-based therapy for perinatal mood and anxiety: CBT, ACT, mindfulness-based work, behavioral activation. These work for perinatal depression and anxiety much as they work for those conditions in other periods of life.
• Trauma-informed work for birth trauma and pregnancy loss.
• Couples and family-systems work when the perinatal period is also reshaping the relationship.
• Coordination with prescribers, including those who specialize in perinatal psychiatry. We do not prescribe; we will help you find prescribers when medication is part of the plan.
• Coordination with OBs, midwives, doulas, lactation consultants, and pediatricians when that helps your care.