DAYS OF OUR LIVES' Lisa Rinna tells Us
how she fought the postpartum blues

My first daughter, Delilah, was born on June 10, 1998. Everything was fine for the first three months. Then it really hit me — hard. Crying. Feelings of desperation. I would have these visions of guns, knives, murder. Boom — they would just flash into my brain. I got into arguments over the littlest things with Harry [her husband of six years, actor Harry Hamlin]. I never tried suicide — I'm that that selfish — but I did have suicidal thoughts. Every day.
     I had stopped nursing — the baby was colicky — and that contributed to it. When you stop nursing, your hormones drop. It was a chemical imbalance. That's what postpartum depression is. And because my therapist was going through her own problems with colon cancer, she never saw the depths of it. People weren't talking much about postpartum depression back then. Nor was I as honest as I could have been, because I felt such shame. So I was never diagnosed.
     I didn't work for a long time; I wanted to be home. But 15 months later, I got a part in a Lifetime movie, Another Woman's Husband. I'll never forget it. I was walking into my trailer, and suddenly it was like a cloud was lifted.
     When I got pregnant again [with daughter Amelia, born June 13, 2001], Harry and I got proactive. I set it up with my doctor so that I could say, "OK, the minute I start having these feelings, I want to be put on something." And that's what happened. When the baby was six weeks old, I developed a very negative attitude. I didn't like anything. We got on the phone with my doctor, and he put me on an antidepressant, Sarafem. That pill saved my life. When you have a baby, you're supposed to be a superwoman; to admit you're not a huge failure. But once you talk about it and ask for help, you find that help's so readily available.