Those who know and love people with depression usually want nothing other than to help. But during the times I’ve been depressed, even the most well-intentioned efforts to help often backfired.
While most of the things people told me while I was depressed stemmed from compassion, they also stemmed from their misguided belief that they could treat my depression. Ultimately, there was nothing anybody could have said to cure me. It was probably a combination of time and medication that transformed me from an often-depressed adolescent into an occasionally depressed adult. Implying that you can cure someone’s depression undermines the severity of the condition, as does throwing out suggestions that have likely occurred to them already.
Here are some statements and questions to avoid if you don’t want to make matters worse for someone who is already feeling bad:
1. Have you tried getting eating better/sleeping less/exercising more/getting more light? If depression could be cured that easily, nobody would suffer from it. Most people with depression have already tried everything in the book and more.
2. There’s nothing to be upset about. There’s actually a lot in the world to be upset about; people with depression just spend more time aware of it.
3. There’s no use dwelling on things. You are correct; there’s no use in having depression, just like there’s no use in having cancer, yet here we all are.
4. Everything will be OK. This fact hasn’t escaped our awareness, but things still feel pretty shitty right now.
5. What are you sad about? Depression isn’t really “about” anything except a chemical imbalance. Depressed people feel bad about a lot of things, but those things didn’t cause the depression.
6. You should get out and do something fun. OK, I’ll get cracking at that once I muster up the energy to put my shoes on.
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