Raising a kid ain’t easy, y’all. The stressors of mom life can be really rough for a first-timer — and Real Housewives of Orange County alum Gretchen Rossi wasn’t afraid to get candid about how she’s dealt with postpartum depression since the birth of her daughter, Skylar Grey.
“You know, my first month was really tough on me. I spoke with Billy on The Doctors about my struggles with some postpartum depression and anxiety and the transition of the new life,” she revealed to Us Weekly. “You know, figuring out my new normal. So that was hard. I’m not gonna lie, like, it was a tough first go.”
But she’s finally found her footing, which is excellent news. “Second month, I have felt like a million times better and my doctors really wanted me to go on meds, the pharmaceutical meds that they prescribed for postpartum, and I really didn’t want to go that route,” she explained. “I was really anxious about going on meds because I just don’t like taking meds and we’ve had history of addiction in my family and it has really affected a lot of things so I didn’t want to go that route.”
The Bravo TV OG then decided to try something a little more natural to recalibrate her postpartum brain — and it looks like it worked wonders for the blonde beauty.
“I decided to try the natural supplement CBD. We own a company, our co-founders own a company called BioReigns so I decided to try the natural form before I went to pharmaceuticals. And two days and I felt like a completely different person,” she revealed. “And I still am kind of in shock about it, honestly. There’s so many things that CBD has helped with, but I never really heard people voice that about postpartum. So I just decided to try it and I’m so grateful.”
As far as her support system, Gretch has a good crew who has her back, including longtime boyfriend-turned-fiancé Slade Smiley. “Well, what’s interesting is I confided in a lot of people,” she dished. “My best friends and my parents and Slade, but what’s funny is none of them, they were like, ‘No you’re fine, you’re fine.’ And I was like, ‘I’m not fine, I’m struggling.’ And it was funny because everyone was like, ‘No, you’re killing this mom thing, you’re so good, you’re so great,’ but I’m really struggling.”
But believe it or not, they didn’t quite pick up on her struggles until the supplements started taking effect. “So it wasn’t until I really like, they saw the difference in me when I started taking the CBD and how much happier I was,” the RHOC alum said. “And they were like, ‘Oh, you were actually struggling.’ Or ‘Oh, you were hiding it really well that you were struggling.’ But Slade has been incredible. Slade’s just been truly incredible and the best dad, the best partner, like I literally couldn’t have survived this without him.”