Around 10 pct. fathers suffer from perinatal depression. This disorder should be viewed as a relational disturbance rooted in relationsfrom the father’s own upbringing, constituting itself in relations as a parenthood disturbance also influencing the mother and influences relations in future, namely by having impact on the child’s development. Psychotherapy therefore must approach this suffering as a relational disturbance. In addition, therapy should engage with ‘male specific’ mental states, because many men in  their upbringing -and in the cultural and societal expectations of masculinity -are confronted with and have psychologically internalised an ambivalence between autonomy and freedom on the one hand, and closeness and attachment on the other. This ambivalence becomes sharpened in men’s mental states during the process of being a parent, and it is a vital issue in postnatal depression in men. This ambivalence is often displayed in a man’s tendency to withdraw himself from relationships in the hope that he will find relief indistancing himself from close family. It also appears in many men’s wanting to quickly getaway from agony, sometimes by alcohol abuse, irrational actions, etc. Finally, this also appears in some men’s tendencies to act out in angry out-bursts, violence, or different abuse. Besides the mainstream psychotherapy that builds upon psychodynamic, mentalising, narrative, or cognitive methods it is therefore useful to include the above-mentioned topics in a treatment model suited for men with perinatal depression and men’s other familyrelated  disorders.

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