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(I do think hormones can be huge as you say, but sometimes it seems like there's little acknowledged space between loving parenthood all the time and PPD etc.)

I agree that hormones can be a legitimate issue. But I also agree with the article that sometimes things are objectively hard. I had a few people suggest to me in my first month PP that I might have PPD because I was pretty honest about the fact that I was having a hard time coping. But I also think I had a lot to cope with! I had ended up with a c-section with post-op complications that required daily wound care from my husband (which was scary and frustrating and kind of horrible to have to have my husband care for me). I had a baby who was screaming 5-7 hours/day for 2 weeks straight until we figured out I had low supply. I had (have, actually) so much damage from breastfeeding that my LC called it "shocking" and she's "seen a lot of boobs!" I had inlaws staying with me for over a week who then got us all sick and I was dealing with a sick 4 week old and sick husband while being sick myself. So someone telling me that maybe I had PPD, as though all these problems were just hormones and not just a really hard period of my life was sort of like telling me that my feelings weren't valid.

Wow, they've done some excellent articles lately about parenting. All of them have touched what I've experienced. I noticed how DH and mine's fighting style and expectations of each other changed with LO's arrival. Add family stresses to it and it was awful in the beginning. It took a long time to heal from it. If anything, that period of our lives made counseling a reality in our marriage. DH is more open to it than before with a change of counselor. Nobody really talks about how hard the transition from a couple family to a kid family is. I'm glad it's being spoken about more openly.

Sad article, but I liked that it pointed out that sometimes parenting is just hard, and it's not necessarily in one's head. Speaking from personal experience, it was a real zero to sixty transition - I never expected to be home all the time but have no time for basic self-care, never mind cooking, cleaning and intelligent conversation. And then it got worse... my maternity leave ran out, we weren't ready to leave the baby with strangers, and I ended up working from home full-time with precious little support from anyone but DH. No regrets about the decision, exactly, but the stress was through the roof. Now I know why so many couples crack after having kids, and really wish that more families had some sort of support network to get them through the early days.

On the one hand I really appreciate what this is saying and think they make really good points. @zbug: well said!

On the other, stuff like this is kind of what made me second guess myself when I first suspected I had ppd almost right of the bat, and that confusion about "well it's probably just normal" sometimes leads to people not seeking out professional help when they really really need it, so I kind of wish they had added the disclaimer of "still seek help if you think ppd might e the case" because IMO it's better to get checked up than wait and wait as it gets worse.