Postpartum and Vlogging — An Honest Conversation About Whether Now Is the Right Time
There is a space between wanting to create and needing to rest. A strange, quiet space where you’re holding a newborn at 3am and thinking about the video you haven’t edited, the upload schedule you’re falling behind on, the comments you haven’t answered.
This page is for that space.
Not to tell you what to do. Not to push you toward the camera or away from it. Just to sit with you in the honest question that most new parent creators don’t say out loud:
Should I be doing this right now?
Maybe the answer is yes. Maybe it’s not yet. Maybe it changes day to day. All of those are fine.
The honest question: should you be vlogging right now?
There is no universal answer. But there are some honest checkpoints.
If filming feels fun and natural, yes, absolutely. If picking up the camera makes you smile, if capturing your baby’s tiny yawn gives you a spark of joy, if editing feels like a creative outlet and not a second job, keep going. You don’t need permission. You have it.
If it feels like another obligation, pause. You are already feeding a human being every two hours, surviving on fractured sleep, healing from birth, and trying to remember your own name. If vlogging has become another item on a list that is already too long, it’s okay to cross it off. No guilt. No apology. Just rest.
If you’re filming to prove something to the internet, stop and check in with yourself. Proving you’re a good parent. Proving the baby is okay. Proving you’ve “bounced back.” Proving you can do it all. If the camera has become a performance instead of a joy, that’s worth noticing.
Ask yourself one question: am I doing this for me, or for followers?
Sit with the answer. There’s no wrong one. But there is an honest one.
Anna Saccone-Joly has spoken candidly about the tension between wanting to document and needing to recover, particularly after her fourth baby. Her honesty about putting the camera down gave a lot of parent creators permission to do the same.
Signs that you might need to step back
None of these mean you’re failing. They mean you’re human, and your body and mind are telling you something worth hearing.
Filming feels like a chore, not a joy. You used to reach for the camera because you wanted to. Now you reach for it because you feel like you should. That shift matters.
You’re comparing your content, or your baby, to others. You find yourself watching another parent’s vlog and thinking their baby hit a milestone faster, their nursery is better, their body recovered sooner, their content is more polished. Comparison is normal. But when it’s constant, it’s corrosive.
You feel anxious about posting schedules or engagement. The algorithm feels like a boss you can’t satisfy. You’re checking analytics instead of sleeping. A drop in views feels personal.
You’re filming instead of sleeping when baby sleeps. The oldest piece of new-parent advice exists for a reason. If the camera is replacing the nap, something needs to shift.
Comments are affecting your mood or self-worth. One negative comment ruins your whole day. You’re seeking validation from strangers to feel like you’re doing okay. The comment section has become a mirror you can’t stop looking into.
You feel guilty when you don’t film something. Baby smiled for the first time and you didn’t capture it, and instead of enjoying the memory, you feel like you missed content. That guilt is a signal. The moment was not content. The moment was your life.
If you recognized yourself in three or more of these, it might be time for a pause. Not forever. Just for now. We’ll talk about coming back later in this guide.
Postpartum depression and anxiety: what to know
This section might be the most important thing on this page.
Postpartum depression and anxiety affect approximately 1 in 5 new mothers. And increasingly, research shows that fathers and non-birthing partners experience it too, at rates higher than anyone previously acknowledged.
Baby blues vs. PPD: they are not the same thing.
Baby blues are common in the first two weeks. Mood swings, crying, feeling overwhelmed, difficulty sleeping. For most parents, this passes on its own as hormones settle.
Postpartum depression is longer, deeper, and more persistent. It does not pass in two weeks. It may not arrive in two weeks. PPD can develop anytime in the first year.
Symptoms to know:
- Persistent sadness that doesn’t lift, even during good moments
- Anxiety that feels constant and disproportionate, a hum of dread you can’t switch off
- Difficulty bonding with your baby, or guilt about not feeling the way you expected to feel
- Rage, sudden, intense anger that surprises you
- Hopelessness, a feeling that things will not get better, that you are not enough
- Intrusive thoughts, unwanted, frightening thoughts about harm coming to your baby or yourself
- Withdrawing from your partner, your friends, the things that used to matter
- Changes in appetite or sleep that go beyond normal new-parent exhaustion
This is a medical condition. It is not a personal failure. You did not cause it. You cannot willpower your way through it. It is not about being strong enough or grateful enough or loving your baby enough.
Getting help is the strongest thing you can do. Talk to your GP, your midwife, your OB, your health visitor. Tell your partner. Tell someone. Treatment works. Therapy works. Medication, if needed, works. You do not have to feel this way.
Doyin Richards, a Black American father and author, spoke openly about his experience with paternal postpartum depression, a topic that barely existed in public conversation before he started talking about it. His honesty changed the way a lot of families think about who PPD affects.
Shay Mitchell documented her postpartum journey with unflinching honesty in her YouTube series: the sleepless nights, the identity shift, the pressure to perform recovery. Her willingness to show the unglamorous reality connected with millions of new parents.
If vlogging is helping you
For some parents, creating is the thing that keeps them afloat. If that’s you, this section is for you.
