My oldest nephew went off to college last weekend.  

Well, sort of.

My mother, along with his mother and maternal grandmother, dropped him off at the dorm.  But they hadn't hooked up the internet yet, so he couldn't play Halo, and he refused to do any of the Freshman orientation activities the school had lined up for the incoming class because his roommate, whom he'd already met online, wasn't coming until Monday, and he wasn't about to venture out without a wingman.  

So the whole lot of them trooped the hundred miles back home so that he wouldn't have to go bowling alone.  Which is what happens when you've got a gaggle of grandmothers and no grandpas around to say, "why, back in my day..."

I didn't have any living grandparents, period, when I went off to college, but even if I had I would never have considered turning around once I got there. College was everything I'd ever wanted at that point. It was freedom. As for my sea legs: back then you just had a stiff drink and sallied forth to face your fears — and your peers — face-to-face.  There really was no other option.  I don't know if all kids today are as skiddish about meeting others in the flesh as my nephew, or if they all vet their potential peers as exhaustively, but something about his refusal to even try to swing it old-school struck me as sad.  

_______________________________________________

I don't struggle with depression.

I struggle with reality. 
_______________________________________________

The men in my family (and we outnumbered the ladies — um, lady, actually — four-to-one growing up) all seem at times perversely shy among strangers.  The more perverse for the fact that we can all be obnoxiously outspoken among family and friends.  I've come to think of this false bravado among intimates as the flipside of a social phobia I had to overcome, myself.  

We've all seen kids who pitch a fit whenever their parents drop them off at preschool — I mean, way above and beyond what the situation merits.  As if they're being handed over to pirates or pimps or sold to Goblins for magic beans.  And we've all said to ourselves, "whoa, there's something going on there." 

My sister-in-law's caving in to my nephew's carping about spending the night on campus without his internet is all you need to know about what's going on there.  Enable much, sis?

Families, like that old Granta issue had it, fuck you up.  It's not anti-family to say so, either.  It's just a fact.  There's no avoiding it.  They warp you, and then it's up to you to unwarp yourself as best you can, while hopefully still staying warped enough in that particular way that allows you to relate to them.  

Of course, this warping is way worse when you're dealing with someone who's shy to begin with, since you generally can't get to where you can survey the wreckage without climbing out of it.  Morrissey was right: "shyness is nice, and shyness can stop you from doing all the things in life you'd like to."  And if your shyness stops you from building friendships beyond family, social anxiety can spiral into depression.  

As my mother and I chatted about my nephew, who has apparently been in a bad mood for the last seven years, and has lately alienated all his childhood friends, I recalled his father's jags of gloominess and lack of motivattion, his grandfather's long bouts of blah, and my own debilitating fits of boredom.  

"Maybe he's depressed," I suggested. "He might benefit from talking to someone."

A suspicious "hmm" was all my mother could muster by way of an answer. 

Some people, the first thing to pop into their heads when someone's moody is "therapy!"  But where I grew up, you just toughed it out.  People weren't depressed, it was just the seventies.  You muddled through.  Men were supposed to be the strong, silent type, and, frankly, so were women.  People didn't talk about their problems. Everybody's got 'em.  You walk it off, you don't talk it off.  That's what sports are for.  Shrinks were for people with too much time and money on their hands.

Of course, everyone can benefit from a listening ear. Someone impartial, whose judgments are at least more objective than anyone in your family or circle of friends. The priest or pastor can play that role. Some people think the internet is a substitute, but I see no real benefit in chatroom therapy sessions. There are just some things you have to say to someone who's sitting in the same room. Especially when alienation is the issue, human contact is really the only answer.

But as someone who has suggested therapy to friends in the past, and lived to regret it when the therapist created a monster, I also think fixing a friend up with a therapist is as tricky as arranging a blind date.  There's definitely chemistry to consider, but even before you get there, there's the issue of self-awareness.  Where it's seriously lacking it's like sending a sheep to the slaughter.  

I hate to say it, but just as there are bad hairdressers and shifty auto mechanics who should be avoided at all cost, there are therapists who shouldn't be allowed to tinker around in a fragile psyche.  I suggested couples therapy to a friend who was having issues with his partner some years ago.  After a single session his partner refused to return, but my buddy kept going.  

He's now gone through several therapists, and there is not a single plate left unshattered in the china shop of his psyche.  At this point even his issues have issues.  Frankly, there are certain people who, the more therapy they get the more they need — unfortunately that complex, as it applied to other parts of his life, was what I thought he might address in therapy.  No such luck.

Is my nephew depressed, or just your garden-variety shy, spoiled teenager? Most likely the latter. Like most of us, he's probably not struggling with drepression so much as reality. But that doesn't mean he can't use a little help in growing out of it. If only they made a video game for that.