Copy pasted from Facebook from my friend Luke Hanbury … because I’ve been dealing with this too, in & out, for the past year and a half. And even though I am NOT suicidal, I’ve never been able to properly describe what true depression is really like.
“This amazing post was written by one of my life long best friends and from an awareness perspective, everyone would do well to read it.”
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Stop asking people to reach out when they feel depressed.
I understand that you’re saying that with only the best of intentions, but that is not how it works for the depressed person.
I have experienced more bouts of depression (from mild to crippling) than I can even count as far back as I can remember.
Times when my body and mind could barely function.
Not leaving my home/bed/couch for days at a time.
Times when I didn’t have it in me to even look at my phone, let alone make a call to someone.
Anxiety and depression are referred to as “crippling” for a reason. There is a chemical imbalance happening in the brain that forces you to do things you wouldn’t normally do. Or in most cases NOT do things you would normally do and know you should do, which makes you feel guilty for not doing them, thus perpetuating a nasty, nasty cycle.
Depression is a mental, emotional, and spiritual black hole that you cannot see beyond when you are in it. Physically, it feels like there is something tying you to the center of the earth rendering you unable to function. I referred to it as wearing the 1000 lbs cape.
Depression is insidious and can creep up on you at any time without notice. And then, there is circumstantial depression.
Mix those two together and you are in what feels like quicksand in the middle of the blackest night with duct tape over your mouth and you only have minutes to live and no one is around. It’s terrifying and bleak.
It can and does make you contemplate 100 intricate ways to kill yourself so that no one would know it was suicide. And for others, it makes them pick a more obvious and public route to end their pain.
For those of you lucky enough to have never experienced depression or anxiety, I am genuinely happy for you. It’s not something I would wish on my worst enemy.
I remember checking in on an exgf because I hadn’t heard from her in a longer time than was normal for the two of us. She had been lying on her dining room hard wood floor in the fetal position for three days. I drove over – not to do or say anything in particular – but just to be a human body in her presence.
I have needed the same thing on occasion.
Most of the time, a depressed person doesn’t want to talk about what’s bothering them. Don’t let this frustrate you.
Sometimes they do this because they don’t know exactly what’s going on but its scary as shit and they need a body around to feel safe.
Sometimes they aren’t ready to talk about it yet.
And sometimes they are grateful for your friendship and feel guilty they would bring you down with them, too.
Yes, I know that’s not rational to you, but to them it makes perfect sense.
Depression is not something you can think yourself out of. Depression is not a conscious choice. Depression sucks.
This next sentence may piss a lot of people off, but… depression and suicide are not meant to be selfish.
When you have experienced chronic depression for long enough and get to the point where you want to free yourself from what feels like never ending darkness PLUS have a chemical imbalance happening in your brain, you truly believe the world (family and friends included) would be better off without you to worry about.
I am not asking you to agree with it. I am asking you to try to understand it in a different way.
People are not in their right state of mind when they make the decision to commit suicide. To them, it’s actually the opposite of selfish… they think they would be making the world a better place if they took themselves out of it.
Let me be clear… I am not saying suicide is ever the answer. But to the depressed person not thinking logically, it feels like the logical thing to do. Referring to suicide as selfish only heaps more shame and stigma on a depressed person that hears you talking that way, making them feel even worse and shutting them down further.
Instead of judging a depressed person or telling them to “snap out of it,” I have some other suggestions.
If you haven’t heard from someone you know in a longer than average amount of time, YOU reach out to them. Let them know you are there for them no matter what. Offer to come over and just sit with them. Do not force them to talk about anything. Just BE there.
Ask them, “How can I best be here for you right now?” And let whatever their answer is be ok with you.
They may say to just sit with them and not say a word.
They may ask you to keep checking on them with a simple text even if they don’t text back.
They may ask you to make soup for them.
Or walk their dog.
Or whatever the hell it is, just be okay with it.
The gratitude they will feel for those small selfless actions is unbounded yet they won’t be able to thank you in the moment.
Do it anyway.
If they don’t return your calls or texts, reach out anyway. Any lack of response is not about you during those times.
I was once in such a dark, incapacitated place, I had to have the woman I was dating look up therapists, call them, make appointments for me, and drive me to those appointments. I was once in a place so dark, I sat in my car inconsolably sobbing and stared for hours at the tree I was going to drive into. I have written notes and left them for what I was about to do. I have been to the absolute edge of ending my life and only been stopped seconds before by a voice deep inside that whispered “not yet.”
It is humbling and downright embarrassing to admit all of this and I can only do it now that I am in a much better place and have some perspective to offer.
