Postpartum mood disorders will hit around one in seven new mothers within the first year after having their baby; I was one of those unlucky ones. After a rough, rough battle, I am finally starting to take control of my life again, to take it back from this horrible, horrible temporary illness. I did everything I could to get back to myself in a timely manner. I went to therapy, tried medicine, joined social groups and Internet chat rooms, and read countless books. Things have slowed down as far as the intensity, but today I was reading a book about Postpartum depression, and one line cut me deeper than I've been cut in awhile.

The chapter was on your support systems, it was saying how neighbors, friends, family, and professionals would be your support system, but none of them could replace or match up to the significance of the support of your husband or partner.

"Research has shown that emotional support from your partner greatly reduces the severity and duration of postpartum depression."

Ouch.

These women talked about how they never would've made it through without the support of their husbands, that their partners gave them a break when they needed one but never invalidated them or their abilities to mother because of postpartum depression. Their lovers knew how much of a toll growing an entire human takes on us physically and emotionally.

I cried, I threw the book across the room, and then I listened to country music — If I'm listening to country music it's a dangerous, dangerous thing. It just wasn't fair.

It's funny, you pick this person and you think, "this is my person," and you don't just think this is the person you'll kiss for awhile; At some point it clicks and this person becomes the one you want to settle down with, this is the person you would be with till death do you part, in sickness and in health, through every ugly and horrible thing that could happen. You'd take their last name, and you know you would stand by their side and love them through their darkest days.

But what if they don't love you through yours?

The first year after childbirth is the most common time for separation or marital issues, which ironically happens during the same time period of postpartum depression. Mixing the two together is not an ideal combination.

It wasn't fair. I read about these women who had boyfriends or husbands who would take the baby through the night feedings, who went to therapy appointments, who did research on their condition, who held them when they cried, comforted them, assured them they weren't crazy, told them they were beautiful, and did everything they could to make the emotional transition to new motherhood, easier.

I think the hardest part to read, was they all stayed. There were women with psychotic breakdowns, their husbands stayed. Women who attempted suicide, their husbands stayed. Women who cried and screamed every day, and they stayed. Women who had it far worse than I did, and it wasn't "too much" for their husbands, it wasn't their "last straw" they didn't throw in the towel after their girl got postpartum depression, I mean it's not like she just spent 9 months growing their child or anything, right?

It wasn't fair. Why did all these other women get to have ideal recoveries? Why did they get this amazing support system boyfriend and all?

I wonder what I ever did to deserve it, to know that after carrying our child, nursing her 24/7, and loving you through your endless mistakes, always being in your corner, how you could have abandoned me, abandoned the family our daughter was supposed to have with the two of us, together through anything and everything.

I couldn't understand what I ever did to anyone to deserve what happened to me, and it took a very hard day to realize that I was better than the people who hurt me. As lies were told and my back was stabbed, I cried in front of everyone, and I said loud enough for the whole room to hear me, "I would never have done this to any of them. Especially not him."

And I wouldn't have. I still don't have it in me to hurt you the way you hurt me. What others do to you is their karma, what you do for them is yours. I loved you through all your chaos, all the trouble that came with you, to me you were always worth it. I would never have thought the reason you decided I no longer was, would be postpartum depression.

I would've answered the 2 a.m. phone calls, I would've ridden down to see you if you left and convinced you not to go, if you felt unloved I would've told you every second of every day how much I loved you, I would've made you feel like the most important man in the world. I would've listened, every day to the turmoil going on. I would've been at every single doctor's appointment, I would've held you through every nightmare, I would've told off anyone who insulted you or your condition, I would've said you were the best damn father in the world. I would've read every single article on your condition. I assumed you would've too, that you loved me enough to stand by me through postpartum. Depression would not have kept me from loving you, it would've caused me to show you I loved you more. I would've fought for you. I just assumed, without a shadow of a doubt, that you would've fought for me too.

Every second of every day I would've fought for you. I loved you when no one else did, I held you when no one else would, and I believed in you even when the people who "have your back," didn't. I was always in your corner, and I expected that you would just be in mine too. When you said forever, when you said you wanted to marry me someday, that we would be together through anything, I assumed that you meant it. And if for some reason we did split, I wouldn't have expected postpartum depression to be the reason.

I remember when your eyes shifted when they stopped looking at me like I was a person and started looking at me like I was a foreign concept. I remember leaving article links, you didn't read them. I remember inviting you to therapy sessions, you only came to one. I gave you books, pamphlets, letters from the doctor, websites, I gave you all the tools you could've used to be supportive. I read this paragraph, and it talked about writing things down that your partner could help you with, and as I read that part, that's when the feeling of jealousy hit me.

I wrote you a note. I listed 10 things that you could've done to help me with postpartum depression. I told you how to help, I gave you the right tools, the doctors gave you the right tools, the OB/GYN, the therapists, the Internet; You had it all in front of you.

You had a letter that I wrote in my most distressed state, with what you could do to help me, and you couldn't have been bothered. You didn't ask me how I felt, you didn't hold me, you didn't tell me I was a great mom, you didn't remind me I was beautiful — You didn't care. To be honest, I'm not sure if you even read it.

And I envy women, who're lovers did care. Who had their man by their side defeating postpartum with them, being their knight in shining armor fighting off this evil illness. It should've been you, and I will never forget how you stopped loving me during the time I needed your love the most.

Especially, after all, I stood by you during your dark days no one other than I helped you get through. Those people who "love" you now weren't there for you when I was, and they would've let you just sit in your mistakes and wallow. The people who thought you were nothing more than reckless behavior, who was the one telling you what you were worth? What could you accomplish? Pushing you to reach for more in your life? Who stood by you through everything? Never forget who fought for you when no one else gave a shit.

I am very envious and resentful that I didn't have the support and love I deserved from you, that I would've given you in a heartbeat. I realize now that others don't have to do good to you, that people don't owe you anything and they don't have to be there for you just because you were for them.

The world goes on with or without the people you thought you couldn't live without, and some day, I'll be grateful for everything that being out from under taught me. I don't regret all the things I did for you, I don't regret the tears I caught, I don't regret driving you home when you got into trouble, I don't regret standing up for you, having your back, and fighting for you, I don't regret sticking by you as your friends left or telling your family you work your ass off and don't need to be belittled for forgetting to take out the garbage, I don't regret hearing you cry on the phone and begging for me to stay, that if you ever were free from the issue you were in, you would spend the rest of your life proving to me I made the right choice to stay, you promised. and most importantly, I don't regret loving you. Not even for a second.

I could never forgive what was done, but I have moved on in many ways. I have grown as an independent person out from under.

I know in my heart that the man I am meant to be with for the rest of my life would've stayed through depression, would've loved me every day and worshiped his woman as the goddess she is for growing human life. The man I was meant to be with would have spent every second of every day trying to figure out how to help me during my difficult time, and he would remind me how amazing of a woman and mother I was every damn day.

It's okay that you didn't, because you have set me up to meet the man I am supposed to be with — the man who will love me and treat me the way I deserve, the man who would appreciate everything I did for them and have not treated anxiety or postpartum depression as a criminal, or wrongdoing. The man I will marry, will know I am an amazing mother, they will tell me every day. They will tell me I'm beautiful, they will fight for me, they won't let their family insult me, but most importantly, they will never, ever give up on me. They'll love me through the hard days. The days you left me alone to sink or swim.

You didn't; You "couldn't", you said. You didn't know what to do, or how to help or how to stay or be there for me like I was for you, but you could have. . .

Because I wrote you a note.