Chrissy Teigen Wrote A Moving Essay About Having Postpartum Depression

“I also just didn’t think it could happen to me."

Chrissy Teigen is Glamour magazine’s April cover girl, and she’s taking the opportunity to open up about an important topic: postpartum depression.

In an essay, Teigen wrote that no one had ever told her, “I have postpartum depression.” Because of this lack of conversation, she never expected to experience it after welcoming her daughter Luna with husband John Legend last April. After months of pain, though, she finally got her diagnosis.

For Glamour's April issue, Chrissy Teigen decided to write an essay "about something no one really knows about" her: her experience with postpartum depression.
Miguel Reveriego
For Glamour's April issue, Chrissy Teigen decided to write an essay "about something no one really knows about" her: her experience with postpartum depression.

Teigen opened up about her “wonderful, energetic pregnancy” and the way the team at “Lip Sync Battle,” the celeb-filled show that she hosts, helped her and Luna by adding a nursery to her dressing room, lowering the noise and giving Teigen plenty of pump breaks. She has “a great life” with help from her husband, mother and a nanny, which kept Teigen from talking about how she really felt.

“I also just didn’t think it could happen to me,” she wrote. “I have a great life. I have all the help I could need: John, my mother (who lives with us), a nanny. But postpartum does not discriminate. I couldn’t control it.”

In her essay, Teigen wrote that postpartum depression "does not discriminate."
Miguel Reveriego
In her essay, Teigen wrote that postpartum depression "does not discriminate."

Teigen detailed her bouts of “spontaneous crying” and explained how her “bones hurt to the core.” She slept on the couch often and frequently felt nauseated. It wasn’t until she went in for a physical that she found out what was causing her pain.

I looked at my doctor, and my eyes welled up because I was so tired of being in pain. Of sleeping on the couch. Of waking up throughout the night. Of throwing up. Of taking things out on the wrong people. Of not enjoying life. Of not seeing my friends. Of not having the energy to take my baby for a stroll. My doctor pulled out a book and started listing symptoms. And I was like, “Yep, yep, yep.” I got my diagnosis: postpartum depression and anxiety.

Teigen wrote that she began taking an antidepressant and that she plans on seeing a therapist. She also started being open about her diagnosis with her friends and family, and now with many more people. Since Glamour published the essay online, moms have shown their appreciation for Teigen and her openness about postpartum depression and mental health.

In her essay, Teigen pointed out how many moms don’t have the help or access to medical care they need and wrote about the intense admiration she has for all mothers.

“I look around every day and I don’t know how people do it,” she wrote. “I’ve never had more respect for mothers, especially mothers with postpartum depression.”

Read Teigen’s essay in full on Glamour. The magazine’s April issue is on newsstands March 14.

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