Archibald Hart - Unmasking Male Depression

UNMASKING
MALE DEPRESSION

RECOGNIZING THE ROOT CAUSE OF MANY
PROBLEM BEHAVIORS, SUCH AS ANGER,
RESENTMENT, ABUSIVENESS, SILENCE,
ADDICTIONS, AND SEXUAL COMPULSIVENESS

DR. ARCHIBALDD. HART

UNMASKING MALE DEPRESSION

2001 Archibald Hart.

All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any meanselectronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, scanning, or otherexcept for brief quotations in critical reviews or articles, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

Published in Nashville, Tennessee, by Thomas Nelson. Thomas Nelson is a registered trademark of Thomas Nelson, Inc.

Thomas Nelson, Inc., titles may be purchased in bulk for educational, business, fund-raising, or sales promotional use. For information, please e-mail SpecialMarkets@ThomasNelson.com.

Unless otherwise indicated, Scripture quotations used in this book are from the Holy Bible, New International Version (NIV). 1973, 1978, 1984, International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan Bible Publishers.

Scripture quotations marked KJV are taken from the King James Version of the Bible.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Available

Hart, Archibald D.
Unmasking male depression : recognozing the root cause to many problem behaviors such as anger, resentment, abusiveness, silence, addictions, and sexual compulsiveness / Archibald D. Hart.
p. cm.
ISBN 978-0-8499-4070-5 (trade paper)
1. Depression in men. 2. Depression in menReligious aspectsChristianity. I. Title.
RC537 .H354 2001
616.85'27'0081dc21

2001017691

Printed in the United States of America
08 09 10 11 12 QW 18 17 16 15 14

CONTENTS

F or a long time, there has been a cultural cover-up of male depression. Thank God that is changing. Finally, men are beginning to acknowledge that depression is a part of their world as well. The myth is that men are not supposed to be weak. But depression is not a sign of weakness. The forces that help to create male depression also conspire to keep men from seeing it in themselves. Depression is the hidden, secret pain at the core of many mens lives.

If secular men have problems confronting the reality of male depression, imagine how difficult it is for Christian men to concede it! For them, it isnt just a matter of it undermining their masculinity, but it raises the question of whether they are failing spiritually. The myth in evangelical Christendom, where I belong, is that depression is a sure sign that you are defective in your reliance on God, that you are weak in faith, or, worst of all, that sin lurks in your inmost being.

But men do get depressed. They dont always realize it, but they do, and it is not a failing of any kind. At least one in twenty of them at any one point in time has a serious form of depression that qualifies as clinical, meaning that it needs professional treatment! It is a disorder, and just as you cannot get over pneumonia on your own, it is very difficult to get out of depression on your own. This book, hopefully, will help men accept and address their depression. In particular, I will explore the unique way that men, as opposed to women, experience it.

Let me hasten to add that this book is not just about the deepest of all depressions, known as major depression, but more about the more common forms, the depressions that all men experience from time to time whether they acknowledge them or not. I will certainly address major depression because it is common and serious, but it is misleading to think that depression is only a problem when it is severe enough to incapacitate. By far the greater pain and hardship caused by depression is in the realm of the less seriousthose depressions brought on through stress, distorted values, and lifes inevitable losses. Whole families, especially wives, are ravaged by these hidden depressions.

My hope is that women will read this book as well as men. For one thing, depression can be dangerous. While more depressed women attempt suicide than men, more men succeed in killing themselves. Furthermore, a lot of domestic violence has depression at its core. Women, therefore, need to know what they are up against when their partner is depressed. But equally important is the fact that most people, male or female, do not easily or openly own up to their depression until someone else confronts them with it. For men, their egos get in the way. They are less likely to seek help for it, believing that if they wait, the sad feeling will just go away. If it doesnt, then they often find ways to distract them from their sadness, like having an affair! An observant and wise partner can do a lot, as we will see, to facilitate healing.

I hope that parents and grandparents of boys will read the book also. Serious depression can show itself in early childhood, puberty, or later adolescence. There is a lot more depression behind adolescent acting out than previously recognized. A wise parent will remain well informed about the risks and pitfalls of early life depression. There is much a parent can do to build resilience into a childs life, a resilience that could relieve more serious depressions later. I am trying to put the same principles that I will describe in this book into practice with my own grandchildren.

In the final analysis, depression is a healing emotion if we cooperate with it. Men are typically oriented toward problem solving. A friend of mine and I were chatting recently about a problem he was having. I tried to get him to explore how the problem originated and reflect on where it was going to end typical stuff of psychotherapy. He cut me short with, Thats all fine and good. If we had the time, Im sure I could benefit from such explorationbut just tell me what I need to do and Ill do it! Like it or lump it, thats just how men are. Well, guys, I hope you find plenty of solutions in this book!

Archibald D. Hart, Ph.D.
Graduate School of Psychology
Fuller Theological Seminary

1
THE MALE EGO UNNERVED

The mass of men live lives of quiet desperation.

HENRY DAVID THOREAU

I have great sorrow and unceasing
anguish in my heart.

ST. PAUL (ROMANS 9:2)

I f you think that men dont get depressed, or if you believe that male depression is the same as female depression, you need to think again. Yet for many years, even as a clinical psychologist, it never dawned on me, and many thousands like me, that there was something different and unique about male depressioneven my own. This book is about the unique way men experience depression. I call it a new paradigm for understanding male depression. The old paradigm, which saw depression in both the sexes as essentially the same, is now passing. Yet this isnt only a book about or for men. Women, especially those who have husbands, fathers, brothers, or just male friends, need to read this book as well.

My story begins with my father, long since deceased. I only lived with him until my twelfth birthday, when my parents separated mainly at my mothers instigation. My father had been quite abusive emotionally and extremely jealous. While he was very upset by the separation and they ultimately divorced, it seemed to me that he made no effort to change his behavior toward her. Perhaps he was incapable of changing. Thereafter, I saw him occasionally after school or on weekends, but those were always awkward times, since we felt very much like strangers to each other. In retrospect, however, I now believe that he was a depressed person who did not know how to deal with the out-of-control feelings that haunted him.