Dutch physics student Jonathan Schoenmaker presented at a TED Talk and I felt others might benefit from the frankness of his discussion. One of the most difficult things to understand about depression is that the means to treating and coping with depression vary greatly.
In his presentation, Schoenmaker makes note of four types of ‘helping’ that his friends tried and what worked and didn’t. The honestly of his responses might be off putting for some but I think necessary to hear. Go through the video (~9 minutes). You’ll see some of my commentary below.
“Good Life”
I sometimes think of this as the ‘Grass is Greener’ fallacy. There’s always a friend that will try tell you how much you have to look forward to, that tells you how good things are in your life, thinking that somehow you’ve forgotten these things. For me at least it’s never been about comparisons or thinking how much worse something could be. I’m already a cynic and mostly pragmatic about things. Knowing my life could be worse is simply a reason for frustration. As Schoenmaker noted, it often just feels like people are raising the issue of “Why are you being a crybaby”. People suffering from clinical depression know that there’s always a ‘worse’ thing that could be right around the corner. The opening statement of Schoenmaker’s talk probably echoes it best, depression isn’t necessarily wanting to die, it’s sometimes no wanting to live. It isn’t about what’s good in your life, sometimes it is imply that you can’t feel or connect to any of that.
“Oh, Thanks I’m Cured Now”
This is perhaps the most frustrating for most people when they try to open up. While I won’t diminish the influence of ‘positive mental attitude’ it isn’t a cure-all. I’ve often found this to be something of a semantic debate as people associate ‘being depressed’ with ‘clinical depression’. As Schoenmaker reminds us, clinical depression is an actual illness. Saying to ‘unthink’ your way out of it is like saying ‘Just don’t have the flu’. Folks will always have an ‘answer’ to your depression, they’ll suggest ‘try this exercise’ or ‘eat this herb’ or ‘read this book’. From medically minded folks ‘take this pill’. There’s no one-size fits all remedy and that’s the hardest part about living with any form of clinical depression. Each thing can contribute to being able to cope with your state but there’s no single thing that immediately wipes away depression.
“Here When You Need to Talk”
This is a weird case, and perhaps the most well meaning type of help which sometimes goes awry. I experienced this all the time during my divorce and it was disheartening and frustrating to no end. Often your closest friends will want you to be able to speak about what’s going on but I found and what wasn’t mentioned in Schoenmaker’s speech is that the same friends who want to know how you are doing will often fall into the traps of the earlier two types of helping. Friends mean well, they want you to be able to get through and process your depression but most people have no idea how to be a sympathetic listener. It’s oddly passive and I think that is a bigger challenge than most people realize. As a guy it’s probably the last thing we want to do before our friends. To show vulnerability, to show weaknesses isn’t an easy thing to do. It’s sometimes back-sliding when as we try to vent or show our frustration that the response becomes a “but your life is so good” or “just try not being depressed”. For me at least it was that very loop which caused me to withdraw from a lot of my old circle. It’s also one of the reasons I feel that therapists and psychologist provide a useful outlet. Friends who are able to listen empathetically are my anchor and in concert with therapy have been my main outlet for coping with my dysthymia.
“Just Sit Here With Me”
This seems like the most counter intuitive but for some people it’s a bedrock. For Schoenmaker other outlets provided him a chance to vent. Music was his creative outlet but what was lacking for him was simply to sit and be there with friends. No judgement, no prodding, just being able to be there in the moment. While that works for some it isn’t always a good fit. For me this sort of half worked. There are certainly groups of my friends that I can still just hang out and feel comfortable in my own skin. Others however I can only handle in small doses. Sometimes I wonder if that’s because I feel as though I can’t be frank about what I am or am not feeling. It’s like that knee-jerk reaction we all have when someone says “How’s it going”. How often have you ever actually answered that question in truth? Disconnection and loneliness are certainly one of the most dangerous parts of depression. While I don’t think trying to be a massive social butterfly is necessarily going to work for everyone, having a core that you can interact with honestly I think is vitally important.
Take all of this with a grain of salt. As I said at the start, different methods work for different people and you may have to gradually teach your friends what works and what doesn’t. For me it lead to a lot of self reflection about who I could and couldn’t be that brutally honest with. It isn’t easy to tell someone “I know you mean well but you’re actually making me feel like shit.” Find what works for you, work on incremental improvement. That’s been my approach thus far and I hope that others are able to find their treatment path as well.