Ryan Lochte’s wife, Kayla Rae Reid, has opened up about her struggle with postpartum depression, 11 months after she and the Olympic swimmer welcomed their first child together.
The 26-year-old Playboy model gave birth to her son, Caiden, in June 2017, and in a new YouTube video she details the mental and physical anguish she felt before seeking help and being prescribed Zoloft. She admits her mental health issues have made her ‘terrified’ about having more children in the future.
‘I was dead inside, and it makes me so sad because you don’t want to feel like that,’ she says in the clip. ‘You just gave birth to something. You know that you are their everything and everything you do is for them.’
Candid: Ryan Lochte’s wife, Kayla Rae Reid, opens up about her struggle with postpartum depression in a new video she shared on YouTube
Heartbreaking: ‘I was dead inside, and it makes me so sad because you don’t want to feel like that,’ she says of her experience
Happy family: Kayla, 26, and Ryan, 33, welcomed their son, Caiden, in June 2017. The family is pictured in April
At the start of the 22-minute video, Kayla explains that decided to share her story because it was helpful for her to know that she wasn’t alone.
‘When I was going through it, I just remember how much hearing other people’s stories gave me so much hope in myself and [reminded me] to not give up and gave me perseverance to just continue waking up each day saying, “I will get through this.”‘
Kayla says she started to realize something was wrong around the time Caiden turned three months old. All she wanted to do was stay in bed and sleep.
‘It wasn’t just mental it was also physical,’ she recounts. ‘I felt like utter crap constantly, and that was one thing that I was just like, this cant be right. I feel like death.’
While suffering from postpartum depression, she saw an increase in her anxiety, something she has struggled with her entire life. She also felt incredibly guilty for feeling so awful when she had a healthy baby, a husband, and a family to support her.
In the video, the mother-of-one recalls visiting the grocery store while her grandmother was watching her son and feeling like everyone else was living a better life than she was.
Motherhood: Kayla (pictured a month after giving birth) says she realized something was wrong with her when Caiden was about three months old
Dark point: Kayla (pictured this week) says ‘everything was so extremely exhausting’ and overwhelming that she couldn’t even fathom living a normal life
Struggling: When her family first tried to suggest that she was suffering from postpartum depression, Kayla says she didn’t want to hear it
‘I felt they were living life, and I was on pause,’ she explains.
Kayla says ‘everything was so extremely exhausting’ and overwhelming that she couldn’t even fathom living a normal life and going on vacation like some people she knew.
‘I think one thing that people don’t know is that depression is physical. It’s a physical thing,’ she points out.
Although many experts says it is misleading for placenta to be marketed for the treatment and prevention of postpartum depression, Kayla says she had placenta pills but they ‘didn’t work’ for her because she didn’t take them religiously.
After confessing that she didn’t take her prenatal vitamins as much as she should have, she realizes that she’s still trying to think of ways that she could have prevent what happened to her following the birth of her son.
Kayla admits when her family first tried to suggest that she was suffering from postpartum depression, she didn’t want to hear it. It wasn’t until she joined an online support group anonymously did she realize that was going on.
‘I am so anti-medication, but everybody was just like, “You have should probably consider medication because we don’t want to see you like this,”‘ she says of her decision to get treatment.
Getting help: The mother-of-one was eventually prescribed Zoloft, which she is still taking
Confession: Kayla admits she felt incredibly guilty for feeling so awful when she had a healthy baby, a husband, and a family to support her
Working out: Kaylo also hired a personal trainer to force herself to get out of bed and exercise
Kayla did some research and spoke to her doctor, who prescribed her Zoloft, which she is still taking. She says it took her about three months on the medication to start feeling more like herself again.
Despite the improvements in her mental health, she tried to go off her medication because she wanted to show people that she had recovered when she filmed her latest YouTube video.
‘I slowly weaned off, and I felt myself kind of slipping back,’ she explains. ‘People were noticing that I was being moody or whatever. I just hate the stigma of someone being medicated. I think that is really heartbreaking.’
Kayla advises new mothers to find other moms to talk to, insisting that those vent sessions can be the most ‘freeing, free therapy.’
In addition to joining a support group and going on medication, Kaylo hired a personal trainer to force herself to get out of bend and exercise. She also started getting B12 shots to boost her energy.
‘I had to get a trainer because I could not get my a** up because I was just so in my sunken hole I did not want to anything,’ she recalls. ‘I didn’t even want to leave the house. I would rather not even step outside.’
The mother-of-one says she wants to have more children, but she is ‘absolutely terrified’ because she doesn’t want to go through postpartum depression all over again.
Mommy milestone: Kayla celebrated her first Mother’s Day with Ryan over the weekend
However, she knows she needs to be strong and remind herself that she will be grateful if she has more children.
Toward the end of the video, Kayla urges people to take a minute to check in with new parents after they’ve welcomed a child instead of just asking about the baby.
‘Always check in on the mom or the dad and see how they’re doing because sometimes the baby might be doing great, but they might be suffering,’ she explains.
Kayla’s husband, Ryan, has battled his own issues with mental health. Last June, right before the birth of their son, he admitted that he had considered suicide after revealing he had lied about being mugged during the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro.
‘After Rio, I was probably the most hated person in the world,’ Ryan said in an interview with ESPN: The Magazine.
‘There were a couple of points where I was crying, thinking, “If I go to bed and never wake up, fine.'”
When asked if he had actually considered suicide, Ryan nodded his head slowly and then said: ‘I was about to hang up my entire life.’
The four-time Olympian and winner of seven medals said that things eventually got better, and he was focused on being the best father to his son.