Supporting Loved Ones

It’s imperative to always remember, major depression is often an invisible impairment your loved one is suffering through at various levels every day, it surfaces in behaviours and actions, and we often believe it can be controlled. It’s crucial for the family to have/be, empathy, sympathize, imperturbable, affirmation, incrementally focused, nurture belonging, direction and purpose (hope).

The support starts with empathy, the term “empathy” is used to describe a wide range of experiences. Emotion researchers generally define empathy as the ability to sense other people's emotions, coupled with the ability to imagine what someone else might be thinking or feeling. This is the critical first step to building capacity to fight depression with your loved one.

The reality with a loved one fighting depression, they often feel they are alone and in their most vulnerable moments isolate themselves, physically or psychologically. Justice would often express he’s appreciation to his family for everything we did to support him.  

The attributes to maintain and sustain an environment of support for our loved ones begins with empathy and grows well beyond. We found sympathizing was important for Justice because we learned to understand his problems and always ask how we could do this with him. It was at times difficult not to be easily upset, but we would take a step back and be calm, we would always say to Justice you can't let things bother you or get you stressed, confused, or angry. We would also use affirmation/positive thinking to approach unpleasant thoughts in a more positive and productive way. Remind Justice to think the best is going to happen, not the worst. Recognize consistently that this would be incremental to recalibrate the scale of emotion. It was always a thoughtful approach letting Justice know, how much value he added to our life. Giving Justice a greater sense of belonging and encouraging him on a sense of direction and purpose to help provide him a sense of hope and motivation. Promote the practice of self-care.

Validation and patience is key. When Justice shared his experiences of difficult moments or feelings, he often looked for affirmation in his experiences. This could either look like having late night conversations or encouraging pursuits powered by his passion. Often Justice would make breakthroughs throughout his journey, but just as often as there were good days, he also had tough ones and with depression, it made it all the worse. This was his battle. Sometimes these setbacks undid the good he felt. It’s important to be supportive and persistent during a loved one’s difficult moments, no matter how often it happens.