I have had clinical depression & anxiety most of my life and have been off and on of meds for years. I just happened to have been off meds when I fell pregnant with baby girl, then I had a pretty stressful pregnancy, she came almost a month early and had some complications due to that. Then I fell deep into post partum depression because I refused to take any medication because I was dead set on breastfeeding (even though I didn't even make enough milk for her). When it got to the point where I was having very scary hallucinations, suicidal, and didn't trust myself to be alone with her--I called the doctor. I went on Zoloft, and it has managed my symptoms better than any medication I have ever tried. I was finally happy--ecstatic actually. Then when hubby and I decided to try for one more precious angel, I weaned myself off, slowly, due to scary things I had read about anti-depressants in general during pregnancy. After a couple of months I was at rock bottom again. That's when it clicked--there is far greater a risk to myself, my current baby, and my future baby, by me NOT taking the medication than there is if I am taking the medication. Besides, I've read newer studies that actually have shown that there is no connection between Zoloft and birth defects--the connections have been found in broad range anti-depressant studies, or in slightly less broad SSRI studies--but both of these include other, much more dangerous drugs, such as Paxil and Prozac. I don't remember which one it was, but one article I read actually suggested that when they looked at the amount of women on each different antidepressant, they found that Zoloft was not one of the responsible drugs. Everyone has to do their own research and weigh their own pros and cons. There are risks to taking Zoloft. There are risks to NOT taking Zoloft. You know your situation better than anybody else.