#8: 10 Things to Say (and 10 Not to Say) to Someone With Depression

This is number eight on the list of things to say and not to say to someone with depression, as was posted by health.com.  Here's the link: 10 Things to Say (and 10 Not to Say) to Someone With Depression.  It's a super simple article.  It gives a good and bad example, that's it.  If you missed it, here was the Number Seven Thing to Say (and Not to Say) to Someone With Depression.  Here's number eight:

What to say:
I’m not going to leave you or abandon you.

What NOT to say:
I think your depression is a way of punishing us.

Nicholas L. Laning

Is this not a fear we have anyway?  Of being left or abandoned?  Add in the confusion, the stigma, the uncontrollable negativity that comes with depression, and you can just imagine how much this plagues the soul of your depressed loved one.  Chances are they have reached out to others, maybe not wholly, but in some way, and have been rejected.  

The hard part of this is that you can be near someone and abandon them.  We see it marriage, where the spouse is physically present, but no longer emotionally engaged.  This is true with depression.  It isn't enough to be simply be physically present.   You must also be emotionally engaged.  That doesn't mean feel what they feel.  You feel what you feel, which, if you love someone and they hurt, should include hurting for them. 

Also, there is this weird conundrum that follows loving someone.  When you love someone you trust them.  So, you can be tempted to leave things unspoken as a means to almost honor or cherish your closeness.  "We are so close, that we don't have to say it to know that we love each other."  This may be true to a degree, but love needs to be reiterated everyday.  We need to hear it.  Silence leaves room for struggle.  It is in that silence that temptation grows.  Doesn't it?  Am I wrong?  Is it not the mystery that usually drives the believing of lies?

Express your love and involvement, and do it often.  Don't leave room for lies to form in the mind of someone whose mind is being attacked by uncontrollable negativity.  

I'll never forget my brother sharing his process of coming to grips with the reality of depression.  Towards the end of my battle with depression, he shared with me that for the first year or so of my depression he didn't believe that I was in fact depressed.  Not only did he not sympathize with me, he resented me.  He was angry with me because he thought that my depression was an act.  In his mind, depression was fake, merely an emotional play, a grab for attention.  

In his mind, he had always been able to overcome his moods.  So, everyone else should be able to as well.  Therefore, if I was continuously acting depressed, then I was doing something to myself.  I was choosing to sit in a mood that I could in fact overcome.  If I was choosing to do this, and it was hurting our family to see me do it, then I was punishing them.  I was self-centered beyond belief.

Only, that's just not true.  I will continue with the same analogy I have been using all along to show how ridiculous this is.  Depression is a disease, and you don't choose it.  Can you imagine your loved one having cancer, and you saying, "John, just stop it!  Stop having cancer!  I feel like you're punishing us with this cancer!"

If you think it is different then you are wrong.  Depression is no more brought on personally than cancer is.  Perhaps someone smoked, and cancer resulted, but is that the same as choosing to have cancer?  No.  And you would never say that to someone.  It is so incredibly self centered it is unbelievable.  It is self-centered in about ten ways.  To think that someone's utter and complete misery is about YOU!?  Really?!  

I don't want to condescend.  I am the worst.  I have been guilty of this.  That is why I can say it with such fire, because I was extremely self-centered in my rejection of depression before I got slapped upside the head with it.  So, I am right there with you.  That doesn't make it any less stupid.  It just means I am stupid too.

Pray that your heart would be open.  Keep soft, and be willing to be wrong.  It's not only okay, but a fact, that we are all wrong about a lot.  We are human.  Fortunately, you can rest in the knowledge that a perfect God is there when you are not for your loved one.  That same God is there to strengthen you.  God changes hearts.  If you are struggling to believe, pray that he will change yours so that you can be what you need to for your loved one.  I am praying for you as I write this.