Depression Is Contagious

"1 idiot + 2 smart people = 3 idiots"

-Unknown

From the above, the same can be said with depression. If one depressed person goes in a room with 2 non-depressed people - 3 depressed people are going to come out. When I hang out with a person that is depressed, it often feels like the entire conversation is around their mental state which negatively impacts my own, fragile, mental state.

Depression is a sickness of the mind - it's a focus on the wrong things. The sufferer has little to no thought except the negativity he keeps repeating to himself. In a conversation, it can be difficult to move away from the subject because there's not much else the sufferer can talk about.

If you are in a bad place you need to seek help. Whether it be therapy, medication or lifestyle changes there are ways to fight back. Your mind, as is your body, is your responsibility. There's only so much your friends can help with until it starts to negatively impact their own mental state.

Prevention is always better than medication. 

While I'm not a medical professional I think we can all agree that exercise, good sleep and proper diet have tremendous health benefits not just on the physical self but the psychological one as well. Many depressed people I have encountered are failing at, what I consider to be at least, the basics required for a healthy mental state. 

What we need to keep in mind is that it's also possible to be depressed while doing the basics. There are no guarantees in life ... we can only decrease the chances of it something like this from happening. There are also exterior, often outside of our control, things that can happen that would negatively impact our mental state - such as loss.

“Good thoughts and actions can never produce bad results; bad thoughts and actions can never produce good results. This is but saying that nothing can come from corn but corn, nothing from nettles but nettles. Men understand this law in the natural world, and work with it; but few understand it in the mental and moral world (though its operation there is just as simple and undeviating), and they, therefore, do not cooperate with it.”

-As a Man Thinketh by James Allen