The Deirdre O’Shaughnessy Podcast: The year of care campaign, with Aolish Gormley

Sligo business owner Aolish has established the Year of Care campaign to lobby for a full year of postnatal mental health care for new mothers 

Aolish Gormley is Deirdre's guest on this week's podcast.

Sligo business owner Aolish Gormley struggled with her mental health after having her second baby.

Despite many strides in maternal care in Ireland in the past decade, suicide remains the leading cause of death for new mothers, having increased in recent years, according to recent figures from Mental Health Reform.

The amount of support available for struggling mothers varies hugely according to contacts Aolish has received through the campaign’s social media channels.

“In a lot of cases, women will be referred to the perinatal mental health team by their GP... There's varying reports on that in terms of waiting lists and how long it takes to be seen, depending on the area that you're in, or to be referred to private counselling... depending on the pressure on the system,” she says.

“So if there's a lot of women looking for it or if there's a lot of pressure, then you could be looking at some women who say they have waited six months for appointments with counselors... when you’re talking about that data with suicide rates, six months for anybody that's struggling with their mental health is too long.

A day is too long for some people really struggling with their mental health. 

One major issue for the campaign is the lack of mother and baby psychiatric units.

“We should have three. We don't have any. And that means that if a mother does have to be admitted to a psychiatric unit, she has to be admitted without her baby. 

And I have spoken to mothers who have said firstly that that sent them even into a worse downward spiral, because they had to leave their babies, and I've spoken to other mothers who refused that care and refused to get the help that they really, really needed and knew that they needed because they could not bear leaving their babies. And that's the situation that some mothers are being faced with, and in 2026 that really is not good enough.” 

Aolish has established the Year of Care campaign to lobby for a full year of postnatal mental health care for new mothers including GP follow ups and establishment of a perinatal mother-and-baby unit.

She is the guest on today’s Deirdre O’Shaughnessy Podcast.