Thank you for posting this, Joy. Andrea's story has always had a powerful impact on me. She was so severely mentally ill--schiozophrenia and bipolar disorder, if I recall correctly--and she didn't have a lifestyle that was conducive to staying mentally stable. (I seem to remember hearing that at one point, they lived in a schoolbus, and her husband said he never changed diapers!) I'm bipolar (type 2) but thankfully I've never suffered as horribly as she apparently did. 

It's bizarre to me that very few people admit that pregnancy and parenting isn't always fabulous. My pregnancies were very difficult, particularly the first one, pre-diagnosis; what made the first one truly horrible was the feeling of being alone in our church. No one wanted to hear me say that I was depressed. Even the pregnancy manuals I had didn't really address being pregnant with a mental disorder. (The second pregnancy was better, thanks in no small part to a caring church and a great ob-gyn and great psychiatrist!)

If we Christians want to truly change the world and help others, we need to do better than this. We can't be afraid to admit that even wonderful things, like parenthood, don't always feel wonderful. We've got to be willing to say how we really feel and be transparent about things like this. The Not Alone book did a great job of this with depression; Joy, I really appreciated the candor in your essay.