Psychiatrist

My ob referred me to a psychiatrist because she was worried about how much I still reacted to her office. Yesterday I went to see him. It was helpful to me to hear from him that three months is really not long in this situation and he wouldn't expect me to be coping any better at this point. He said if I'm able to watch someone's kids, get up, look after the house, then I'm coping and I don't need medication.

He asked me a couple of questions that made me realise how different I feel to the person I was before this. He asked if I thought of myself as anxious and I said, I do now but I never would have before. Before this I had a couple of anxious friends that I used to sometimes think 'it must be hard being that anxious all the time'. And now I'm that person. He also asked if I thought of myself as a sensitive person and again, before I didn't and now I do. I know this is going to affect me forever but I wonder if my personality will go back to basically the same as before eventually? I imagine it will but at the moment that person just seems so far away from who I am now.

I also talked to him about how withdrawn I am. I stay home mostly and this is what worries my husband most. I've always been an extremely social person and happy in a crowd of loud people. The idea of being in a crowd of people make me feel awful now. He said that I should probably start making a bit more effort to get out and see close friends because the longer I withdraw for the harder it will get to eventually get back out there. I think the reason I withdraw is because then I don't expose myself to the chance of having people say 'helpful' things to me that actually hurt. Or just having strangers ask questions they have no idea could hurt - 'have you got kids?'.

He wants to see me again in 3 weeks to make sure my mood is improving rather than spiralling downwards.