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When pregnant, they put you on a prescription pre-natal vitamin that's stacked with folic acid. You frequently are put on iron as well. If you don't get pre-natal health care though, you probably wouldn't know.
I had some post partum depression, complicated by being married to an idiot. It eased greatly when I went back to work at 6 weeks. It wasn't easy going from independent working woman to stuck at home with newborn woman with no contact with the adult world for days on end. Add a colicky baby to that mix and WOW. You are sleep deprived too, which doesn't help. If you never sleep more than an hour at a time, you get really messed up. Add that to the hormonal changes. It is a tough time. For me it was less with the second child simply because I knew that it would get easier and that it really didn't last that long.. and I'd survived it all once.
Keep in mind, women of child bearing age are also at the peak time for most mental illnesses to appear. It is entirely possible that what is diagnosed as post partum depression is really just plain depression and that the stresses of being a new mom brought on the first episode.
Dee
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