AardvarkGoodSwimmer
Phoenix
Joined: Apr 27, 2009
Age: 50
Posts: 5002
Location: Houston, Texas
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 Posted: Tue Feb 21, 2012 4:19 pm Post subject: |
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| Orr wrote: | | Quote: | | Depressed people are depressing. |
I agree. Visiting a person with depression, and perceiving a failure to improve the mood of the depressed person through their interactions, they consider their visit to be of no value. The depressed person shows no sign of improvement, which would have made the interaction of value to the depressed person, in the mind of the visitor, and they also do not get what they wanted from the interaction, to be happy with their having made a difference.
| Quote: | | Most people are fair-weather friends |
Or not very resilient, perhaps they have personality disorders. |
It's like the person visiting and trying to "help" is looking for a quick humanitarian hit. It's superficial and one-dimensional.
I don't know why the skill of being there, being available, not being demanding and not expecting any one effort to automatically work is seemingly such an uncommon skill, but it sure seems to be.
Depressed persons are interesting to talk with (even if you don't make a difference right away).  |
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Nikadee43
Yellow-bellied Woodpecker
Joined: Oct 16, 2011
Posts: 62
Location: Seattle
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| Posted: Tue Feb 21, 2012 5:47 pm Post subject: |
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[quote="Orr"] | Quote: | I agree. Visiting a person with depression, and perceiving a failure to improve the mood of the depressed person through their interactions, they consider their visit to be of no value. The depressed person shows no sign of improvement, which would have made the interaction of value to the depressed person, in the mind of the visitor, and they also do not get what they wanted from the interaction, to be happy with their having made a difference.
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Assuming that all people that try to help believe this, it sort of seems that they have more self interest in the situation. Like you want the gratification of helping somebody or solving their problem more than really trying to understand it. Why would you assume that just one or two interactions, no matter how positive they seemed, would lessen a persons depression so quickly? Depression doesn't work that way. If it were that easy, people wouldn't have such problems with it, and wouldn't have to spend so much money on therapy. Maybe I'm mostly speaking for myself, but sometimes it helps to just bounce thoughts off of someone you're close to. Get insight on a situation from another perspective that you trust. I've often expected my talks with people to make me feel better immediately, and maybe it will for a little bit; then I wake up the next day and am back to feeling like sh*t. I WANT to feel better and have every intention to try, but I just can't control it and don't always know how to go about getting better. Somehow I wake up one day and I just don't feel bad anymore, but my problem hasn't gone away. |
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AardvarkGoodSwimmer
Phoenix
Joined: Apr 27, 2009
Age: 50
Posts: 5002
Location: Houston, Texas
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| Posted: Tue Feb 21, 2012 6:15 pm Post subject: Re: Depression and friends |
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| questor wrote: | .
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5. Sometimes depressed people use and dump on their friends and family (needy) when what they really need is professional help. A non-professional person can feel very overwhelmed when trying to help a depressed person, and may pull back to protect themselves.
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I've gone 0 for 3 as far as psychologists and psychiatrists. Or, 1/2 for 3, depending on how I look at it. One person who was generally helpful for me was a speech therapist I hired in my 30s who just seemed to have some horse sense. Another possibility is a doctor who's a GP, who can also prescribe antidepressants. (I have struggled with bouts of depression, have not yet taken antidepressants, but might next time, I like knowing it's available.)
For those of you who have had positive experiences, more power to you. But many of us here at WP have not.
Psychologists seem to play 'challenge.' It's like freshman ethics class in college, for example, if the allies got reports that Hitler was in a hospital, should the allies have gone ahead and bombed the hospital, etc, etc. And whatever answer you give, the person's going to argue the other way! A psychologist is seemingly going to attack your deeply held beliefs, whatever the content of those beliefs. Gee, maybe if someone was bored and was kind of at loose ends with a job, that might be helpful. But if someone is dealing with immediate, pressing, here-and-now problems, no, that's not particularly helpful. But all the same, psychologists sure seem to play 'challenge.' And whatever their particular theoretical orientation, they seem to believe it almost as if it were a religion. (And I for one do not find it particularly helpful to have some braying jackass disagreeing with whatever I believe in.)
