Things NOT to say to someone with depression

1st off, if you don't know, depression is not a few moments of feeling sad, it is a long period of constant sadness, with the added benifits if having trouble functioning. Internally it is a chemical imbalance in the brain, which is the simplest description. But because people think of depression as just being sad & that you can think your way out of it , there's always lots of advice from people who do not have PHD's. 

Advice: You just need to think positively!

Reality: The thinking patterns of most people with depression have this lovely think called rumination, where you think of the same horrible thought over & over & over again. There have been studies done that are showing that the ability to look at a situation in multiple ways is part of how humans evolved. For the most part normal people can look at a situation a couple of times & move on. Where as people with depression seem to lack the ability to stop looking at the same thought or memory. 

Advice: You just need to stop being so sensitive.

Reality: Where regular people can brush off something said off hand, people with depression can't. It goes back to the rumination. On top if that we are extremely self critical, another thing that can't be easily shut off. 

Advice: It'll get better.

Reality: I'm not sure about all depressed people in this one, but in my situation & within a group I was a part of I did see this, that looking to the future is almost impossible. People with depression over analyse the past, & some barely notice the present, so the concept of a future is too much for us to plan for, let alone look forward too. 

Those are the ones I can think of right now, trust me with my years of depression & family members who aren't very tactful, I've got more.

Depression

I don't know what to do with anything. I was working temp as a cashier this past week & found myself falling down that rabbit hole of despair, the 'here we go again' one. I just feel utterly pointless. I have friends & family who I care about, but they don't pay my bills (mom helps with keeping me fed though) & I can't seem to do much of anything outside of them. I really don't feel like myself, not that I really know what myself is, at all. I feel completely like I've lived for other people, that I'm alive for other people. I can't seem to do anything without someone's approval or involvement. So I'm not happy, & being clinically depressed means that I think about how I'm not me, how I disappoint people, how I have no future, & I'm a burden to everyone goes running through my head constantly. My meds have helped leave it in the background keeping me from spiralling so far out of depth that I don't try to kill myself & that I can function day to day, but they don't help me out of my mess. I maintain. If I go off my meds I'll kill myself, there's no maybe, I know I will. But going off my meds just means that I remain as I am & that I will have a panic attack every few months when I notice my life hasn't changed. I've asked my family doctor for a recommendation for a therapist, but I only have OHIP so the wait list for someone covered is insainly long. I've done group stuff, which is usually like 'be your own therapist' stuff & I'm terrible at that. Also one of the groups I went to I was the youngest one there at 30 & compared to everyone else there I had no real issues.