Filming can be cathartic. Talking through your day, narrating the small moments, processing the enormity of new parenthood through a lens: for some people, this is not work. It’s therapy with better lighting.
Talking to camera can feel like journaling. You’re saying things out loud that you might not say to anyone else. The camera doesn’t judge. It doesn’t interrupt. It just listens. For some parents, especially those without a strong support network nearby, this is genuinely valuable.
Connecting with other parents online reduces isolation. New parenthood can be profoundly lonely, especially in the early weeks when you’re housebound and sleep-deprived. Finding a community of people who understand, who are awake at 3am too, who laugh at the same absurdities, who say “me too” when you thought you were the only one, that connection is real, even through a screen.
If vlogging is helping, keep going. But check in with yourself regularly. What helps today might not help next week. Stay honest. The moment it shifts from outlet to obligation, give yourself permission to pause.
Jess Hover, a first-time mum and long-time creator, talked openly about how filming helped her process the identity shift of becoming a parent, and how she had to learn when to put the camera down and just be in the moment.
The “film for yourself” option
There is a middle ground that nobody talks about enough.
Film without posting. Pick up the camera when the light is soft and baby is sleeping on your chest. Record your partner’s face when they figure out the swaddle. Capture the chaos of a 2am feed where you’re both laughing because nothing is going right.
And then don’t post it. Just keep it. For you. For your family. For the hard drive that your kid will find in twenty years.
Private YouTube videos work well for this. Upload, set to private or unlisted, share the link with grandparents and close family. All the documentation, none of the audience pressure.
You can also film with the intention of editing later. Weeks later. Months later. When you’re sleeping again and the fog has lifted and you can look at the footage with clear eyes. Some of the most beautiful family content ever made was edited long after it was filmed, with the perspective that only distance provides.
Filming without the pressure of an audience can be the best of both worlds. You get the memories. You get the creative outlet. You don’t get the comments, the analytics, the algorithm anxiety. You can always choose to share later. You can never un-share.
Resources
If anything in this guide resonated more than you expected, please reach out to one of these organisations. They exist for exactly this moment.
United States
- Postpartum Support International (PSI)
- Phone: 1-800-944-4773 (call or text)
- Website: postpartum.net
- Available in English and Spanish. They will connect you with local support.
- Crisis Text Line
- Text HOME to 741741
- Free, 24/7 support with a trained crisis counsellor
- National Suicide Prevention Lifeline
- Call or text 988
- Available 24/7
United Kingdom
- PANDAS Foundation
- Helpline: 0808 1961 776 (Monday to Sunday, 11am-10pm)
- Website: pandasfoundation.org.uk
- Samaritans
- Call: 116 123 (free, 24/7)
- Website: samaritans.org
Australia
- PANDA (Perinatal Anxiety and Depression Australia)
- Helpline: 1300 726 306 (Monday to Saturday, 9am-7:30pm AEST)
- Website: panda.org.au
- Beyond Blue
- Phone: 1300 22 4636 (24/7)
- Website: beyondblue.org.au
Canada
- Pacific Post Partum Support Society
- Phone: 604-255-7999
- Website: postpartum.org
International
- Postpartum Support International maintains a directory of international resources at postpartum.net/get-help/international-postpartum-support
If you are in crisis right now, please call or text one of the numbers above. A real person will answer. They will not judge you. They have heard it before. You are not the first parent to feel this way, and reaching out is not weakness. It is the bravest thing you can do today.
This page will still be here when you’re ready.
Coming back after a break
You took time away. Good. That was the right decision, because you made it.
Now you’re thinking about coming back. Maybe the itch is there again, the urge to film, to edit, to share. Maybe you miss the community. Maybe baby is three months old now and you’re sleeping in four-hour stretches and it feels like a miracle and you want to talk about it.
You don’t owe anyone an explanation for time away. You don’t need to make a “where I’ve been” video unless you want to. You don’t need to apologise. You don’t need to explain.
Your audience will understand. The ones who matter will. They’ll say “welcome back” and “we missed you” and “so glad you’re okay.” And if some people unfollowed while you were gone, they weren’t your audience. Your audience is the people who are still here.
Start small. One video. No pressure. See how it feels. If it feels like coming home, keep going. If it feels like too much, put it down again. There is no deadline. There is no quota. There is just you, deciding what feels right, one day at a time.
The Michalaks, a British family, took extended breaks from vlogging and came back each time with a different energy, calmer, more intentional. Their evolution shows that stepping away doesn’t end your channel. Sometimes it makes it better.
Rachel Leary, an Irish creator and new mum, was honest about disappearing from the internet during her postpartum period and coming back when she was ready, not when the algorithm wanted her to.
The bottom line
Your wellbeing comes first. Always. The camera can wait.
No video is worth your mental health. No upload schedule is more important than holding your baby and being present for the messy, exhausting, extraordinary reality of right now.
If vlogging brings you joy, film. If it brings you pressure, stop. If you’re somewhere in between, that’s most people, and it’s okay to sit there for a while and figure it out.
You became a parent. That is already the most creative, most demanding, most important thing you will ever do.
Everything else can wait until you’re ready.
