My husband is clearly depressed. He is also a proud man, and some degree of old-fashioned. I am 4 years younger than him, and am far more open to the idea of therapy and medication.
For context, he has dealt with his dad (whom he was close with) committing suicide when he was a teenager, a long-term girlfriend (whom he really wanted to marry) cheating on him with multiple men (including a good friend at the time) for years, and his best friend of 10 years (my brother) dying in a rafting accident that we were both part of. I've been struggling personally myself, but I have a few different things I'm trying, including therapy. He is unwilling to try therapy or medication, but isn't getting better, cause holy shit, that's a lot of unprocessed shit to deal with.
It's manifesting in really nasty ways, and hurting both of us. I don't think he means the things he says; I think he's hurting a lot and doesn't know what to do.
For what it's worth, I really have not been great to him or myself. I've been dealing with my own emotional baggage, but I'm not going to get into that. I'm working on it, and feel like after many years of work, have come through a breakthrough where I understand that I do in fact want this person in my life.
How can I help guide him to anything that will help him? Doesn't need to be therapy, medication, or a psychiatrist. Those do seem like the obvious answers, but I'm open to virtually any suggestions.
This man is amazing and a wonderful person, but he's really struggling and doesn't seem to want help, but at the same time, seems like he needs/wants help. Any thoughts?
Edit: I'm really touched by all of the thoughtful responses I've received. I don't like to talk about my marital issues with people in my life, and I know my husband wouldn't want others to know what he's struggling with. This is a great community.
I'm slowly working my way through each response. Seriously - thank you all.
I was a manic-depressive, with a 2-4d up & 2-4 months down, cycle.
I've experience with profound long-term depression: years & years of it.
There is a mechanism in us that calibrates our brains to the amount, and kind, of light we're immersed in.
the Seasonal Affective Disorder treatment lights angage this mechanism.
Our eyes contain rods ( black & white vision, night-vision, motion-sensing, etc ), cones ( gives us seeing of the yellow-blue contrast & the green-magenta contrast ) AND some pigmented-ganglia ( nerves, that was the term in what article I read years ago ) which reach back into one's brain, which directly alter our state re depression.
Those pigmented-ganglia are most-senitive to the color of a clear daytime sky.
The more profound, & more long-term, the depression, the higher the light-threshold is, that has to be crossed, to get one's brain-chemistry to change.
If one does a simple series of experiments, with mixing "daylight" & "warm white" high-CRI ( color-rendition index ) bulbs, in some place small & bright like a bathroom, one can discover one's threshold, in 1 of 2 ways.
easiest, simply put sooo much bulbs in the room, that when one flicks them on, one feels the "kick" of one's brain-chemistry changing ( others have replicated this experiment. I usually found that 150w or more of quartz-halogen light in a bathroom was required, but the "kick" was sooo distinct/clear, that they were instant believers in the mechanism ). I spent years having 500w of fluorescent AND 500w of quartz-halogen light in my main room, of the apartment I was living-in, and eventually my brainchemisty changed..
use some kind of light-panel, with a dimmer & a switch, to discover how much light it takes to make one's pupils shrink, then stop-shrinking ( 1st-shrinking is rods/cones, then pause, then 2nd-shrinking is the pigmented-ganglia mechanism ), and when the person's pupils begin shrinking again, as one continues increasing the amount of light, that's the threshold they need to cross. Now switch off the lights, while keeping that dimmer exactly where it is, let their brain stabilize for a half-minute, or so, then flick it on, & see if they feel the "kick", or if you have to go a bit higher..
You can use the light-sensor within your phone ( there are light-meter apps ) to give you a means of identifying if you've got enough light for that person's discovered threshold.
Also, I discovered that "alarm clocks" based on sound are destructive, and you need, instead, to put a pair of timers on lamps:
have a "warm white" lamp come on 1st, & about 5mins later, then the "daylight" one.
Light on one's skin has been measured to affect one's .. is it melatonin? .. that chemical having to do with sleep.
The researchers who discovered that bit, were trying to prove it couldn't, so they were shining light behind people's knees, but it actually worked, so that nuked their intended-result/belief.
Anyways, living in a light-box works against depression, and has much less side-effects than, say, Norpramin ( living zonked was its side-effect ), or lithium-carbonate, but one must cross one's light-threshold, or it doesn't work, and each person's light-threshold is unique-to-their-current-condition.
I'm an old bastard.
Evidence has proven this trustworthy & solid.
Please consider asking your husband to read it.
( it is too exhausting ( unrelated health-problems ) to even comment on a few posts per month, at the moment, so I don't reply to replies .. this year .. sorry. )
I hope this helps liberate a life from the inner-darkness.
Salut, Namaste, & Kaizen, eh?
_ /\ _
Man, I've always said to him that the amount of sunlight I see affects my mood! He's always said it was nonsense, but you've inspired me to do more research to back up my claims lol. I always say we live in a cave because the windows are usually closed (one of those "choose your battles" situations, and he prefers the darkness).
Thank you for sharing your knowledge! I'm very happy to have an excuse to bring more sunlight into my day.