And then there's the oppositional thing, that a psychologist or psychiatrist doesn't want to be told what to do.
So, if a client walks into the office and says, 'I think I'm on the Aspergers-Autism Spectrum,' the psychologist says, 'No, you're schizotypal.'
If the client walks in and say, 'I think I'm schizotypal,' the psychiatrist says, 'No, you're on the Aspergers-Autism Spectrum.'
And it is almost that bad. One solution is to learn the soft sell, to keep it very low-key, "I'm beginning to think that I may . . . " that kind of thing.
And then learn some of this on our own, and build a support network which can include such people like speech therapists, hair stylists, personal trainers, etc. People who can just be there most of the time in a straightforward way.
And a regular doctors such as an internist or family practitioner can prescribe antidepressants like Zoloft or Cymbalta just as well as a psychiatrist can. And these medications are trial and error in a respectable sense anyway. |
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AardvarkGoodSwimmer
Phoenix
Joined: Apr 27, 2009
Age: 50
Posts: 5002
Location: Houston, Texas
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| Posted: Tue Feb 21, 2012 6:48 pm Post subject: |
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| Nikadee43 wrote: | | . . . Assuming that all people that try to help believe this, it sort of seems that they have more self interest in the situation. Like you want the gratification of helping somebody or solving their problem more than really trying to understand it. Why would you assume that just one or two interactions, no matter how positive they seemed, would lessen a persons depression so quickly? . . |
I think it's medium step by medium step and a person shouldn't assume it's going to help all at once. And yes, definitely, some people can focus on the gratification of helping rather than the steady eddie work of doing the actual helping.
I mean, one, being aspie and then two, being depressed. For someone who's neither, going to take a while to wrap their mind around what that's like. |
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Sweetleaf
Metalhead
Joined: Jan 07, 2011
Age: 23
Posts: 14869
Location: Somewhere in Colorado
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| Posted: Wed Feb 22, 2012 12:09 am Post subject: |
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From my experience because you can't/wont follow their exact advice or aren't as motivated to, and are more likely to take things personally which can mean you come of as more unpleasant/defensive than intended. and some people even if they know you're really struggling with depression still expect you not to act depressed.
But I really don't know I doubt it could just be those things that cause it. That is what some people seem to express though. I myself would probably at least try to be there for someone if they are depressed. I mean if I did not have a solution I can at least try to be somewhat supportive or leave them alone if I think that would be best......but not to ignore them, either because they would prefer to be alone or if I feel I'll make it worse.
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Sweetleaf
Metalhead
Joined: Jan 07, 2011
Age: 23
Posts: 14869
Location: Somewhere in Colorado
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| Posted: Wed Feb 22, 2012 12:16 am Post subject: |
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| Nikadee43 wrote: | | Fnord wrote: | | Some people - a very small minority - seem to prefer the attention over getting better. |
It's certainly not just attention that I want. Most emotional attention makes me uncomfortable anyway, and it's sometimes the reason I avoid talking to people about it because they expect that I want them to give me a hug and tell me everything's going to be ok or work out eventually. No. I want people to try and understand. I want to not feel abandoned. I want to see if maybe someone actually has some advice to offer on how to deal with certain issues. At the very least, just listen and try to understand. |
I know what you mean, that sort of thing makes me rather uncomfortable as well....If someone is going to pay attention to me I prefer more neutral attention like not too much rainbows and cup cakes and not too much hostility. Just an attempt to kinda understand where I am coming from, maybe some advice if they can respect my space by not cramming it down my throat if I find it too hard for the time being or uncomfortable and a bit of support even if the support is just lack of negative attention.
