Let’s stop stigma – support better mental health

Guest Blog - 5 Important Tips for Supporting Someone with Depression by Valerie

Someone you are close to is suffering from depression. Outside support is important in helping a depressed person find their own sense of emotional balance.  However, you may be struggling to help this individual while still dealing with challenges in your own personal life. What can you do to help this person through this rough time while still maintain your own well-being? The following suggestions will help you to care for your own needs while also providing much-needed support to a loved one with depression.
 
Be Present
 
One of the easiest, yet most effective methods for helping someone with depression is to simply be there for them. You don’t have to solve all of their problems in one fell swoop. Sitting with the person while they share their feelings can make a big difference. Depression can feel very isolating. By simply being there for your friend, family member, or partner, you will help that person feel much less alone in their sadness. 
 
Become Educated
 
If you have never experienced major depression before, then it may be difficult to understand what a person with the disorder is going through. Clinical depression is a disorder that can last from several weeks to several years if left untreated. Learning about the risk factors for depression, reading about how other people with clinical depression feel, and discovering the most effective treatment methods will help you to be a more sensitive supporter. 
 
Depression can stem from a wide variety of causes, including alcohol or drug abuse; stressful life events; chemical changes in the brain; other mental or physical health problems; sleeping problems; medications; and other factors. Learning more about this very serious disorder can help you to assist your friend in finding the proper guidance and healing tools. Keep in mind that everyone is different, and what works for one person may not provide relief for the person in your life. Professional guidance may be necessary to determine the best treatment path.
 
Don’t Judge or Minimize Their Pain
 
It can be difficult for a person who is generally upbeat to understand why another person cannot simply “snap out of” depression. There are so many factors that can cause depression that it is important to understand that no one wants to feel depressed and that, for many people, keeping an upbeat attitude is not so easy. Telling a person that they need to “change their attitude,” “stop viewing life with their cup half empty,” “be less think-skinned about things,” or other insensitive remarks will not help the situation. 
 
Your first instinct may be to offer a dose of tough love, but this can actually cause more harm than good for many people with clinical depression. More than offering advice or criticism, being a compassionate listener is the best thing that you can do for a person suffering from depression.
 
Small Gestures of Kindness
 
For people who do not feel comfortable expressing emotional support, there are other ways to show your support. Cooking a favorite meal, sending a card or a gift, or other small gestures will offer a depressed person little glimpses of hope that will help them in the road to recovery.
 
Encouraging a Depressed Person to Seek Professional Help
 
You may be the closest person to the individual suffering from depression. However, this does not mean that it is up to you to pull them out of their depression. A better approach is to gently encourage the person to begin taking positive action by seeking professional guidance. Mental health professionals will have a better understanding of how to determine the causes of depression and how to assist the person you care about in the recovery process.
 
Valerie Johnston is a health and fitness writer located in East Texas. With ambitions of one day running a marathon and writing for Healthline.com ensures she keeps up-to-date on all of the latest health and fitness news.

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Mossmiss wrote on 12 | 30 | 2012
Oh Rita, what disgusting things to say to you! I’m so sorry. Yes, get rid of the swine! I find it so shocking the things people whom you believed cared about you can say and do when you confide in them about such things. I just posted in another subject about how I got a job offer from someone (I was already working for, so it would have been a big promotion) and we happened to spend a lovely evening out together a few days later. We talked and confided in each other about various things, I confided in her about my depression/anxiety. The very next day, the job offer was retracted! People can be unbelievable arseholes can’t they?
charliebubbles wrote on 10 | 10 | 2012
My wife has supported me from the day I was diagnosed with severe depression. She has cared for me and cuddled me when I've had my darkest thoughts, she's even cried with me when I've cried. She has found it difficult to understand why I can have thoughts of self harm and do nothing, and I also know that it has scared her. She has not once moaned or passed comment about me or my illness. Without her I have no idea where I would be today. But then when we married it was in sickness and in health and we have always looked after each other. Charlie
Rita K wrote on 10 | 09 | 2012
This makes me sad to read. I know it's difficult to live with someone who is depressed. Ours is a family illness and I have been encompassed by it for many years and felt I was understanding of it but not always as patient as i would have liked to be however. It makes me sad to read because the depressed members of my family and some of my friends who maybe I feel should have looked after me or at least understood me when I succumbed myself to this illness, cut me off and became and still become angry with me. Misery guts was the last comment my depressive sister said to me at the weekend because she asked how I was and I told her. My husband of 28 years does not like me anymore so I am divorcing him. He tells me I have become fat (maybe through some of the meds to a degree) and old and he finds me unattractive. How mean is that? I would have loved to have found someone who treated me the way you suggest above. I agree with the small tokens, the listening, the letting people know they are loved. It is soothing and nurturing and can assuage the terror that I sometimes feel. or I think it would. I write to the Samaritans instead, in the middle of the night. Or here. Yes, I didn't choose to get ill. It's not my fault so to all of those who try to make me feel like it is, or teach me a lesson, or tell me to pull myself together and I ask why?...do you not understand?