Psychology vs. Psychiatry

Recovering from Depression – Part 2

Recovering from Depression – Part 1

How can I make a marriage work when depression is involved?
October 9, 2006 2:22 PM   Subscribe

I am thinking about asking my girlfriend to marry me. Things are great in our relationship, with one big exception: she suffers from depression, with serious depressed periods several times a year. I feel very shut-out during these times. And it’s hard to not be influenced by her mood. I am looking for advice from married individuals who have depression or those who are married to someone with depression about what it takes to make a marriage like this work.

Background: We’re both in our early 30s, together about 2 years. She has had periods of depression since her early 20s. Many times, she’s fine: warm and loving and interesting and fun (although always somewhat anxious). And then the depression-times come, and she is withdrawn, angry, tired, full of despair, etc.

I don’t know tons about depression, but have been learning, and have learned enough to know that this is likely to always be part of her life in some way. I try to take care of her during these times, and sometimes I can, in small ways, but often she pushes me away and seems to have little interest in me (or anything else). When the depression has passed, things are back to normal, and normal is good. But it’s very hard to not feel rejected when she’s depressed, and even when I don’t take it personally, it’s hard to not be able to enjoy life with someone you love for stretches at a time.

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Relationships in which one individual is depressed are nine times more likely to divorce. Wow, the normal divorce rate is already over 60% nationally! But, it’s not always a spouse who is depressed, sometimes it is a child or an extended family member.

In this article, however, we’ll be focusing on depressed partners. Most people agree that marriage should be 50/50. We all know this is an ideal, and, with the ebb-and-flow of marriage, the percentages slide up and down but should do so in both directions. For instance, one week the wife gives 70% and the husband 30% and another week the husband give 80% and the wife 20%. This is the way “ideal” marriages work.

Unfortunately, this is not the case when chronic depression enters the marriage. Let’s say that the husband has chronic depression. The wife may pick up many of the tasks that would customarily fall to the husband. Depending on how long this goes on, an avalanche of negative momentum begins.

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Depression and Divorce

The 20-something couple, married just a few years, was eagerly looking forward to the birth of their first baby.

Labor and delivery went fine, and the baby was born healthy. But problems began when the new mom, overwhelmed by motherhood, suffered depression.

“The husband had to take care of everything,” recalls Joan R. Sherman, MFT, a licensed marriage and family therapist in Lancaster, Pa., who saw the couple in counseling.  When he was at work, he worried that his wife was so depressed she wasn’t paying needed attention to the baby. He became so worried he secretly set up a “nanny cam.”

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How Depression Can Threaten Your Marriage

By Nancy Wasson

Nancy Wasson
Level: Platinum

Nancy Wasson, Ph.D., is the co-author of “Keep Your Marriage: What to Do When Your Spouse Says “I don’t love you anymore!” She has more …

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In my work through the years as a counselor, I’ve talked with many depressed individuals. I’ve also had personal experience with depression myself and know firsthand how debilitating it can be.

Nearly everyone at some point in their life will be affected by depression–either their own or someone else’s, such as a spouse, parent, sibling, child, or friend. Just in the U.S. alone, depressive disorders affect approximately 18.8 million adults in any given year.

Statistics show that only twenty percent of those who experience depression will receive an appropriate treatment plan. Many depressed individuals will be too embarrassed to seek help and will suffer in silence, sometimes for years.

The effects of depression can negatively impact every aspect of a person’s life–marriage, home life, work, and friendships. And the burden of living with a depressed spouse can take a heavy toll on the quality of a marriage.

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