Can Dads Really Have Postnatal Depression?

In this powerful episode of Reading With Your Kids, Jed welcomes Dr. Christopher Choukalas, author of Even the Darkest Night: A Memoir of Paternal Postnatal Depression. Dr. Chris shares how what began as a simple journaling practice during a traumatic postpartum period—twins born at full term alongside his wife’s life‑threatening postpartum hemorrhage—became a memoir to help other fathers feel less alone.

An anesthesiologist and ICU doctor during the height of COVID, Dr. Chris describes the emotional dissonance of holding his healthy babies while knowing, in clinical detail, just how close his wife came to dying. This stress, combined with years of infertility treatment, spiraled into severe anxiety, sleeplessness, and depression. With honesty and vulnerability, he explains how his wife, Lindsay, first recognized that something deeper was wrong and gently pushed him toward therapy.

Dr. Chris reflects on the stigma men face around mental health, why he uses the term “paternal postnatal depression,” and how naming his condition reduced shame and allowed him to do the hard work of healing. He also connects his struggle to unresolved pain from his own father’s abandonment, and shares how therapy, time, and intentional connection—especially reading with his now almost‑six‑year‑old twins—helped rebuild his marriage and his sense of self.

Later in the episode, Jed also chats with Miss Bri, author of Having a Giraffe as a Classroom Pet, and Anastasia Saridakis, author of My First Time on a School Bus, both offering gentle, kid‑friendly stories about inclusion, courage, and big feelings around new experiences.