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goodwitchy
Phoenix
Joined: Dec 29, 2011
Posts: 785
Location: Interplanetary
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| Posted: Wed Feb 22, 2012 9:16 am Post subject: |
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| sunshower wrote: | | goodwitchy wrote: |
Some people who are in deep depressions may actually be clinically depressed. Deep depression is scary because often the person doesn't know how to come out of it on their own.
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I have difficulty understanding the differences between "depression" and "deep/clinical depression". What is non-clinical depression like? |
I've never been medically treated for either,
but this a clinical depression description is from webmd:
http://www.webmd.com/depression/guide/major-depression |
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AardvarkGoodSwimmer
Phoenix
Joined: Apr 27, 2009
Age: 50
Posts: 5002
Location: Houston, Texas
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| Posted: Wed Feb 22, 2012 10:50 pm Post subject: |
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| Sweetleaf wrote: | | . . ....If someone is going to pay attention to me I prefer more neutral attention like not too much rainbows and cup cakes and not too much hostility. . . |
I think that's what I might prefer, too, someone who's available to give me more neutral type of attention. And not someone who's putting forth all this effort to be some kind of sugary "happiness" zealot.
Interesting aside: My internist last year told me some studies have shown that depressed persons are actually more realistic than nondepressed persons. |
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auntblabby
Chief Assistant to the Assistant Chief
Joined: Feb 13, 2010
Posts: 18778
Location: the island of loveable toy humans
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| Posted: Thu Feb 23, 2012 5:57 am Post subject: |
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my homebaked "rogerian" technique seems to have talked several folks out of their depression, IRL. or maybe they just pretended to feel better just to get rid of me.  |
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AardvarkGoodSwimmer
Phoenix
Joined: Apr 27, 2009
Age: 50
Posts: 5002
Location: Houston, Texas
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| Posted: Thu Feb 23, 2012 1:44 pm Post subject: |
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| auntblabby wrote: | | my homebaked "rogerian" technique . . . |
And that's fine, as long as you don't overdo it or insist that it "work." |
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LittleBlackCat
Toucan
Joined: Sep 11, 2011
Posts: 266
Location: England
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| Posted: Thu Feb 23, 2012 7:11 pm Post subject: |
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| Maybe they're just scared of saying/doing the wrong thing and making things worse so they end up withdrawing completely? |
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auntblabby
Chief Assistant to the Assistant Chief
Joined: Feb 13, 2010
Posts: 18778
Location: the island of loveable toy humans
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| Posted: Fri Feb 24, 2012 12:41 am Post subject: |
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| AardvarkGoodSwimmer wrote: | | auntblabby wrote: | | my homebaked "rogerian" technique . . . |
And that's fine, as long as you don't overdo it or insist that it "work." |
have you had experience with rogerian therapy? granted, rogerian is not for everybody. but i saw one for about 3 years, and he saved my life. what is really strange, is that he was an ex-marine. he went from gung-ho hooah to humane-ness via the GI bill and a PHd.  |
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Mithos
Phoenix
Joined: Feb 22, 2012
Age: 22
Posts: 685
Location: Ponyville, Equestria.
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| Posted: Fri Feb 24, 2012 2:25 am Post subject: |
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I can cheer ANYONE up, Even if they're depressed. Everyone says, "Matt, you make me laugh, How do you do it?!" I just shrug. xD
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Sickpuppies124
Raven
Joined: Feb 24, 2012
Posts: 121
Location: Cloudsdale, Equestria
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| Posted: Fri Feb 24, 2012 9:19 pm Post subject: |
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| Because a bitter person's mood pollutes everyone else and makes them down and blue for a few days. It's nothing personal but because 90% of the time most people don't know how to help that person without being hurt themselves in the process. If your depressed, PM me. I'll listen and try to help you though. |
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aussiebloke
Phoenix
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Age: 37
Posts: 3879
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| Posted: Thu Mar 01, 2012 6:20 pm Post subject: |
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And this is meant to be a bad thing ?
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