Broke up with someone who was depressed
The term depression tends to gets mentioned a lot but the truth is I'm not really sure what it means anymore. After a decade, my so decided to break up with me bec he says that he doesn't want to be life partners and he was making me unhappy. It wasn't due to any lack of support from my part, he simply hated himself. He was acting and doing things that were emotionally abusive that he just didn't want me to go through that ordeal anymore.
When we parted, I gave him a lot of advice of what he needed to do to get out of his funk. He claims that he's continuing to see a therapist but somehow it seems like his condition is worsening according to what I've heard from mutual friends. He refuses to get a job and relies on short term contract work from friends, he won't fix his sleep schedule and he seems to just not eat at all.
I've accepted that we can't be a couple but really frustrating that he's allowing himself to deteriorate like this. I know he went through something similar in college and he had recovered when we got together but it seems impossible to see him recover now that he doesn't really have family to support him.
The only people he seems to keep close now are either depressed, can't be financially stable, just a bad influence on him. It's as if he's making all the worst choices possible short of dying.
I'm torn between wanting to intervene or just letting him continue to destroy himself.
@tealVillage6189
How horrible to see someone you care about sink to such lows. I can understand why you're feeling torn.
For what it's worth, I don't think there's much you can do, unfortunately. Even if being with you or someone like you eased his issues, he can realistically expect to rely on that. What if an anvil dropped on you while you were walking down the street one day?
I think, though, that there's a lot of middle ground between intervening and letting him self-destruct. It could be that he has to find his own inner fortitude to cope with his life and his issues. And he may have to go through some really dark times to get there. But he has to choose that.
Did you ever hear the butterfly story? A man was watching some butterflies struggling to emerge from their cocoons. He was filled with pity as he watched them struggle to exhaustion, stop and then continue on so he decided to help by carefully cutting open cocoons to let them out. All of them came out easily after that but couldn't fly and soon died. They needed to struggle to make their wings strong enough to fly. OK, that's a bit apocryphal but even as a parable, it might be worth keeping in mind.
You seem like a very caring, empathetic person. If I were in your shoes, I might tell him that I'd give him support and encouragement as long as he continued to try to help himself (therapy, work, meds, whatever he's capable of doing) but I would not be a part of any downward spiral and I would not be an emotional crutch.