how do i help support someone?

[donnashamshar]

Thank you everyone for the response to my post regarding "prognosis."  I am referring to my boyfriend, but I also have depression and OCD and take meds.  I am not sure how I should support him when his depression is bad.  He has moments when he gets so angry that he doesn't remember what he says...usually cruel and hateful.  do i ignore it or confront him or not mention how his behavior affects everyone?

[Hensley258]

Well donnashamshar, Being a man that sufferers your boyfriends same condition, I can not offer justification for him to verbally abuse you.

This disease is frustrating and hellish, but even as bad as my condition is I do have the ability to treat my Wife and Daughter with the level of respect they deserve.

Do I snap at them sometimes because I feel like **** and my condition is acting up? Yes, I sometimes do, but for some reason I am able to hold them and appriciate them more than perhaps a husband that does not suffer my cronic condition.

When I hold my wife and daughter, it's like I am holding them for the very last time, every time. I savor it like nothing else. That's because I know I could put a shotgun slug in my head on any given day.

So no, I don't think that he should be able to use his condition as a reason for his bad treatment of you. I think he should thank God every day that he has a good Woman to stand by his side considering his mental illness.

BUT, on the other hand I also understand his frustration in himself and the mind prison he lives in, simply because I also live in that same prison.

Honestly, I can't tell you exactly how to react. When I get like that sometimes my wife stops and says; "IS THAT YOU TALKING OR IS IT THE BEAST?" she knows what the beast is and she understands how hopeless and black it makes me inside.

Let me re-phrase that; she doesn't actually understand because she doesn't have the illness, but she knows she can't understand and that makes me feel better.

I have always hated when "non-sufferers" say, I understand. Damn it, they don't understand and I don't need bull **** remarks about how they "understand."
My wife fully admits that she doesn't understand and knows she never will.
I respect that much more than some jerk saying. "I undersatnd."

You know what I mean? If you haven't experienced it at it's worst then "you don't and never will understand." People might think they understand, but in reality they have no worldly clue.

Your in a rough situation in that both of you suffer from a serious mental illnesses.
Before I met my wife back in 97 I was in a serious relationship with a woman that was also a cronic depression sufferer. It didn't work because we were both mentally unstable and one could not support the other.

You would think that since we both suffered the same illness that we could better relate to each other, but that was not the case at all.

I wish you the best.

[bbaggins]

I have been married for 11 years to a woman who is bipoloar, and I, myself, suffer from GAD and depression as well. It has been bumpy along the way, we almost got separated at one point, but between her being on her meds and me dealing with my depression, we've made it through.

I don't know what your boyfriend has, but from the sounds of it, it seems that he has bipolar disorder. If he's not currently taking medications, he needs to start. The medications will help a lot.

About the only thing you can do when he gets in to that "dark place" (as my wife describes it) is be there for him and make sure he takes his meds. It was a bit rough for me at first because my wife would go from crying uncontrollably to screaming at me like I was the devil himself. She was put on Zoloft, potassium and Xanax for several years which helped a lot, and seems to have put her on the track to getting better. She no longer takes Zoloft or the other medications and is currently only taking Cymbalta and an occasional Ativan. Generally she only needs the latter when she is on her period. She has only had one bad "dark place" episode since they tapered off after she started taking the medications and taking an Ativan helped to get her out of her "dark place".