What's the worst thing you can say to a depressed person?

This is the worst. It’s always taken extremely out of context and used at the worst time. Gratitude doesn’t change shit when you’re in the depths of depression and I remember how frustrating it was to hear it from not only people around me, but every therapist I paid.

Recently I realized that “focusing on the positive” doesn’t make depression go away, it actually makes it worse. But I’ve found that practicing gratitude regularly when you don’t feel like a bag of shit can help lighten depression when it comes back. Simple things like “my coworker was helpful at work today” once a day when it doesn’t feel invalidating. I hate that it took 10 years and thousands of dollars in therapy to learn this.

Hope you feel better soon.

/r/AskReddit Thread Parent