I am not trying to make this post about how I have been able to drastically turn my life around, but rather to share with those who are baffled by depressed people what they can do to help.
Posting suicide prevention hotline numbers is indeed a nice thing to do. Telling people to reach out is indeed a nice thing to do.
But YOU reaching out and asking “how can I be there for you right now?” is infinitely more effective.
Trust me.
So… Who are you going to reach out to today?
I love you all.
P.S. If you strongly believe or know someone is going to commit suicide and has the means to do so, it is also your job to reach out to the police.
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And then I read this on Facebook from one of my dearest friends, Lee Grossman, and I am sharing it here because sometimes I really need someone to come over, wielding a shovel.
“My friend Lauren copied this from someone’s FB post who does not want to be credited. IMHO it perfectly illustrates the ‘why’ and the ‘how’ of this week’s tragedies. Free of judgment.”
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When you have depression it’s like it snows every day.
Some days it’s only a couple of inches. It’s a pain in the ass, but you still make it to work, the grocery store. Sure, maybe you skip the gym or your friend’s birthday party, but it IS still snowing and who knows how bad it might get tonight. Probably better to just head home. Your friend notices, but probably just thinks you are flaky now, or kind of an asshole.
Some days it snows a foot. You spend an hour shoveling out your driveway and are late to work. Your back and hands hurt from shoveling. You leave early because it’s really coming down out there. Your boss notices.
Some days it snows four feet. You shovel all morning but your street never gets plowed. You are not making it to work, or anywhere else for that matter. You are so sore and tired you just get back in the bed. By the time you wake up, all your shoveling has filled back in with snow.
Looks like your phone rang; people are wondering where you are. You don’t feel like calling them back, too tired from all the shoveling. Plus they don’t get this much snow at their house so they don’t understand why you’re still stuck at home. They just think you’re lazy or weak, although they rarely come out and say it.
Some weeks it’s a full-blown blizzard. When you open your door, it’s to a wall of snow. The power flickers, then goes out. It’s too cold to sit in the living room anymore, so you get back into bed with all your clothes on. The stove and microwave won’t work so you eat a cold Pop Tart and call that dinner. You haven’t taken a shower in three days, but how could you at this point? You’re too cold to do anything except sleep.
Sometimes people get snowed in for the winter. The cold seeps in. No communication in or out. The food runs out. What can you even do, tunnel out of a forty foot snow bank with your hands? How far away is help? Can you even get there in a blizzard? If you do, can they even help you at this point? Maybe it’s death to stay here, but it’s death to go out there too.
The thing is, when it snows all the time, you get worn all the way down. You get tired of being cold. You get tired of hurting all the time from shoveling, but if you don’t shovel on the light days, it builds up to something unmanageable on the heavy days. You resent the hell out of the snow, but it doesn’t care, it’s just a blind chemistry, an act of nature. It carries on regardless, unconcerned and unaware if it buries you or the whole world.
Also, the snow builds up in other areas, places you can’t shovel, sometimes places you can’t even see. Maybe it’s on the roof. Maybe it’s on the mountain behind the house. Sometimes, there’s an avalanche that blows the house right off its foundation and takes you with it. A veritable Act of God, nothing can be done. The neighbors say it’s a shame and they can’t understand it; he was doing so well with his shoveling.
I don’t know how it went down for Anthony Bourdain or Kate Spade. It seems like they got hit by the avalanche, but it could’ve been the long, slow winter. Maybe they were keeping up with their shoveling. Maybe they weren’t. Sometimes, shoveling isn’t enough anyway. It’s hard to tell from the outside, but it’s important to understand what it’s like from the inside.
I firmly believe that understanding and compassion have to be the base of effective action. It’s important to understand what depression is, how it feels, what it’s like to live with it, so you can help people both on an individual basis and a policy basis. I’m not putting heavy shit out here to make your Friday morning suck. I know it feels gross to read it, and realistically it can be unpleasant to be around it, that’s why people pull away.
I don’t have a message for people with depression like “keep shoveling”. It’s asinine. Of course you’re going to keep shoveling the best you can, until you physically can’t, because who wants to freeze to death inside their own house?
We know what the stakes are. My message is to everyone else. Grab a fucking shovel and help your neighbor. Slap a mini snowplow on the front of your truck and plow your neighborhood. Petition the city council to buy more salt trucks, so to speak.
Depression is blind chemistry and physics, like snow. And like the weather, it is a mindless process, powerful and unpredictable with great potential for harm. But like climate change, that doesn’t mean we are helpless. If we want to stop losing so many people to this disease, it will require action at every level.
