7 Things I Wish Someone Told Me When I Was Depressed

Do some deep breathing, take a walk, and eat vegetables. Oh, fuck off. I don’t need someone telling me that eating a carrot a day will heal my depression. I want someone to be kind and tell me it’ll be alright.

Sis, I’m here, and I’ve got you. Getting a diagnosis of depression feels lonely and isolating and can leave you wondering what you did wrong. I understand. There isn’t much advice out there, and anything you find emphasises that you need to fix it yourself. I’m going to share some things I wish I had known when I first received my diagnosis of depression with the hope you can leave feeling less alone and with a bit of practical advice.

Getting a diagnosis of depression sucks. Own it.

People think that if you tell a person something sucks when it GENUINELY does, it will make them feel worse. It won’t. If you have depression, then you already feel pretty bad. However, when someone doesn’t acknowledge that it’s a shitty situation, they ignore what you’re going through. For example, if a friend looks awkward and says, ‘Ah, I’m sorry,’ then starts talking about something else, it doesn’t make you feel great. However, if a friend looks you in the eye and says, ‘Girl, I’m sorry, that sucks,’ it feels different. One person is sidestepping the situation and not acknowledging how you feel. The other is reaffirming that it’s okay to feel shitty about it.

You didn’t do anything wrong.

A diagnosis of depression is often followed by doctors quickly probing you and asking what you’re doing ‘wrong’ with your life. They pinpoint something obvious that is causing the depression.

A common one is, ‘do you eat sugar?’

Yes, I’m depressed, so I eat to comfort myself.

‘You shouldn’t eat sugar.’

I eat sugar because I’m depressed. I feel like we’re going in circles here.

Depression sometimes comes out of things you can’t always control.

You didn’t do anything wrong. People are shitty at work, and life happens. However, it is your responsibility to work on healing your illness. Blaming other people for your feelings is natural, but it won’t change anything. So take action because it’s your life and no one else’s.

You don’t have to fix it.

If there’s one thing that never helps, it’s someone trying to fix your depression (including yourself). Some people get so uncomfortable about mental illness they feel the need to sort it out straight away.

However, when a person focuses on fixing depression, they indicate that you are the problem.

Fixing can sound like someone listing off everything you should do to eliminate depression. Doctors do it a lot. ‘Are you eating healthily, exercising regularly, going to therapy? Why are you not just a happy person?!’

There may be a high chance you aren’t doing these things, but not because you don’t care about yourself. Maybe you’re in a situation where it’s challenging to live a healthy lifestyle, like working long hours or on little pay. Or perhaps something from your past is surfacing, so you stop treating your mind and body with respect.

However, wanting to help and guide you towards healing is very different. For example, if a friend offers to come to a doctor’s appointment, watches a film with you, or lets you talk about it, that feels supportive and healing.

You don’t have a doctor bandage up a broken bone, then slap it and exclaim, ‘as good as new!’ You give it time. You do small exercises to build back the bone’s strength. You’re mindful and gentle of it. Sometimes you think it’s all better and dive into your old life, then cry out in pain because it wasn’t ready. You need to give that bone more time to rest, reset and mend. The same goes for depression. Yes, therapy and exercising help, but you need to heal beneath all.

Focus on healing, not fixing, and you’re already on the path to recovery.

Things that reduce depression don’t heal depression.

Meditation, exercise and diet will help your depression, but they won’t heal it. When I went for a mental health check-up, the doctor asked me, ‘How are you doing?’ ‘I still feel bad,’ I said. ‘Are you exercising every day?’ I immediately felt guilty. ‘No,’ I replied. The doctor restrained himself from rolling his eyes as if to say, do you even WANT to help yourself?! His ending statement was, ‘You need to exercise at least three-four times a week.’

However, that doctor was stupid.

The problem here is that telling someone to exercise isn’t getting to the root of the issue. If that doctor had used any common sense or known about depression, he wouldn’t have told me to exercise madly. For a start, I was skin and bones. Exercising wasn’t going to be healthy. My depressed brain was also very harsh, and it didn’t count walking, yoga or any activity under ten minutes as ‘valid’. Secondly, when you’re that depressed, sometimes you physically can’t move.

Telling someone to exercise out of sheer willpower and motivation won’t work.

You don’t have motivation when you’re depressed. That’s a classic symptom. Even I know that.

Another guilt-tripping piece of advice is healthy eating. I went on a mad mission to consume a tonne of veggies and cut out all sugar. That wasn’t realistic. I didn’t have the time, money, or habits to switch up my entire lifestyle suddenly. I chastised myself for eating a chocolate bar and not consuming enough kale. While reducing sugar and increasing leafy greens was beneficial, it wouldn’t magically cure my depression. It would ease the symptoms, but it wasn’t treating the real issue.

Am I saying exercise and eating well are pointless? Absolutely not! But if you’re on your feet all day and stressed as fuck, then going for a run isn’t the best idea. It would be better to sleep, rest, recuperate or take time off to chill. If you’re too tired and overwhelmed for a kale shake and instead reach for the chocolate bar, should you? Yes!

Eating chocolate is better than eating NOTHING because it’s still giving you energy.

Don’t place so much pressure on things that supposedly ‘solve’ depression. Instead, use them to help you reach a point where you can make dramatic life changes — for example, going to therapy to unearth the actual cause of depression.

Healing isn’t a straight uphill line.

