Opinion
Motherhood is daunting but should not be recast as a disease
LETTER — Posted March 24, 2008
Regarding "Beyond the baby blues: A spectrum of postdelivery conditions" (Article, Feb. 18): The acceptance of the ever-expanding DSM-IV, in a profession that views itself as scientific, is an amazing phenomenon.
As an MD mother of five, I have thought and felt every emotion described in the article, and I do not seek to make light of the horror of it. But the Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale, Speak Up When You're Down, and the granting of government funds will not produce the apparent goal of laughing mothers, peaceful fathers, and infants with advanced motor and cognitive skills.
It is a dark religion that tells mothers that the responsibility of caring for dependent human life is a matter best handed over to psychologists and support groups.
What sounds so compassionate will depress both patient and doctor as laws mandating depression screening bring yet more litigation against the obstetrician who recalls that no one slept well and all cried often when a newborn infant entered his or her own home.
The list of diagnoses reflects our efforts to build fantasyland in a fallen world and to accomplish it via increasing bureaucracy. Our determination to label human struggle as disease will soon make Huxley's Brave New World appear to be a child's bedtime story.
Carol K. Tharp, MD, Winnetka, Ill.
Note: This item originally appeared at http://www.ama-assn.org/amednews/2008/03/24/edlt0324.htm.
