On being an Aspiring Psychologist with Postpartum Psychosis

Editor’s note: 

This blog is a reflective account of lived experience shared to support learning and self-awareness among aspiring psychologists and people interested in this area. It does not include clinical detail. If this topic feels difficult for you, please take care while reading and seek support if needed.

Holding on to Identity in the Haze

It is both incredibly sad and beautiful that when I experienced postpartum psychosis, I prophesied that I would finally get on to the clinical psychology doctorate this year. As part of this, I also imagined my application would write itself.

What strikes me most is that, even in the haze of everything, this part of my psyche held strong - I want to be a clinical psychologist. I want to help others. I want to be somebody who helps others. I also want to help myself, even and perhaps especially - when everything feels too much.

The hazy reflection of a window and plant on a white wall

Entering Services as a Patient, Not a Professional

On the night I arrived without my baby at the mother and baby unit, I remember getting into the ambulance and feeling instantly at peace. The other side of my ill-health at that time also meant I felt I was an emergency services worker, and that I was going to help other people as well as myself.

Whilst I wasn’t well at this time, this aspect of my identity endured and has since become refined. I believe it is the thread that connects us all in the psychological professions - it’s what motivates and unites us.

Of course, I was not in my professional role - I was a patient there, a fact which I was largely under no delusions about and yet I was still myself. And myself, very much, was an aspiring psychologist with every fibre of my being.

Seeing My Future Self

And so, I had the experience and also the privilege of entering psychiatric services as a psychologist in the making.

Upon arrival, I met a support worker who, to me, resembled a ‘therapist’. She was an older woman, rounded and soft, wearing glasses and smiling benignly whilst emanating a calm demeanour. In my psychotic state, I believed this woman would be my future self.

As soon as I had this realisation, I felt peace in my heart which surprised me somewhat, as I did not know whether this woman had any psychological credentials. It did not matter to me whether future me got onto the doctorate or not. I simply wanted to be this person.

It struck me then that my ambition to be a psychologist ran far deeper than achieving a title. It was a mission to become a certain kind of person. This woman embodied what a therapist was to me and that is who I ultimately wanted to be.

Ambition and Vulnerability Intertwined

In the days that followed, there were other manifestations of my malaise and my ambitions, entwined into one.

I met a peer support worker who I turned into an admissions officer for the DClin - someone who would somehow ‘spot’ me as an emerging talent while I sang songs of hope in the communal lounge.

Whilst feeling unsafe and wanting my door closed, I would then open it and announce, “My door is open,” eventually settling on having it partially open - a balance between vulnerability and security that felt symbolic of so much else.

Woman Praying

Trying to Heal in an Imperfect System

I tried to engage with interventions as much as possible. I had bubble baths, did mindful colouring, went for walks in the garden, practised my faith, and as much as the abysmal Wi-Fi would allow, stayed connected with my family.

Despite this, I saw first-hand how counterproductive many elements of treatment could be. It is incredibly difficult, when one is struggling with psychosis, to have staff constantly changing every hour, with your wellbeing dependent on their competence and ultimately how interested they are in helping you.

Highlights included staff peering through peepholes every fifteen minutes overnight, springing into the room hourly to check temperatures, and repeatedly asking when my baby would be coming in at a time when personal survival felt precarious.

Motherhood, Scrutiny, and Safeguarding

I was an unusual admission because my baby did not always stay on the unit with me. I consider myself fortunate to have a family who fought to care for her in a stable home environment. They would bring her to visit during the day so I could sleep at night.

Nevertheless, this triggered a safeguarding inquiry which was as stressful as it was insulting.

During visits, I saw how difficult it was to access staff support to help me care for my baby. The most painful moment came when a nursery nurse ran into my room and said, “We need to understand why you’re not interested in looking after your baby!”

Hospital corridor with doors at one end

The Weight of Containment and Control

There is something deeply unsettling about being locked on a ward, staring at a door that opens for everyone except you and your fellow patients.

It is hard to know that your freedom - even for two hours - rests on the timing of an MDT meeting. Leave becomes precious, then devastatingly fragile when it is delayed, forgotten, or withdrawn because your presentation fluctuates in response to chaos around you.

Recovery as Meaning-Making

Happily, with the help of medication, time, and the team around me, I made a relatively swift recovery from the acute episode of psychosis. But recovery, I came to realise, was not just about symptom reduction or discharge from hospital. It was also about meaning making.

Throughout this period, my determination to help myself - using many of the same psychological principles I had hoped one day to offer others - remained remarkably intact. I reflected, I observed, and I tried to understand rather than judge what was happening to me.

I noticed how compassion, containment, consistency, and being truly seen mattered far more than any single intervention. In many ways, my experience did not weaken my identity as an aspiring psychologist; it clarified it. It sharpened my awareness of what helps, what harms, and what it really means to care for someone at their most vulnerable - including myself.

Lessons I Will Carry Forward

It was hard to want to help other patients whilst I was a patient myself. This became an early lesson in boundaries - one that will stay with me throughout my career.

I learned that being my authentic self is always my best bet, because anything else is simply too exhausting. I learned that I am enough for myself even when nothing else makes sense.

And most importantly, I learned that I am already who I wanted to become: someone who gives everything they have to help others, while also learning how to care for themselves.

That identity will only grow stronger the more I nurture it. And although I will continue trying my best, it no longer feels catastrophic if I never get onto the DClin because I am already becoming the person I was meant to be. I am also a mother and that’s pretty wonderful too.

Further Support and Information

·         To learn more about Postpartum Psychosis, visit the NHS page:https://www.nhs.uk/mental-health/conditions/post-partum-psychosis/

·         Action on Postpartum Psychosis is a charity supporting mothers and families:https://www.app-network.org

• Thank you so much for being part of my world. If you are interested in the stories of other aspiring psychologists, please do check out the Clinical Psychologist Collective and the Aspiring Psychologist Collective books.

  
  

• If you enjoyed this article and you’re an aspiring psychologist - or someone with an interest in mental health - you’re very welcome to get involved. We’re currently inviting blog proposals from our community. If you have a topic you’d like to write about, you can submit a proposal here.