It isn’t a straight line from diagnosis to recovery, but that’s what I initially thought. After my mental health diagnosis, I took action. Now I knew what was wrong then, I could do everything to eliminate it. That worked for a while. I started to feel better and more in control. I thought to myself, ‘I’m not weak like everyone else. I don’t know why people have depression for so long! I certainly won’t.’ After a few weeks, it was getting better, but pretty soon, the motivation disappeared, and I spiralled into a depression that was worse than before. I had failed to solve my depression immediately. How ridiculous does that sound? But it wasn’t absurd to me at the time.

Nowadays, I know that there are times my depression is triggered, for example, stress. Significant changes in my life, such as moving house or starting a new job, are exhausting, and my mental health is the first thing to go out the window. Sometimes I randomly remember bad situations in my life, or I see something that triggers the memory, and I spiral again.

It’s natural to resort back to self-blame because feeling depressed is awful.

You automatically lay into yourself if you do something that might make it worse. That’s because your brain is saying, ‘You stupid fuck! What did you have to do that for? Now I have to feel depressed, and I don’t want to.’

Instead of having an aggressive attitude, hold a calm curiosity and ask gentle questions.

Something set you back. What was it? If you don’t know or don’t want to know at this moment, then ask yourself, ‘what can I do to support myself now?’ You want to get better, and that’s great, but don’t turn on yourself when something goes slightly wrong. Your depression will go up and down, which is part of recovery.

Medication doesn’t make you a failure.

When I first started taking medication, I felt like a failure. It was a physical sign that I had failed to fix myself and admit I had depression. Let me ask you something I wish someone had asked me. If a doctor advised you to take anti-biotics, would you? Most probably. But anti-depressants? Your answer may be a little more reserved.

People sometimes fear that they’ll be on it for life once they start taking medication.

However, I see anti-depressants as similar to taking anti-biotics. Your body needs medical support, and you shouldn’t stop your prescription just because you feel a little better. Instead, see meds as a leg up to help your body heal.

When the symptoms of depression are less severe, you can start attending things that bring joy, like dancing, singing, going to a football game, etc. You’re less anxious, so you attend therapy and feel more able to accept support. Then you can come off it when you’re ready. Medication doesn’t mean you’re too weak to fix yourself. It means you’re being sensible and looking after your wellbeing.

You don’t have to experience trauma to go to therapy.

People hesitate about going to therapy because they don’t think they’re ‘bad’ enough.

Listen.

You don’t need anyone’s permission to go to therapy.

You don’t have to hit the criteria of PTSD or sexual abuse to ‘qualify’ as someone who needs support. There is no list of checkboxes you need to tick off to ensure you’re fucked up enough to get help. There’s just negative judgment, and it mainly comes from yourself.

Maybe you don’t want to go to therapy because you think you’ll walk in, tell the therapist your life story and feel like you’re whining or complaining. That the therapist will think, ‘Why are you here? There are people with far worse problems than you.’ Yes, there are. There always will be, but:

That doesn’t mean your feelings and experiences don’t matter.

I’ll give you an example. When I was doing an introductory course in counselling, I had to role-play and practice being the counsellor. My classmates sat opposite me with a piece of paper showing an imaginary character, a little bit of background story, and why they were attending therapy.

Let me tell you the biggest thing I learned. Every character I encountered had every reason to feel overwhelmed and need therapy. Not ONE of those characters had a ‘tragedy in their lives. They hadn’t lost anyone, and none of the fictional people suffered abuse. They were going through everyday life things.

Let’s imagine a scenario with a woman called Lacey.

Lacey is a mum of two. Her husband works away a lot, so she’s mainly looking after the kids. Lacey also works, and recently she’s moved away from her family and doesn’t know anyone. The job isn’t very understanding about the fact she has kids. Lacey isn’t doing her job or being a mum justice and feels she is failing in both roles. The strain on the family means she and her husband have been arguing, and she’s snappy with the kids. She feels guilty because she’s so tired and fed up ALL of the time. She’s struggling to motivate herself to get out of bed, and her mind is racing at night. Fuck, Lacey. It sounds like you’ve got a lot on your plate right now.

No wonder you’re stressed.

Did Lacey experience any trauma? No. Does she need support? Absolutely. Now that she’s finally talking to someone about what’s happening, Lacey can see she needs help. Maybe that means talking seriously with her husband about him going away. Perhaps she needs some time off work or to ask someone to help out with the kids. Therapy won’t wave a magic wand, but it can help Lacey realise that she feels low for a reason.

Her feelings are real. They’re valid.

If you feel like you’d benefit from therapy but don’t think your problems are big enough, write down everything you’re aware of that’s causing stress, grief, and anything in between.

Once it’s in black and white, you see the bigger picture of why you’re struggling. In your mind, you might not have a valid ‘reason,’ but you have valid feelings, and those feelings are why therapy is the best thing for you right now.

Having depression is never easy.

The above points are by no means an exhaustive list of things I wish I had known during my diagnosis. Teaching myself compassion, learning the value of depression, and the power of knowledge is equally as valuable. Experiencing depression is tough. There are no two ways about it. Some things will heal you, like minimising self-blame and getting support. Other things will hinder your recovery, like trying to fix it and hoping yoga will make it miraculously disappear.

Remember, it’s normal to feel lost, overwhelmed and hopeless.

But I hope the above will provide a bit of support and comfort. Please know that you’re not alone. I’m here, and you’ve got this.

Recommended: How to Tell Your Friends and Family About Therapy

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