For Meghan Trainor, Struggling With Breastfeeding & Postpartum Mental Health Was a ‘Nightmare'
Meghan Trainor loves being a mom, but she’ll be the first to admit that it’s the hardest job in the world. Trainor, who is mom to sons Riley, 3, and Barry, 18 months, with husband Daryl Sabara, recently partnered with infant feeding company Bobbie for their “Ask For Help” campaign, and shared that she “felt in fight or flight all day, all night” after her second pregnancy. It took a heart-to-heart with her doctor — and leaning heavy on her support team — to see her through.
For Trainor, the postpartum period came with mental health issues, breastfeeding struggles and a surprise diagnosis of post-traumatic stress disorder. As she details in an essay on Today.com, the “Made You Look” singer said she hit her “breaking point” one month after giving birth to Barry. “I felt like my body was giving up on me,” Trainor recalls of that moment. “I was alone with Barry and he would not stop crying and then I was crying. I was having a panic attack and I was just over-exhausted, but I felt like I was dying.”
Luckily, Trainor knew where to turn. She “called everyone” on her support team, and got a prescription from her doctor that helped her calm down that very night. Having that kind of support made all the difference, she said. “I know a lot of other moms don’t have that support, or don’t feel like they do, so I can’t imagine how that night turns out for them. It’s frightening and sad.” In telling her own story, Trainor hopes she can show other moms that they’re not alone and that it’s OK to ask for help.
Trainor credits “therapy, my antidepressants and my entire team” for supporting her and making it possible to keep up her career as a pop star while growing her family. She especially shouted out her pediatrician, who told her what she needed to hear when she struggled to produce milk. “Pumping was impossible,” Trainor recalled. She’d struggled during her first pregnancy too, but had heard it might be easier the second time around, “So I decided to try again even though it was my nightmare,” she said. Her doctor, she said, “saved me” by telling her that wasn’t necessary. “Hey, you can stop now,” Trainor recalls him saying. “I’m looking at you and Daryl and you look exhausted. You look defeated. It’s totally OK to have formula.”
At the same time, Trainor was dealing with mental health issues. After her first pregnancy, she experienced labor-related nightmares that involved being on a surgical table and feeling “the doctor’s hands inside of me,” Trainor recalled. Hearing of the terrifying dreams, Trainor’s therapist diagnosed her with PTSD.
Trainor stayed on antidepressants during both pregnancies and, in a past interview with SheKnows, attributed her lack of postpartum depression to the medication. “I only had like the classic, like I’m a mother and I have terrible thoughts,” she told SheKnows in 2023, “but everyone has that.” This time around, though, “my postpartum was there and I felt it,” Trainor said in her campaign video for Bobbie. “I felt myself start to have panic attacks again.”
For Trainor, relying on her support system and taking care of herself was crucial. “I know if I don’t take care of myself, how am I supposed to keep this baby alive?” she said in the video. “I could not get through without antidepressants, without my therapist, the support of my mom coming over every day… I hope that when I share these really personal, private stories, that someone clicks with it and someone goes, oh thank God, me too! If you feel like this, you are normal and you’re OK. I know it’s scary, but ask for help.”
Before you go, check out our favorite affordable mental health apps: