Josh Metellus My Cause My Cleats Postpartum…

One study found that one in seven women may experience postpartum depression in the year after giving birth. With approximately 4 million live births occurring each year in the United States, this equates to almost 600,000 postpartum depression diagnoses.

“Haley’s very on top of stuff like that, researching. She’s like, ‘You know, we could have postpartum [depression].’ And my mom has four kids … so [we understood the possibility], but we didn’t think it would happen to us,” Josh said. “Nobody ever thinks it will happen to them. But it did. We were prepared for it, I would say, at least a little bit.”

It’s for that reason Josh will be repping Postpartum Support International for the Vikings My Cause My Cleats game against the Steelers Dec. 9.

“I just wanted to bring awareness to it. Because it is real, and although we did get help, we’re in the process of [her recovering], there’s still some people out here who aren’t getting help,” Josh said. “They don’t know what’s going on. There’s probably husbands or dads out there who don’t know how to help their wives or girlfriends, don’t know what they’re going through. So I just wanted to bring awareness to it because it’s something that hit home with us.”

Whether dealing with anxiety, general depression, PTSD or postpartum depression, Josh emphasized, it’s important to seek support when facing mental health challenges.

“Don’t be scared to reach out. Don’t be scared to lean on somebody and make sure you’re doing the little things,” Josh said. “That’s what we’ve been stressing a lot – taking care of yourself, making sure you feel good, so that way everything else can fall into place.

“It’s a lot when you have a new baby,” he added. “Your life changes all at once, and you don’t necessarily have time to think or focus on yourself, but you have to focus on little bits [at a time].”