If depression affects 1 in 4 of us (and the statistics tell us today alone 2 people in Scotland will commit suicide) imagine just how many people are then affected by association. How many wives, mothers, fathers, daughters, grandparents, friends, colleagues will have had to battle with living with, working alongside and continuing to care for, love and support someone who's struggling with some form of mental health problem? Thousands upon thousands of listeners are, right now, struggling to cope with mental health by association.
In The Ripple Effect; Clare English hears the experiences of living with mental health problems from a loved one's perspective. Negotiating unpredictable behaviour; the introspection and apparent self-obsession of a sufferer and the uncertainly of what will greet them when they go home.
Today, we speak to Simon who lives with his wife's Post Natal depression; that means coping daily with her breakdowns and extreme anxiety over the children's health, but most poignantly, he's watched the woman he fell in love with become a shadow of her former self. Clare hears how he hangs in there and manages not to end up depressed himself in the face of such challenges, not to mention, quite simply, just how he continues to love someone when they are so emotionally withdrawn? Show less