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second of a 3 part series on Marriage and Depression: How can the depressed person work on himself to get out of depression.

Marlene had to admit that a lot of her problem was born of a sense of childish entitlement which went something like this: “I’ve had an awful life, so I’m entitled to cut corners here and there to make it easier on myself.” The result was that she had bounced a check. And this wasn’t, unfortunately, the first time. “If I’m going to turn my life around and ditch this foolish anxiety problem, then I simply have to force myself to do my...

Marlene is a perfect example of a person who thought she had an anxious personality. Before learning the steps above, she understood why she had it, but that didn’t change anything. (It usually doesn’t.) Her father abandoned the family when she was young and then her mother had to work, leaving her in charge of younger siblings. She was responsible, but that was an awfully heavy burden to place on a child. It was scary. Little kids do not...

In the last post, I set up a typical example of mixed messages. (By the way, in psycho-jargon, these are called “double binds” and they were discussed extensively way back by Gregory Bateson. Analytical people will enjoy Bateson.) Mary Lou, who delivered the mixed messages may have had an ulterior motive to doing so and I did not discuss that in that post. I also left open how Lloyd, her husband of 20 years, ought to handle the problem.