Freida Pinto shares her experience with postpartum depression: 'I wouldn’t even let myself go out and get fresh air because that’s how horrible I felt'

Freida Pinto and her husband, Cory Tran, welcomed their first child together, a baby boy named Rumi-Ray, in November 2021.

Almost a year after her delivery, the Slumdog Millionaire (2008) actress, 37, has opened up about being a new parent and battling postpartum depression. “I think it’s almost easier to talk about the physical level. But on a mental level and an emotional level, you can’t necessarily always explain anxiety and expression in words like ‘I feel pain in my knee, or in my lower back,’ so it starts making that illness invisible, and because it’s invisible, it starts getting ignored,” she wrote in a long note on Instagram.

Pinto further added that she created a “postpartum sanctuary” and resorted to her culture of Ayurveda with the help of her mother, who traveled to her from India when her son was born and tried to nourish her body with nutrition, postnatal supplements, and plenty of rest.

“I thought that was going to make me immune to any of the mental illnesses that come in the postpartum period, mainly feeling very low, anxious, and depressed,” she added. “In some people’s minds, including some doctors, the postpartum period ends at six weeks or three months. That is completely false. Postpartum is forever.”

Pinto went on to add, “I stayed kind of hidden for quite some time; I wouldn’t even let myself go out and get fresh air because that’s how horrible I felt. I had not given my body and mind enough credit for the hormone surges and the new changes and the pressures of going back to work and the anxiety that came with it—I really struggled with focus and concentration and lack of sleep. I fell into the trap of listening to everybody and everything and found myself losing my instinct. When it started getting really bad, I actively started seeking help because I am someone who is predisposed to anxiety and I’ve been in therapy for anxiety before, it was a sign that I was going through it again.”

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