Friend permanently depressed, is this normal?

[Nanananaheyhey]

About a year ago, a friend of mine had a mental breakdown and was diagnosed with anxiety and depression. Since then she has been on ADs and in counselling provided by her work. She is no longer suicidal or in the depths of depression but it does seem like she permanently has a black cloud over her. She never shows joy or happiness about anything, she is very self-absorbed, and she often destorts the truth so that things seem worse than they are.

A few years ago, I was depressed for a couple of years but I'm sure that during that time, there were periods when I was ok, and for a lot of the time I was pretending that I was ok even if I wasn't. Similarly, during first lockdown my mental health was pretty poor at times, but I drew on learning from previous counselling sessions to pull myself out of it and get on with living. I know that there is no normal for depression, and I usually have huge empathy for people with MH problems, but I'm running out of empathy for my friend. Even though I know it's not this simple, sometimes I just want to tell her to look on the bright side for once. Have I been lucky with my MH, and is it actually more normal for people to get 'stuck' in depression?

From my (limited) experience most depressed people I know behave like your friend.
Depression literally sucks the joy out of everything.
Being self absorbed I think is also quite common. If your MH is bad your often consumed by how you feel and the thoughts in your head.
If you could 'look on the bright side' you would. No one would ever choose to be depressed!

Yes, it's normal for depression. Sorry.

You've been lucky and you don't know how she feels. Don't compare, you don't have a window into her head.

If you're feeling like you've run out of energy to support her, that is OK and understandable, but it's not OK to give her the "bright side" talk. You feel frustrated, fine, take some time out from her but don't stick the boot in.

If she could look on the bright side and it actually cheered her up (rather than forcing herself to fake it so other people find her more bearable), then she wouldn't be depressed, she'd just be feeling a bit down. Is she having any counselling or medication to help her? It is exhausting for people around depressed people, but not as exhausting as it is being depressed.

It can be a bit of both but you haven't said what she was like before the breakdown. If she was happy go lucky before and in permanent despair now you would see a marked difference.

As they say, the life and soul of the party who commits suicide is always a big shock for people when their persona is anything but unhappy

A lot of depressed people cannot even get out of bed let alone see anyone so the fact she sees you is huge.

Yes, depression can and is hugely self absorbing but it is no one's choice to feel at the bottom of a pit of despair with seemingly no way out.

You are giving too much of yourself if you find her a drain of your positive energy..

As they say in planes, put your own oxygen mask on first before helping others.

It sounds as if your friend needs specialist mental health support and as that is something you aren't trained to do then you should, if you really want to help her have a look at online training (for example Future Learning mental health training) which is free and run by the Open University in association with applied psychology courses at Reading University I believe. Your local community college may also have free online counselling courses level 1 and 2 as well as mental health charities such as Mind who offer support for friends and families of people with depression and anxiety.

It is beneficial for more people to learn about mental health difficulties and how to help.

Anything is better than telling someone to look on the bright side which will just make someone feeling bad to feel guilty for feeling bad which will make things worse.

But put your own MH first as I said at the start.

Good luck

There can be a "glass half empty" attitude that persists after the depression has beeb treated.

It could be that being an Eeyore was what caused her depression to be far more acute than yours in the first place, and what is stopping her ever being sunny again.

I speak from experience, having had a breakdown at 24. I had years of ADs afterwards and then sadly, had PND 10 years after that. But I was always able to come out of it and have a fairly sunny life in between.

But not everyone is like that at all.

Thanks for all the responses, particularly @Smudgingpastels and @ElspethFlashman. I just wanted to say that firstly, although I want to tell her to look on the bright side, I never actually would as I know it wouldn't help. Secondly, although I've tried to be kind and compassionate to her, the responses here have made me realise that, as with most things in life, my approach to my friend's depression has been framed by my own experiences and I've become a bit judgemental over time. I'm going to try and take a step back and just accept that this is how she is at the moment. I might also follow smudging's advice and find an online course to help widen my knowledge.

Its really nice to see a poster taking responses on board.

I think it's easy to frame by your own experience. My dsis and I both experienced depression heavily in our twenties. Some fairly brutal experiences. For a while to my shame I lost sympathy with her because I instituted coping strategies that brought me out of it over a period of time (it was a long hard slog). I was a bit judgy and I am ashamed of that. When I stopped and thought I realised I had many protective factors she didn't.

I was away from my parents who were a massive cause , she wasn't and they torpedoed her all the time. I met my partner , she hadn't met anyone and became increasingly isolated. So from the outside our situations seemed similar in that our depression was caused by the same thing. But a 100 other factors , some large some small played into it. I effectively got really lucky and the so called stars aligned to allow me to put the work in.

I don't like my dsis as a human being for unrelated reasons but now I can fully recognise that her still being in the throes is not down to her as such. She didn't recieve the opportunities and support (and dearth of undermining I had due to moving far far away from my family).

Many of those factors couldn't be seen from outside. It was only because as her sister I know exactly how she was brought up , all the tiny micro aggression she experienced then and still does now.

She got unlucky and I got lucky. I was able to put the work in but I understand why she is still mired in it now.

I have a similar friend and it is exhausting. I do understand though as I too have had periods of (undiagnosed) depression in the past and you really can't just drag yourself out of it. I'm sure my friend da at the time found my negativity draining so I try to be patient with my friend. It does suck the joy out of things though so make sure you spend time with people who are optimistic/happy-go-lucky so you can strike a balance and not get dragged down.

It’s only been a year so that is hardly permanent depression. I’d give her more time. Depression can last for years and years. Hopefully the counselling is helping her.