Anxiety - how to help

[Totallyconfused2]

I've been lurking here for a while and you are all so supportive to each other. I wondered if you could help me. My DPs suffers from depression and anxiety. He manages it reasonably well most of the time. He is very open about it. When he has anxiety he will tell me what it is that's making him anxious. My natural instinct is to tell him not to worry, it will be alright, he's putting to much pressure on himself. I'm not entirely sure that really helps though. What's the best way to support your DP through this? Any techniques/advice I'd be very grateful for

I think a few things could help - him knowing that he can talk to you definitely helps. But if it gets bad there is only so much you can do (and as someone who also went through this with my DP it is exhausting for you too). So he will need to work out his triggers and some coping mechanisms. Also see a GP for medication. My DP did this and medication didn't really help him, just gave him side effects that made his health anxiety worse!! It helped my DP to get his own space when he felt depression coming on - I learnt to leave him to it for a few days until the cloud lifted. Once he stayed at a hotel for a few days.

When it got really bad he went to see a counsellor, privately, just to talk. I think this helped the most. Now he meditates regularly, takes care of himself physically and knows his triggers and goes with it (ie doesn;t try to fight the depression, he knows it will lift). The anxiety is tough but we talk it through together most of the time.

My biggest piece of advice is the counsellor. Good luck, it can be very lonely living with someone like this at times.

Thank you

Have you asked your DP what he finds is the most helpful thing for him. Sorry if that sounds obvious, just thinking that as he is good at self managing he might be quite aware of where you could help too.

mindfullness works well for a lot of people you can find free guided meditations on you tube, you could both listen to them

To be honest I haven't asked DP. This is all new to me and up to now I think I've been massively unhelpful (as in 'why are you anxious about that', 'that's daft') etc. It's a recent realisation for me how serious it is and I've been reading about it and understanding that I'm not helping at all right now. Apart from he does talk time so that's good