Black Milk - Elif Shafak [97]
What she didn’t know was that I then thought my life was terribly boring. So the last thing I wanted to do was to write about myself. Instead I began writing about people other than me and things that never really happened. Thus began my lifelong passion for writing fiction, which from the very beginning I saw not so much as an autobiographical manifestation as a transcendental journey into other lives, other possibilities.
Now, however, I felt as if illiterate. Words that had been my lifelong companions abandoned me and dissolved into soggy letters, like noodles in alphabet soup.
Gradually, my condition became apparent to those around me.
Some people said, “You must be having a writer’s block or something. No big deal, it happens to everyone. It will pass.”
Others said, “It’s because you went through some pretty stressful days. You were brought to trial due to the words uttered by characters in your novel The Bastard of Istanbul. Being pregnant at the time, it was a taxing experience and took its toll.”
My maternal grandmother said, “Your depression must be the doing of the evil eye. May those malicious eyes close!”
A spiritual master I visited said, “Whatever the reason, you need to embrace your despair and remember, God never burdens us with more than we can bear.”
Finally, a doctor I consulted said, “Welcome to postpartum depression. Let’s start with two Cipralex a day and see how it goes. If you experience any mood changes down the road, you should immediately report them to me.”
“Thank you, Doc,” I said, putting the pills in my shirt pocket.
Cipralex, Xanax, Prozac . . . The trouble was, if I started taking them, my milk would have been affected, and I wanted to breast-feed.
That same afternoon, back at home, I thought hard about this dilemma and decided to give my Cipralex pills to the pink cyclamen in the kitchen. One in the morning and one in the evening, on an empty stomach. Every second day, the fuchsia in the sitting room got its share of Xanax. Four times a week, I put Prozac into the gardenia’s soil and watered it to make it easier for the plant to gulp the pill down.
A month hadn’t passed when the cyclamen turned a color so dark it was almost purple and the fuchsia’s leaves went numb, unable to feel anything. The gardenia was perhaps the one that was most deeply transformed. What a blissful flower she had turned into—jovial and buoyant, cracking jokes, giggling from dawn to dusk.
My mood, on the other hand, remained the same.
Lord Poton and His Family
Today it is a well-known fact that many new mothers go through an emotional turbulence in the early stages of motherhood. Yet only a few actually get to meet Lord Poton. Most women come across his young, innocent nephew, and then there are a small number of women who, unfortunately, run into his nasty uncle.
1. Baby Blues (Poton’s nephew)
Baby Blues is a low-key emotional imbalance that may occur immediately after the delivery. A harmless and frequent visitor to maternity wards, Poton’s nephew is not regarded as a serious problem.
2. Postnatal Psychosis (Poton’s uncle)
This is the most dangerous and alarming psychological transformation that a new mother can go through. Those who come into contact with Lord Poton’s uncle can end up harming themselves, their children and their surroundings. It requires long-term and serious medical therapy to be rid of him.
3. Postpartum Depression (Lord Poton)
As the lord of the djinn, he is estimated to appear to one out of ten new mothers. Usually he pays his first visit within four to six weeks after the delivery. He looks simple and innocuous at first, but gradually reveals his true colors.
Months into my depression, I began to read extensively on the subject,