depression advice

For the last six years, I have been living with depression. Despite the fact that I have extremely low moments when there is an inexplicable and unreachable pain inside me that demotes me into a sobbing, self-harming, low self-esteemed shell of the person that I actually am, there are a number of ways that living with (not suffering from) depression has improved my life and made me a better human being.

Those who know and love people with depression usually want nothing other than to help. But during the times I've been depressed, even the most well-intentioned efforts to help often backfired.