How to deal with a loved one going through depression? We have just broken up.

[Challen]

Please can anyone advise me on how they dealt with their loved ones going through depression? A man very close to me seems to have all the symptoms of depression and I need to know how to best support him through it. I may be wrong, perhaps it isn't this, but the symptoms are all there. I have been there myself before, which is why I think it may be this.

I know I need to give him some headspace first of all, but I want to be able to assure him I am there for him fully without making him think I am crowding him.

Should I blank all contact for a few days, and then perhaps just send a text saying something like, 'I am thinking of you, please let me know if there is anything I can do for you'. That seems so vague yet I don't want him to feel worried either that someone's worried about him, if you see what I mean?

The dilemma is that we were actually seeing eachother for a few months and he has ended it because he was not in a position to commit himself emotionally to a regular relationship, and I have accepted this, luckily he has caught me just before I fell madly in love with him, so I have dealt with the break-up ok.
And I am not asking how to support him as a way of wheedling myself back into his affections either, he still wants me in his life as a friend, which we were before we initiated a relationship. I have accepted that too.

His situation comes from a very deep-seated pain and anguish from a few years ago, which re-surfaces irregularly causing him to shut people out, he said.
But I have watched him lose about a stone in weight, become more withdrawn and confused, over these last few months, despite our relationship being otherwise loving and caring. I knew something wasn't right within him if I'm honest, but he was a happy occurrence in mine and my young children's lives, I didn't want to let him go too soon I suppose. I see that was selfish now, and instead I want to be able to support him, and I have no endgame, I know there is no chance for reconciliation between us unfortunately, but that does not mean surely I should make a 'clean break' altogether?

In the cold light of day, I think I can manage our relationship going back to just platonic friendship. I genuinely want to be there for him, and I strongly feel this over-rides any personal needs I may have.

Please advise me how I should deal with this first week at least. This all onlyhappened last night. I keep wanting to text him but don't know what to write. Should I just ignore him for several days, 'let him be', do you think?

Personally, I don't think you're the right person to do this. Your motives may be pure, but he won't necessarily see it that way and find having to deal with you stressful as he fears you may put pressure on him to get back together regardless of what you say.

It's lovely that you care so much, but you might be better placed texting him now just to say that you know it's best you don't contact him for a while, but you're concerned about him and want to make sure that he has someone to talk to. If he's ever in a place where he has no one to turn to, he can turn to you but you won't take it personally if you don't hear from him for a while.

You could also mention any concerns you have to a good friend of his, but otherwise I'd leave it at that. It's good to be supportive, but this is something he'll have to do on his own if he's really going to get past it.

You may be able to manage your relationship going back to being platonic but that may not be so easy for him. A phone-call will be more sincere than a text and FWIW the 'right' approach is to point him in the direction of professional medical help rather than think you can tackle it as a layperson. If he shuts you out, accept it and leave him be.

you may be part of the reason for his depression as he doesn't feel he can be in a relationship. Awful as it is, you're not the right person to help him directly. You may have to walk away to help him (and actually yourself).

He is not your 'loved one', that's the whole point.

What you are proposing, is that you become his friend/helper/support, but my feeling is, as Dahlen said, you are not the right person to do this.

I also think it will take up a lot of your emotional energy and time, as you will stay emotionally involved with him.

In essence, you are going to get the bad bits of the relationship without the good bits of his commitment and love.

I have been a friend to friends with depression, the key thing is to stay detached and help from that distance. You can't help if you start to live every up and down, I also think your children don't need to live it either.

I also see, rereading your OP, that he may well not have depression. He has simply said he doesn't want a regular relationship and moved on. You might well believe he is depressed/losing weight/had a previous trauma and so on, but you may also just not want to accept he doesn't want to be with you (both may also be true).

I think you have to leave him to find his own way now, he's made it clear it isn't with you, so I don't think trying to 'help him' is your role. Why do you want to rescue him when he doesn't want that? (he could have stayed and had that with you).

encourage him to go to get profressional medical and therapeutic help and leave it at that.

let him go and seek help for his "very deep-seated pain and anguish" - you dont want to be bringing his issues into your and your dc life. put your DC first.

Thankyou for your replies. I don't want to rescue him, I want to support him, but I can see from some of the replies the best course of action to benefit him would be to leave him alone, with a final reassurance that I will always be there for him if he needs me.

I have sent a final text based on Dahlen's suggestion, and his reply was to thank me for being so understanding.
So I will now leave it at that and will not contact him again. I'm very sad at my own loss from all this, but it is all about him, not me.

Thankyou everyone. I hope I have done the right thing by him.

why is it all about him and not you?

peppapiglet because he's worth it :)

I have two wonderful children who love me, extended family support, my life is pretty empty other than that but I'm bumbling along moderately happily enough, I want to keep him as a friend as we have lots in common and enjoy doing stuff together, I don't make friends easily so I want to keep him.

But right now, I have to let him go so he can eventually make his own way back, if he wants to do so in the future. He may not, and I will accept that.

This post was to request views/advice on how to do that, to let go, yet simultaneously reassure him I will still be here for him. I thought he might be depressed, but some views have suggested I may have caused that depression, or it may not be depression at all, and that it's none of my business what he is going through anymore

I have sent a final text to him now and am 'letting him be'. I want to do the right thing by him, and you have all helped me to see which options are available to do that right thing.