Ask Anything Monday!

ASK ANYTHING MONDAY!

Thanks @Jacques for responding to last week's question! Some really helpful tips in there!

Looking forward to hearing what advice and support members have for this week's AAM poster -

Could anyone give me advice on how I could get my partner to understand what its like to have depression?

When I go through changes of medication or if it's a really stressful period, I almost go back to square one again and have to build from the ground up. My partner is supportive with most things in my life, but I feel so isolated when I talk about my depression with him and how I'm going - he just kinda shuts down.

I understand it's not easy to live with someone who goes through negative periods, but I just need some understanding.

Everything else in our relationship is perfect.

How do I get him to understand or at least have empathy and help out when I'm going through the negative period?

Most of my friends never understood my schizoaffective or schizophrenia when I had that early on in the piece.

I played them several movies over about 3 months which described my mental illness pretty well.

There are some hard edge ones out there.

For my friends who are a bit artistic, I think Black Swan was the one that hit home the most, and although the violence is not a feature of my illness at all, the portrayal of delusions was very graphic and realistic. Its not a movie for the feint hearted.

There are a number of softer movies out there, like I never promised you a rose garden-through a glass darkly-benny and joon-the fisher king-shutter island-clean shaven-the soloist etc etc.

A beautiful mind was a bit too manufactured for me but the "markers" for schizophrenia hallucinations were accurate, like the imaginary class mates never aging, always wearing the same clothes, very very accurate.

Also the portrayal of schizophrenics having a point of difference with non MI people was pretty spot on.

These portray schizophrenia particularly and are mostly are sympathetic in these movies, but they are warts and all, giving a real depth into the world of a schizophrenic.

So I guess there are also movies out there dealing with depression specifically. It might be worthwile showing him some of the delicate ones of so that he might understand. It worth the effort.

If everything else is ok in the relationship I would just focus on that part that needs some adjustment. Understanding can be just a matter of education.

Counselling sessions with a trained psychologist or psycho therapist can also be a big help.

Its a bit different, but my paranoid schizophrenic flatmate and I had to go through a number of sessions so that we could understand our different illnesses before we lived together. It helped us to understand and empathise with our different emotional states.

It sure made life a lot easier.

I'm guessing you have already tried to talk with your partner about how he seems to shut down on the subject of your depression. If not, that might help you get a better understanding of why he does it. Also, he may not be aware of your feelings of isolation.

If it's simply that he feels you talk too much about it, there might be some room for give and take both ways with him giving you undivided attention at certain times and you holding off on talking about it at others. I know that at times I talk too much about my mental illness in a way that is not particularly helpful to me or anyone else and so I try to be patient with my partner if he seems a bit 'compassion fatigued'.

You have a good base to start with that other things are great in your relationship.

I found what I paste below in italics, part of a reply given in the Forum to the question the difference between a psychiatrist and psychologist, to be very helpful for my situation.. The ability to be able to not feel intimidated and to have the feeling that you will be listened to and that you can have a say in your treatment I think is very important.. Now I feel I can more easily talk to and with the professionals helping me..To have a say...Thank you...

"I believe the most important ingredient in any therapeutic relationship is trust. Listen to your intuition/gut feeling here, rather than the very understandable first-meeting nerves. Do you feel listened to? Are they respectful and open to your viewpoint? Do you feel ok to disagree with them? Are they compassionate? Do you feel like they "get" it?"

Welcome to another Ask Anything Monday!

Thanks to @autumn @Mazarita @Former-Member @kenny66 @Windyridge for your great responses last week.

This week's question:

I continue to disassociate - does anyone have any practical grounding tips?

The best grounding technique for me is to anchor myself to something familiar in both phases. For example this could be a person, a particular room or a familiar item or event.

I have a friend who is very adept at coming in and taking me out of a disassociative event.

A good psychologist can also teach you some practical steps to take, as the clinic I attend taught me.

I don't know the situation or type of circumstances you disassociate within or the length of the episodes but I have found a common thing or item between a disassociative state and non disassociative state to work for me, a common memory I guess is a good way to describe it.

Thanks for your advice Kato......very helpful for me in talking about difficult things with my psychologist