For many new parents, the arrival of a baby is cause for celebration. But for 14% of women and nearly 10% of men, it can trigger postpartum depression - a condition that mirrors clinical depression.
Symptoms include sadness, fatigue and feelings of hopelessness. A sufferer may experience drastic mood changes, excessive preoccupation with a child's health or intrusive thoughts of harming the baby.
"Though postpartum depression in women is better understood, there hasn't been much focus on the condition in men," says psychologist Itzaan Haafman. "Men are just expected to cope."
WHAT IT MEANS
 To fight postpartum depression spend time as a couple
Exercise, eat right
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A study in the journal Pediatrics shows that 10% of new fathers suffer from some form of postpartum depression.
There's a long-standing belief that in women postpartum depression is due to hormonal changes that take place after childbirth. But a history of depression, sleep deprivation, changes to lifestyle and relationships and financial pressure are also triggers - and these can precipitate depression in new dads too.
"Most men will express depression as feelings of helplessness and neglect as their partner becomes focused on the child," says Haafman. "They tend to become withdrawn, angry and irritable."
Dealing with it - Affected dads tend to spend less time with their children
She says most men tend to cope by working longer hours at the office. " That simply maintains the problem," she says.
The problem is becoming widespread in dual-income families. "It used to be more simple - the mom would get up at night for the baby because the dad had to work the next day," she says.
The Pediatrics study also showed a link between maternal and paternal postpartum depression in that men whose partners are depressed are at a significantly higher risk of experiencing it themselves.
"The dads often have to step in where their partners cannot," she says. But on the upside, older men tend to have more experience and better developed coping mechanisms. "At executive level, stress is less often about the financial pressures of having a new addition to the family and more about achieving work-life balance," says executive coach Jill Hamlyn.
Still, postpartum depression in men is less likely to be picked up by professionals as they have less contact with health-care workers than women do in the early stages after a baby is born. "They are also less likely to seek help," says Haafman.
A study by researchers from Bristol and Oxford University in Lancet found that paternal depression can affect a child's development up to the age of three years old. Boys, in particular, experience twice as many behavioural problems as other children in their early preschool years. "In severe cases, therapy and medication may be necessary," says Haafman.
Eating correctly, exercising and spending time together as a couple are vital ways of tackling postpartum depression. "You have to learn to redefine your roles and relate to each other as a couple and not just as parents," she says.
