When Love Isn’t Enough to Heal or Stop Your Depression

It seems like having love would make everything okay, doesn’t it? But sometimes love isn’t enough to rise out of a severe depression caused by major trauma, whether it’s because of what happened to you as a child or from a new trauma that triggers that old one. Sometimes it takes specialized help, like talk therapy, to find yourself. You can’t do it alone. But early trauma makes you believe “you should” be able to do everything for yourself. That you “shouldn’t need help.” That you can “figure it out.” Plus, how do you trust someone now when no one was there then? That seems impossible.

Coming out of depression means not shutting people out. But depression has another idea. It closes you down. That’s because you’re fighting so hard not to feel the things you’ve tried for so long to push aside. Like feeling small. Unwanted. Ugly. Useless. Weak. And, now, those feelings are too close by. The smallness. The shame. About not being able to do everything you used to.

You’ve always done your best to “soldier on.” Be tough. Fight those feelings of smallness. You had to. But now? Old hurts start to take you down. You feel small again. Worthless. Filled with self-hate. Fighting everyone who tries to help. The voice of depression says, “Most of the time, you’ll just mess up, so it’s better not to try.” That voice can drag you under. Make you stay in bed. That voice can convince you to give up.  And, when it tries to, that’s when you need to go to therapy.

Thinking you have to “go it alone” is a trauma response. An old one. That’s what happens when there is no one to care, as a child. And even if you have people who love you now, you can’t let them in. Sometimes love isn’t enough.

Not when things are over your head, confusing, and scary.

In therapy, you can admit that you’ve always believed you should deal with your problems without all the talking. That you’ve judged people who need help. Judged yourself. You can admit how hard it is to trust anyone and how much shame you feel now.

In therapy, you can open up your feelings. Shutting out your real feelings weakens you. “Sucking it up” isn’t strength. Talking, when you’re heard and understood, that’s what heals. You get another perspective (when love isn’t enough).

Talking brings you out of your depression. Talking helps you face the feelings you’ve had to block. Talking brings you back (or, maybe, takes you or the first time) to the music that is truly YOU.

Depression makes you block feelings and withdraw from people who care. Sometimes you don’t see love when it’s staring you in the face. Talking helps you build a stronger self and gain resilience when something hard hits you again.

You don’t have to fall into an immobilizing depression again.

You can be sad. You can grieve. You can feel all your feelings. You can even learn to embrace them. And you can know that there is help there when you need it. You never have to go it all alone.

Click here to read more from the film Song Sung Blue on my Characters on the Couch blog.