Hi Fuzz! //38

I go to another site for spouses/significant others of people who are depressed. This site is more "high tech", and well, the people have entirely different perspectives. I visit each of these sites for opposite purposes. The other site is good for me to vent my frustration, because I really don't want to make anyone here feel bad about how their condition affects their families. I originally came to this site because I wanted to understand what my boyfriend is going through, because he isn't great at expressing his feelings and I was seriously worried and freaking out about him. However, I don't really go to the other site anymore, because it ended up being a little draining. New members constantly flooding in; frustrated, stressed, and worried about their depressed partners. It was always the same story, it always put me in pain to read about how much pain they were in (especially since I can relate so well to it) but I could never really help because most of my attempts at helping my boyfriend and myself have failed. It was kind of dragging me down.

Support and enabling: that is one of the main topics at the other board. That is a tough one... what the people inside the situation consider supportive, people external consider it enabling. Examples of how I've been told I have enabled my bf include:
- making his doctor's appointments
- checking to make sure he has taken his meds
- making excuses for the things he drops responsibility for
- filing his insurance claims
- letting him off the hook for being cranky to me, even hurting my feelings, because I know that he's only being that way because he's depressed
- doing his taxes out of fear that he wouldn't do them himself
- reminding him of his family's and friends' birthdays or to return their calls, or worse, getting cards for them and doing everything but signing his name
- making sure he has eaten,
etc. etc. etc.

I don't do most of those things anymore, but believe me, it's hard to hold myself back. Especially about things that could come back to bite me in the butt: like if he doesn't file his insurance claims, then I won't get reimbursed for the money I've paid for his medical expenses. If he doesn't take his meds, then he'll slip back into severe depression which is very stressful for me. If he doesn't pay his taxes and we get married at some point, his tax penalties and interest will hurt me and god forbid I get audited, being self-employed.

It's such a fine line. People who enable are usually trying to help. I'm also finding, at least about myself, that if I DON'T do the things I mentioned above, my anxiety level goes up, and doing those things calms me down. But the flip side is that doing them also generates resentment from both sides: he resents me because doing those things for him implies that I don't think he is capable of doing them himself, and I resent him because frankly I do not want a relationship with someone I have to take care of. But the thing is, I don't have a relationship with someone I have to take care of unless I take it upon myself to take care of him. So I have learned, especially this summer, that I need to back off because my efforts to help do more harm than good.

I think support is:
- being a good listener
- not judging
- not pushing the other person too hard to or getting the ball rolling for them to do something they aren't ready for
- keep the relationship at an age-appropriate level (don't treat your teenager as a 6-year old, and don't let your husband act like a 16-year old)
- but don't pick up the slack for them
- and maintain your own sense of self-respect

This is just my 2 cents from a non-depressed perspective. You asked some good questions here, Fuzzy - I'm interested to see what everyone else has to say!

Your friend,
LMo

We are ALL going to be a-ok!