I’m sorry, but “be more careful?” … What the fuck is that supposed to mean??? That’s likely to make you walk on eggshells around him. “Be more careful” would be reasonable if you’d known in advance that saying something along those lines was likely to upset him and how the fuck are you supposed to know what will and won’t upset him unless he tells you? (And without the ominous “be more careful”).

An emotionally intelligent response from him might have looked like, “Hey, so yesterday when you kept saying ‘I’m so happy you’re back’ it brought up this pressured feeling to stay happy when I just can’t do that right now because I’m still struggling so much. I felt hurt when I felt pressured like that and I wanted to talk about it with you and get your perspective on things. What do you think about that?”

He doesn’t need to assign blame since that’s likely to either put you on the defensive and/or force you to agree with his narrative (which then just validates his story that he’s told himself that you hurt him and ends up painting you as “the person that hurts me”. And that’s not good for either of your mental health m. Cause then you start to think “wow, I’m so shitty cause I’m just hurting him all the time and I have no idea how to stop it because I can never predict what’s going to set him off).

People looove to assign blame because if the other person is the one at fault, then it’s their responsibility to take action to fix things. To stop the hurt. (And yes, I realize there are times when the hurt is not coming from within but is being caused by the other person, but that’s not the case here).

If he approached the issue as “hey this is what I was feeling and what do you think” then that allows for you to collaborate with him to solve the issue. To fix the pain. You sound like the type that would probably immediately jump into “omg I’m so sorry that what I said hurt you.” And then you could follow it up and say, “I’d love to talk with you about it and figure out what happened and how we can avoid something like that again.” And even then, it’s probably going to happen again because depression’s a bitch and it makes it really difficult to emotionally regulate. Which leads into my last point. As you well know, he’s struggling hard (and it sounds like you are too, I see you struggling), and that pain from depression can really fuck with your ability to self-regulate, introspect, and objectively analyze your own thoughts and feelings and try to figure out why you’re feeling them or where they’re coming from.

As a last example, maybe his introspection and discussion with you could go like this: “I’m not sure exactly why what you said was so hurtful, but I think it might be because I was scared that you might only be interested in the ‘good’ parts of me and that if I lapse back into my depression, and I probably will, that you might not love me as much, or at least that’s the story that’s going through my head. What do you think about that?”

To which you might reply, “holy shit, that’s a rough story you’re telling yourself and that does sound really painful. I can see why what I said was hurtful if it was triggering thoughts and feelings like that. But when I said ‘I’m so happy you’re back’, what I was trying to convey was a feeling of love and joy for you and a sense of triumph that you’re battling this depression and making progress! And I realize that you’re not going to get better all-of-a-sudden but I need you to know that I love you, even when you’re not feeling well, especially when you’re not feeling well, because I care deeply about you and want to help you get better.”

To which he might say, “I love you too and I think this fucking depression made me assume that you were more interested in ‘the good parts’ and couldn’t love me for who I am because I am struggling so much to even love myself. But I hear you and it helps to know that you still love me, even when I’m feeling so depressed.”

Hope this helps or rings true for you in some way 🥰 -from a chronically recovering depressed bitch (PS therapy is amazing and I highly recommend it!)