To think we need to stop treating depressed people as the only ones whose feelings matter in a friendship?

[StormAndStillness]

When someone ghosts, drops out of plans with no notice or cuts friends off completely during a depressive episode, the narrative often becomes “you should be more understanding/you don’t know what they are going through/don’t take it personally.” But I think that’s quite polarising. The person who’s struggling deserves compassion, yes, but that doesn’t mean the friends they disappeared on don’t get to feel hurt, confused, rejected or upset.

People forget that friends may also be dealing with illness, bereavement, job loss, divorce or their own quiet mental health battles. Just because they aren’t formally diagnosed doesn’t mean those struggles aren’t real.

AIBU to think both sides of the dynamic matter and it’s unfair to expect one set of feelings to completely disappear just because the other person is depressed?

I tried my absolute hardest to be there for someone very close to me that had depression and it broke my heart. I ended up feeling dragged down to rock bottom but they didn’t care one bit until they came out of the other side.
Of course they wanted me to spring back into being the same as I was before they kicked me into oblivion but I couldn’t go back to how I was with them.

Well, I’m sure it can all be rectified with flowers and a nice box of Leonidas. Or possibly hearing from @Swiftasthewind’s legal team.

Course you did. 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

Have you seen what happens to animals if they are repeatedly hit/kicked/beaten? They become anxious terrified messes. But you think that’s empathy and kindness?

Whilst this may be the reason why they did what they did this doesn't make the behaviour OK

In the real world, where there is nuance and middle ground, it is possible to have empathy and boundaries.

My personal choice would be to distance myself from someone who had so little self control - whatever the reason - that they hit me in the face. That’s really not an unreasonable self protective choice to make.

This is basically the whole bizarre misunderstanding about mental illness - one person’s feelings don’t matter any more than anyone else’s. Just because someone isn’t choosing their unpleasant behaviour, doesn’t mean we have to continue subjecting ourselves to it, or build our lives around accommodating it.

If we don’t like how someone treats us, for whatever reason, we are entitled to withdraw from the friendship. Whether we’re depressed, or they’re depressed, or we’re all depressed.

People can feel however they want about it, but nobody is morally compelled to give another person whatever they want, whether that’s a shoulder to perpetually cry on or a prompt response to their text messages. Or their face to slap in the heat of the moment!

We have to make tough decisions in life, and let people down sometimes, and accept that other people will let us down.

Likening depression to normal feelings of disappointment/upset and then thinking it’s similar (or the person who is depressed is more unreasonable) is the mental equivalent of telling someone to go for a walk with you who has 2 broken legs and then saying to them “but my legs are aching a bit as I walk. I’m carrying on walking though. How selfish that you think your legs are more important just because they are broke so can’t do it/need to sit down”.

There is no understanding towards mental health in this country at all.

Well said. I agree with all of this.
We will all let people down and be let down.

Good bit of weapons grade sarcasm from Swiftasthewind, there ...

You’d hope so, but you never know on this site

If they can’t help what they do then by extension it’s OK. You can’t punish a person for acting within the bounds of their mental health condition, even if their actions end up taking someone’s life. It was on me to ask for forgiveness because it was me that caused the situation in which she had to resort to instinct and lash out at me. Do you understand?

But who can measure how depressed someone is? Is the person who managed to get to the doctors to get a formal diagnoses ALWAYS worse and more depressed than the person with such bad anxiety as well as depression they can’t manage to even make an appointment? Maybe that person is struggling on the best they can because they are just far too anxious to book an appointment. But then could the person with official depression get annoyed that the other person is only experiencing “disappointment and upset”? Who says who’s is worse?
So diagnosed person says to non diagnosed how dare you complain about not being able to meet for coffee just because you’re a bit upset! I’m the one with the “broken legs”! Yours are just a bit sore! But really, non diagnosed person is experiencing more like legs crushed under a lorry and need amputation. But there’s no scale to measure this so how would you know?? How can anyone know how anyone else feels in their own head?

There was a discussion on the radio about empathy snd the radio caster asked similar to this op. I’ll be honest, once people start standing up for a society that tells people their struggles don’t mean everyone should try and be understanding we’ve pretty much lost. The lady speaking about it started talking about boundaries and society thinking more about individuals and people having to think about themselves and she put me off so much. Society and community are just collapsing and we’re all applauding it saying we have to start thinking about ourselves

This is it, exactly. I’m very sympathetic towards people with mental health problems. I’ve had my issues too, though I managed to sort them out, more or less. But everyone’s feelings matter.

I have a friend with mental health problems who has never (in my opinion) made a real effort to get help. She’s increasingly narcissistic, mean, destructive, and a fair-weather friend. I know she’s going through hell and I still care about her, but I don’t reach out any more. I’m not going to be anyone’s punching bag – too old for that shit.