When Depression Doesn't Look Like Depression

So it's six months after your daughters are born.

What's, what's life like in your house?

Well, at six months with twins, you can imagine there's a lot of chaos, but the truth of the matter is the chaos started even before-

Hmm

... that point.

Uh, when the girls were born, you know, we're in the middle of COVID, uh, pre-vaccine.

Uh, I'm an intensive care physician at the University of California, and so I'm seeing some horrific things, uh, every day at work.

Hmm.

And then on top of that, there are w- uh, wildfires making the sky gray and orange and black and even the scent infiltrating the hospital as the girls were born.

Lindsay's recovering from her emergency surgery, her harrowing near-death bleeding event, and I'm just kind of holding on.

I, I don't think I know at the time what's happening.

I'm just trying to be there and be present as much as I can.

Just show up, survive, function, keep the day moving forward, or how would you term it?

Well, you know, I'm a, a, a, an earnest Midwestern Scandinavian-

Hmm

... and our job is to keep the train moving.

Mm-hmm.

And so, and as, again, as you can imagine, there's a lot to do.

So I am shuttling the girls back and forth between the nursery and the ICU-

Mm-hmm

... where Lindsay's being cared for, trying to help with the feeding.

They even, uh, have me carry these little swabs of, of colostrum from the ICU down to, uh, uh, down to the babies to-

Hmm

... pretend that I'm doing something that's helpful.

[laughs] And, and give a little bit more color about, you know, about Lindsay's birth-