How should relatives deal with depressed people?
For many relatives, living and dealing with depressed people is a challenge. Family members and friends want to cheer up their loved one with depression – but that doesn’t work. Depression is a serious illness that affects drive, mood, sleep and the ability to feel pleasure, among other things.
Read our article on depression to find out how to recognize depression and what symptoms the illness entails.
How can you help those affected?
It is often difficult for partners, family members and friends of a depressed person to experience how badly this person is feeling. They ask themselves how they can best help with depression. There are various ways to make it easier for people with depression to deal with the illness:
Support when visiting the doctor
The diagnosis of depression also seems threatening – many people are afraid of it. But it is often a relief to know that the lack of joie de vivre is the result of an illness that can be treated. In addition, the diagnosis relieves patients because it becomes clear that it is not their fault if they constantly feel down. Use this information to motivate relatives with depression to seek help.
Have patience
Relatives support the patient with patience and understanding. Realize that the patient’s behaviour is not directed at you, but is part of a depressive phase. Do not turn away, even if your depressed relative seems to reject you.
Depression: give hope instead of pressure
Also important: Don’t argue with your depressed relative about whether their negative view of the situation is “objectively” justified or not. This also has no chance of success. Do not dismiss the intense physical discomfort experienced by the depressed person and their fears of physical illness as exaggerated or “only psychological”. Because depressed people do not exaggerate their experiences.
Avoid well-intentioned advice
When someone withdraws completely from social life, it is natural to want to cheer them up or motivate them. However, good advice that helps healthy people with problems does not work for depressed people. Instead, they put the patient under pressure.
Take suicidal thoughts seriously
People suffering from severe depression sometimes lose the courage to face life. Suicidal thoughts are part of the depressive disorder and are exacerbated by hopelessness and strong self-doubt. When people with depression talk about taking their own lives, this is a serious warning signal!
In most cases, this is not due to a real wish to die, but rather a lack of strength to go on living or a loss of hope that the situation can change for the better.
Offer to go to an emergency psychiatric clinic together. If your relative refuses, seek advice from a doctor or psychotherapist immediately on how to deal with the situation.
Even if depressed people do not want to be helped: It is possible to admit patients who express suicidal thoughts to a clinic, even against their will.
How can relatives help themselves?
Sometimes it happens that the negative mood of the depressed person also clouds your own mood. It is therefore important that you focus on positive experiences, cultivate your friendships and treat yourself to something good more often – without having a guilty conscience towards your depressed relative.
Depression and relationships
Depression and relationships can often only be reconciled with great effort. A partnership thrives on mutual give and take. However, people in a depressive phase are very dependent on support, but are hardly in a position to give anything back.
Overall, the relationship and your own affection are put to the test when your partner is depressed. You may develop feelings of guilt because it is not possible to help your partner and you may even feel angry with them. If the depression lasts longer, you will often feel overwhelmed and exhausted because you are emotionally burdened and have to take on many tasks for the patient.
However, experts advise those affected and their relatives not to make momentous life decisions such as a separation during a depressive episode, but to seek professional help beforehand.
