I don't get it.
So you tried everything, and nothing worked. So what is next?
I feel like the validation of pessimistic feelings is a slippery slope because one may inadvertently validate the defeatist thoughts behind those emotions.
I try to ask "What do you think you should do, then?" and more often than not, it's some sort of ambiguous capitulation. Like there's a desire to just dwell in the hole they are trapped in, and it can be difficult to have patience.
Because it's regarding common "mainstream" solutions such as, for example, "have you tried exercising?", "have you tried going outside?", "have you tried keeping a todo-list?", etc. And not like, "have you tried this therapy session that I'm offering you for free?", or "have you tried this medication which I'm giving you access to yet?"
Because chances are, there are things that are yet to be done, but those are not things that the average person who is about to suggest something might be able to do
Once upon a time, I was battling severe depression and I had a similar attitude.
I would get angry when people would suggest water and exercise, because it felt like they weren't acknowledging the severity of my problem. I also found exercising very daunting and I had gone into exercising with the wrong attitude (goal oriented vs. enjoyment).
Turns out, I really did need to drink way more water and exercise.
Often my role as a therapist
Before we can work out how to climb out the hole, we gotta sit together for a while in the hole.
Not forever but a while. Long enough that we got what was needed by climbing down there and to not be alone in it
So many don't understand this. When someone is depressed in such a way, it isn't uncommon to have already reached a point where you're just going through the motions of living life. It isn't that you don't want help or don't want to be better, but that so much has already been attempted and very little, if any of it, actually contributed to a lasting positive mental state. This is where serotonin and dopamine deficiencies come in, where people who are depressed to have the inability to ground themselves like the average person can.
At this stage, the help that is needed is specialized and intensive, and few people understand how to actually help and fewer still recognize if they have the resources to actually help.
I'm on board with this way of thinking too. Your opener is poignant - you mean you tried everything already and absolutely nothing works? Well I guess there's no point in this conversation then, is there. Unless you're in need of a complaining session, in which case I can handle that for about 5 minutes until we move to a new topic.
In my experience it typically is unsolicited advice. Like, you're explaining why you're having a tough time, and then they try to offer solutions, when you just wanted to explain why you're having a tough time without requesting them to help you with it, directly
Though of course, it depends on the context yeah. In one form of the situation you're right
That's a good point, actually. When people are asking you to stop with "just go for a walk or exercise" it is not because it has no chance of working. It may be very effective for some people. But seriously, how likely is that this struggling adult person raised in the same culture as you with similar knowledge-base as yours didn't hear about the concept of going outside? Your insights are not that insightful.
And yes, it applies to parenting advice as well, Karen.
Yes, but have you tried Tequila?
Ahhhh yes, both the cause and solution to most of life's problems
