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Stephanie is helping other rural mums struggling with depression and 'crippling' isolation

By Naomi White|

When the door closed behind her husband as he left for work each day, Stephanie Trethewey wo?uld burst into tears.

The new mum, then living in Melbourne, would look at their baby son Elliott, now three-and-a-half, and dread the day ahead.

"I really struggled the first few years. No one can ever prepare you for motherhood, but I felt as unprepared as possible. It hit me like a ton of bricks," she told 9Honey.

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Stephanie Trethewey with husband Sam and kids Elliot and Evie. (Supplied)

"I lost my sense of identity. I used to think how lucky my husband was to be free, while I struggled at home with this baby."

Compounding the issue was that Elliot was a 'terrible sleeper'. He would scream for hours, and woke every 45 minutes กช for months, turning ?Stephanie into a 'walking zombie'.

It all came to a head one day, when Stephanie couldn't hide it anymore and broke down.

"?I handed him to Sam and went into the bathroom and shut the door. I cried for an hour, it was so hard to cope. There was so much pressure to be #grateful and embrace it."

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Stephanie found the isolation of parenting in a rural area 'crippling'. (Pip Williams)

With the help of her mother-in-law and her mother's group, Stephanie says she 'battled through it'.

But when the couple decided to move to Central North Tasmania in 2019, the isolation of rural life, which she described as 'crippling', threw new challenges at them.

When Stephanie found the courage to seek help after the birth of their daughter Evie, almost two, the limited mental health support available to rural, regional and remote families meant she was almost unable to access the help she needed.

"It's laughable how much services are lacking. It was an eight-week wait to see a counsellor. I turned up to the appointment, to find out I'd been booked under podiatry, not psychology," she explained.

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Stephanie did not have a positive experience when she first found the courage to seek help for perinatal depression. (Pip Williams)

"?It took so much guts to book the appointment, to get the mental health plan and get help and then be turned away because of that, after such a long wait.... it's unacceptable."

"We need to do better because it's ?one thing having mums feel confident enough to ask for help, but when they do ask you need to bloody be there."

Especially given the unique pressures faced by these families, particularly farming families, whose success is often at the mercy of conditions. With floods and droughts and the upcoming pre-Christmas harvest, Stephanie says many women feel their struggles would be a burden to an already stressful time.

"When we moved here, Sam was so under the pump starting the farm and beef business from scratch, I didn't want to 'whinge'. I thought 'It's not that bad, I'm not suicidal, I have a beautiful family, what have I got to be sad about'. That was my internal dialogue.

"I'd see my partner working his guts out and I didn't want to add to that mental load."

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Stephanie says the unique pressures of rural life stops women from prioritising their mental health. (Pip Williams)

?Another consideration is that there's little option for farmers to take paternity leave.

Stephanie's experience led her to establish Motherland?, a not-for-profit charity advocating for the emotional well-being of rural, regional and remote mums, and acting as a 'virtual village' to connect mums on their parenting journey.

Stephanie hopes it helps other women to seek help if they're struggling, saying the more perinatal mental health is spoken about, the less stigma will surround it.

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Stephanie's experience led her to establish the charity Motherland Australia to connect rural mums. (Pip Williams)

"Why are we not normalising speaking before the pain is so bad? Why can't we normalise checking on our mental health, the same as we do going to the dentist," she said.

"Rural women in particular are resilient and admitting they are struggling flies in the face of that. But by sharing my story, and others, hopefully we'll continue to break that stigma." ?

You are not alone. To find the right support for you, or a loved one visit www.pmhweek.org.au.

If you need immediate help please call Lifeline on 131114 or call PANDA on 1300 726 306.

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