5 Ways to Help a Friend Who is Depressed After a Break Up

Good for you for trying to figure out how to help a friend who is depressed after a break up.

The second worst thing in the world, after getting depressed over our own, is watching a friend suffer through a break up. We have been there and we know how much it hurts and our hearts go out to them.

What we don’t always know is what is the best way to help a friend who is depressed after a break up. The path to break up recovery is full of minefields and, as a friend, you want to help them through it and not make things worse.

To that end, here are ways to help a friend who is depressed after a break up, ways that will get them through these dark times quicker. And not leading to you ending up with you In the dog house for your efforts.

#1 — Consider what would you want…

When you have a friend who is depressed after a breakup, sometimes you feel helpless as to how to help. One thing I would suggest is asking yourself what you would want.

I remember when my 13 year old daughter’s best friend had a terrible break up. My 13 year old had never had a boyfriend but the first thing that she told her friend to do was to get some ice cream.

When she told me that, I knew that that was probably the first thing I would tell a friend as well but I wondered how she knew, considering she had never had her heart broken.

‘That’s what I would want if I was feeling sad,’ she said. Brilliant.

So, think about what you would want if you were in the same place. I know that I would want to cry for a bit and then go out for a drink (or 5) with friends and rag on him and then go to the movies. I would eat Pad Thai and French fries and block him on my phone. I would suggest all of those things to my friend and see what stuck.

#2 — …but ask them what they want too.

I know that above I suggested doing things for your friend that you would want done to you but sometimes what we would want just isn’t helpful at all. As a result, your friend could actually feel worse, being forced to do the things that would make YOU feel better.