{"id":207,"date":"2019-11-14T21:00:53","date_gmt":"2019-11-14T21:00:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thejorni.com\/blog\/?p=207"},"modified":"2019-11-22T15:27:25","modified_gmt":"2019-11-22T15:27:25","slug":"the-depression-disconnect-and-communication","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thejorni.com\/blog\/the-depression-disconnect-and-communication\/","title":{"rendered":"The Depression Disconnect and Communication"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Round<\/span><\/p>\n

The depression disconnect broke my family<\/span><\/h2>\n

Depression disconnect.<\/p>\n

Something I have always wondered about is why my parents never picked up on how bad my depression was as a teen. I have talked to hundreds of people battling depression. The more people I spoke with, I discovered that pretty much everyone battling depression has felt misunderstood by their loved ones and friends to varying degrees.<\/p>\n

It made me think about the disconnect depression creates between people. The wedge it drives between loved ones and the incredible damage that distance causes.<\/p>\n

When I was a teenager, several events combined to kick off what were to be nearly two decades of depression. I developed an eating disorder and attempted suicide, but somehow I felt my parents did not take any of this seriously. All I felt was confusion and despair.<\/p>\n

I felt unloved, unsupported, and lost and I did not know who I could even ask for help.<\/p>\n

What did we ever do without the Internet?<\/h3>\n

Now, I am not that old but at the time the Internet was just becoming popular for the average household. I did not have a Smartphone or any kind of mobile phone. I had a pager if that tells you anything. But you definitely could not browse the Internet with that. Resources only included people and books at the time. I was not able to connect to any online depression forums or chat with a counselor online.<\/p>\n

We have come a long way with the understanding that there need to be more mental health resources and immediate access for people in crisis. I also believe that children today are much more aware of depression (maybe because of the Internet). The scary thing is that way too many teens and adults know of someone who has committed suicide. <\/p>\n

\u201cAnd something inside me just…broke…That’s the only way I could describe it.\u201d                                                       – Ranata Suzuki<\/p>\n

We have already succeeded in creating more awareness around depression and mental health in general. The Internet has definitely been a major factor in making that information accessible.<\/p>\n

But none of that actually changes the fact that there is still a disconnect between people battling depression and the loved ones who are trying to support them. One of the biggest disconnects can happen between parents and children, for example, as was the case for me.<\/p>\n

\"Family<\/span>\"Round<\/span><\/p>\n

Hindsight is always 20-20<\/span><\/h2>\n

Now, twenty years after the fact, I can look back and understand what happened back then. As a teenager, the lack of support almost cost me my life. <\/p>\n

And today I understand that my parents were just as traumatized as I was and lost without resources to cope with a depressed teenager.<\/p>\n

As I learned more about my family, I began to understand that the pre and post-war generations had their very own approach to depression – “suck it up princess”. If you can imagine that men who fought in the war were just expected to return to their normal lives after witnessing traumatizing events or after being held prisoner of war, it might not come as a surprise that my grandparents were ill-equipped to define depression, never mind talk about it and try to break through it.<\/p>\n

This type of thinking passed to my parents’ generation, who also largely grew up with the sense that depression was a weakness of the mind and the only way to deal with it was to ignore it and get through it.<\/p>\n

Depression during the post-war years<\/h3>\n

One did not complain because being depressed meant there was something wrong with you. And there was no room for broken people. Depression was something shameful and “broken” people just ended up at asylums and sanatoriums.<\/p>\n

\"No<\/span><\/p>\n

Fast forward to me and I can understand why my parents may have sensed that something was off, but again had no skills to deal with it in any kind of way. And the more they realized something was wrong, the more they panicked because they did not know how to fix it.<\/p>\n

The result was me, as a depressed teenager, feeling abandoned in my depression, and my family, traumatized by watching me go through this and unable to help. It was not that they did not want to help. They told me this many, many years later, when I was actually able to talk about all this. They just did not know how to help me and watching me suffer froze them in pain and fear.<\/p>\n

\"Round<\/span><\/p>\n

The depression disconnect for a teenager<\/span><\/h2>\n

When I was going through depression as a teenager, I was not able to see any of this. And I am pretty sure that anyone battling depression right now won\u2019t have the clarity of mind to understand the situation either.<\/p>\n

It will just seem like family and friends don\u2019t care and you are all alone with your depression. The other very common problem is that depressed people are very good at hiding their depression. That can contribute to the confusion loved ones experience around depression and what it \u201cshould\u201d look like.<\/p>\n

This can be especially true for teenagers, where their depression symptoms could be put off as regular teenage moodiness. Having gone through teenage depression, there are a few things that felt off to me. But the chances of getting me to talk about it with my parents were pretty much zero. Instead, I first went over the top crazy-busy and then completely isolated myself.<\/p>\n

\"The<\/span><\/p>\n

The extremes of depression<\/h3>\n

So what can depression look like in teenagers? I think one possible way to clue in is to look for extremes. I know that does not happen for everyone, but most teenagers I know who are battling depression did experience an \u201cextreme\u201d at some point.<\/p>\n

For example:<\/p>\n