Hi everyone.
I've been with my girlfriend for just a little over a year, and we've had many ups and downs, and broken up and got back together many times.
Recently she's been stressing a lot about uni, and her family, and her job, and a lot of insecurities. I know her family, and they are an almost textbook example of a dysfunctional family. That's fair enough, I went through many years of depression so I know how she feels. She's mentioned wanting seeing a counsellor for a little while now, and I explained to her how that's nothign unusual, and nothing to be ashamed of, and if she wanted then I could help her find one.
Tonight in our MSN conversation she said some things to me, some of which were:
---
Her:
i think i want a therapist
Me:
how come?
Her:
just so i can talk to someone about everything that goes thru my head
Me:
it's a lot?
Her:
yeh
Me:
i think it's fairly straightforward to do that
Me:
and i bet we can do it through uni
---
Her:
plz no smiley faces
Me:
what's preventing you from looking into councelors?
Her:
i know ur just tyring to be pos and nice
---
Her:
i might just kinda think about things on my own
Me:
why not do something? you can talk to me, like i said before
Or I can help you find someone
Her:
im not ok talking to someone i dont know
Me:
some ppl feel better about it if it's someone they don't know
Her:
id rather not dump things on u
Me:
you really don't want me to help you find someone?
Her:
its coz im wishing u or my mum will offer it to b u to listen
Her:
makes me feel bad when u suggest i should talk to someone
Me:
ah ok, just that you said you wanted a therapist, so i thought i'd help
Her:
i meant u
Her:
thats the thing, i dont want to tell u or anyone
Her:
im sure u can figure out how i feel right now
Her:
i think its just best we end this convo tnite now
Her:
i will never talk opening [openly] to ppl i dont know
Her:
can we drop this?
Her:
actually nevermind
Her:
gnite
---
And that was it. She went offline and won't answer my call. A few minutes later she came online and then offline again with half a second, which usually happens when people connect to MSN and then quickly put themselves on invisible mode.
I've always offered to help her in any way, despite knowing full well that I'm not certain I want to be with her for the rest of my life, but at the moment I am fairly happy. I've offered to be the one she can talk to, I've offered to help her find someone she can talk to. But when she says she wants a therapist, and then I offer to let her tell me, and then offer to help her find somebody she can talk to, she gets snappy and says she wanted me to offer?
If she wants some good psychological help, a boyfriend like me (of only a year, and our relationship is quite rocky as it is) is probably not the best person to go to. For small things yes, but I do think that for serious emotional issues she needs more professional help than I can give. I know that sounds like I'm being impatient and uncaring, but my intentions are true here. My friends were of great help when I was depressed but I also knew that the more serious issues were mroe seirous than anything some supportive friendly words could deal with.
I really think that for the past seven or eight months now I've been a VERY supportive boyfriend. I understand the depression she's going through, I've done everything I can to help her. I've always offered to be there for her to talk to, and I've always told her that if she doesn't want to talk to me then I understand, and that I'll help her find a councellor. Of course I would never take offence at something like that, if she didn't want to tell me about some things.
I went through some really bad depression that lasted for about four years, and I know I was quite stubborn, but I didn't refuse help as blatantly as this. Am I being very impatient by getting frustrated that she shoots down my attempts to help her? By benig accused of being falsely positive and falsely nice? I'm worried I'll soon be at a point where I snap at her and tell her that she has to help herself, I can't just try and try to help her and get shot down every time.
EDIT: Just to clarify something. I feel like I may be a little too impatient. I do recognize the value of the kind and supporting words of friends when you're feeling down, my friends have certainly helped me through a lot of things. But I also realize the value of professional help, and that psychiatry is a <i>much</i> more complex study than Dr Phil or simple pop psychology.