Beatlebot said:
So what's your point? Are you trying to say that everyone should just tiptoe around mentally ill people indefinitely? Because I've been there and that sure as hell doesn't work either.
No one should tiptoe, but the first course of action should not be to tell someone that they're being an asshole if they have no control over what they're doing...
I never said anyone was 'just' dicking around.
Let's see...
It's good to support people when they are depressed, it is also good to call them out and give them consequences when they are being a jackass. Telling people you don't care what they do because you will be dead in a few days is clearly in the jackass catergory, I don't care how depressed you are.
Again, people do stupid shit when they're really out of their head sometimes. Sure, the behavior ain't nice, and it pisses people off, but it's not right to judge it. My best friend and I both have depression issues, and we've damn near ripped each other's heads off for doing and saying some really awful shit to each other, but we're lucky enough to understand each other pretty well and know when things are simply out of the other's control. Sometimes you have to put the criticism aside. You can sure as hell still feel upset about it, but you should not project that onto the person. It won't help. The criticism can be saved for later when it will be constructive.
I'm sure she has a legitimate depressive problem, that's not in dispute here. I'm simply suggesting that being depressed doesn't give someone a free ticket to also be a jackass without consequences. Sorry, the whole world doesn't just come to a stop because you (or anyone else) have depression.
It doesn't give you license, but that doesn't change the fact that it's going to happen. Again, we're talking about total loss of rational thought here. You wouldn't tell a schizophrenic to just stop being such a dumbass for listening to the voices in their head. *Really* depressed people do *really* stupid shit, but it's like blaming someone in a coma for pissing themselves to put some sort of judgment on them.
You seem to think that people should be given unqualified support and if that doesn't work they should be abandoned. I think people should be supported, challenged when they go too far and confronted with the truth before being abandoned if things don't get better.
I don't think that at all. I agree with the second sentence for the most part, but I do think you're missing the issue of times when the person is completely not in touch with reality. Jumping down their throat about behavior will simply make them withdraw even further, and it will play into their self hate. Now *once they've gotten a little bit better* (although obviously not necessarily completely better), for sure, bring out the big boy words and tell people when they're hurting you. It can be hard to realize you're doing it when you're depressed, and we all sometimes need those harsh reminders, depressed or not. But that should *never* be the first course of action. Ever.
So we disagree, that's all. There's no need to go putting words in my mouth or discounting my experiences.
I'm not putting words in your mouth, as evidenced by the quote, and I'm certainly not discounting your experience. You're wise to realize that depressed people can't just always be treated with kid gloves. They'll never get better if people do that, and you learned that personally, so you would definitely know. But what you obviously must have never experienced is a *total* loss of control due to depression. If you had, you would know exactly what I'm talking about. It's a very fucked up and strange thing, and I can't even begin to describe it to someone that hasn't been there. I thought I was just a seriously fucked up human until I met some other people that had been in the same place. Looking back at the times in my life when I've really been down the hole, I can't even comprehend the shit that I did. I can't even think of or even conceptualize what was going on in my mind to do the stupid things I did. And I can definitely look back and see times when I was just being self-indulgent and/or wallowing in anger and self-pity, and there's a difference between those two states of mind. In the self-absorbed times, I knew what I was doing was bad, but I did it anyways because I just didn't care and was an asshole. But when I've totally lost it, like I said, I don't even know why I did the things I did, and I had no comprehension of it at the time. It's important not to lose sight of that very important difference.
When you're dating someone, it's usually best to assume the worst at first until some sort of progress has been made. If you don't, it's likely you're going to do something very hurtful rather than helpful. And unfortunately, sometimes people don't make progress. When there is no progress, you just have to leave the relationship, because it will only drag you down in the mess. But you do have to at least try at first, and trying involves being considerate and aware of the fact that a lot of behavior may not be intentional. People repeatedly bringing up suicide obviously have something very wrong going on...
The only thing I think we disagree on is what the best starting point is for approaching this kind of situation. I assume that often people have no control at that point, you assume that they do. We're both coming from our own experience... But I can at least definitively say that *sometimes* depression can completely kill your logic.