The Peace & Prosperity Podcast is a bi-weekly conversation with Jason Phillips, LCSW, licensed therapist and confidence expert in Raleigh, NC, discussing all things related to self-love and self-confidence, and how we can improve ourselves personally and professionally.
Depression doesn’t always look like sadness—especially for Black men. It can show up as overworking, material success, or serial relationships, and often gets mistaken for strength. As a licensed therapist and Black man who's been there, Jason breaks down how these patterns mask real pain. This episode sheds light on what depression really looks like for for Black men—and why getting help might be the most powerful move you make.
To stay connected with Jason and learn about coaching, connect with Jason on social media:
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Website -https://www.jasonlphillips.com
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Episode Transcript
All right, y'all welcome to another episode of
the Peace and Prosperity Podcast.
I'm your host, jason Phillips,licensed therapist, confidence
expert, and we're back, but now,as you can see, we're on
YouTube, so we have the visualplatform to go ahead and match
the audio platform.
So today we're going to betalking about a very important
(00:27):
and necessary topic, which isdepression in Black men.
Now, I caught a little bit ofslack over this on Instagram
because I was talking aboutdepression in Black men, and
this is not to say that some ofthese signs and symptoms don't
apply to other races andethnicities as well.
(00:47):
Throughout my career, I'm goingto get into it, but we're going
to talk about my experienceswith depression in men in
general.
I'm going to share my ownexperiences with depression, and
then we're going to talk abouthow do we manage depression and
how do we best treat depressionin our men.
Now I'm going to start off bysaying that if you are familiar
(01:10):
with depression, or maybe you'vehad your own depressed episode,
you may have noticed a coupleof things.
One is changes in your behavior, so changes in your sleep
pattern.
Maybe you're sleeping more orsleeping less, so you're not
waking up feeling really rested.
It's almost like you can't getenough sleep or you can't fall
(01:31):
asleep.
That's one sign.
Another sign is changes in youreating patterns.
So when I say that you may nothave an appetite at all, like
your favorite foods just don'ttaste as good, or, on the flip
side, you're eating a lot toovercompensate for what you're
feeling.
So those are a couple ofchanges in your patterns.
(01:51):
Also, you may start to avoidand when I say avoid, you're
avoiding your best friends,you're avoiding going out,
you're not being as socialbecause you're not comfortable.
You don't want anybody torecognize or to say oh wait,
(02:17):
hold up, jason.
You you're looking a littledifferent or you don't seem as
bubbly or just like yourself.
And you know if anybody cantell if you've been depressed or
if you're going throughsomething, it's going to be the
people that are closest to you.
So pay attention to when peoplestart to isolate and not show
up to events, not come aroundfor even holidays or celebrate
their own birthday becausethey're going through their own
(02:38):
depressive episode.
Other changes to look for orsigns would be just low mood, so
you're feeling really lethargic, like you don't have any energy
, and this is across the board,the stuff that you used to want
to get into like things thatwere of interest to you, they no
longer interest you anymore.
(02:58):
So again, I wanted to start outwith just going by, what are
some of the general signs ofdepression?
Now, in my career I've had theprivilege of working with men in
different sectors.
So I started my career workingat the VA so I worked with
veterans, mostly older white men.
(03:19):
I was in Ann Arbor, michigan,so that population was
particularly around 40 to 60,sometimes 65, 70 years old.
What I noticed with thispopulation they had not talked
about what they've been through.
For a lot of the veterans thiswas their first time actually
seeking care, or if they wereseeking care, it was because
(03:40):
maybe their spouse had told themto do it or their primary care
doctor had referred them to ourmental health clinic.
Then I started working inhospice.
So I worked in grief and loss.
So I was doing a lot of griefcounseling here.
Mostly this was working withmen or women who had lost a
partner, who had lost a mom ordad, and even in this population
(04:01):
I did a lot of group work.
And even in this population Idid a lot of group work and most
of the groups if there were 15,20 people in a group.
You probably had about two orthree men, just give or take.
And then when I was workingwith them on an individual basis
, most of my clients were stillolder white women.
So you're talking aboutanywhere from ages 50 to, let's
(04:23):
say, 65, just depending uponwhat they were going through and
if they had lost a partner orif they lost a parent who they
were likely the caregiver for.
So men across the board werestill not showing up.
Now, when I worked in hospiceand this was free services so
anybody could come for anylimited period of time I can
(04:43):
definitely count, on one hand,the number of Black men that I
had in my office during thattenure and this was over about a
five-year period we just werenot seeking the help or seeking
the care, even if it wasavailable to us.
Then I worked in communitymental health.
Now, in the community you didhave more men seeking care,
(05:05):
whether it was mandated, whethertheir parents brought them in
or sometimes it could have beena community referral.
But I did see more males.
Typically they were kind ofcoerced into getting treatment.
Like, I'm being honest, itwasn't not.
They weren't just saying, hey,I want to go talk to a therapist
.
Something was going on in theirlife that brought them into the
(05:27):
therapeutic setting Fromcommunity mental health.
I worked in the college campus.
I can still count on one handthe amount of black males that
were seeking care.
So I could go on and on acrossdifferent sectors and areas that
I've worked in.
Where I'm getting at here y'allis.
The reason why I made this postwas because we have to start
(05:49):
looking for signs of depressionin our black men differently.
It's not going to alwayspresent as the person who's
sleep deprived or sleeping toomuch, not eating enough or
eating too much, the person whois very withdrawn and not
hanging out with their peers.
It shows up vastly differently.
(06:09):
So what does it look like?
I'm going to say this In myexperience it looks like
overdoing, and the first sign ofoverdoing is overworking,
throwing yourself into work,because work is something that
looks really plausible in oursociety.
It's something that people cangive you kudos for.
(06:30):
It's like oh, you're pullingextra shifts, great job.
Or you're starting a businesson top of the work you're
already doing.
Man, you're so dope, so you geta lot of praise.
But men are doing this becausethey don't want to talk about
what they have going on, whetherthat's trauma from a
relationship that didn't go well, whether that's trauma from a
(06:51):
relationship that didn't go well, whether that's trauma from
losing a parent or losing aloved one, whether that's
feeling inadequate about wherethey are in life, financially or
in the relationship.
Professionally, it's like letme throw myself into work,
because that's a good way for meto hide out and I will say when
I'm going through stuff, it ismuch easier for me to do the
(07:15):
same thing, so I can work, work,work, work and be productive
and not address what I'm feeling.
So I'm being very open andtransparent on this because I
want you all to know.
If you have black men in yourlife, if you are a therapist and
you work with a lot of blackmen, I want you to be more aware
(07:35):
of some of these signs so thatyou can explore it and have a
conversation about what's thetrue meaning behind this
behavior.
Are you doing this because youwant to, or are you piling more
things on your plate becauseit's good to just keep you busy
and avoid what's really going oninside?
The other sign of overdoing isoverspending, so you're now
(07:59):
overcompensating because of thethings that you didn't get.
This is something that you mayhave experienced, where they
seem to want to buy every singlepair of Jordans, air Maxes
could be Gucci loafers I'm fromDetroit, so that was a thing
(08:22):
back then Like, whatever it is,they just they're fixated on it
and you're like, well, how comeyou say this is your goal, but
I'm noticing you're.
You're spending a lot of time,energy on these materialistic
things, and sometimes this couldalso be materialistic things.
So when I say that is, theJordans, the Air Maxes, the
clothes, the trips, you're doingall of this thing.
(08:45):
You're spending all of thismoney to feel good or look good,
but what's really going oninside?
So I want you to haveconversations with yourself and
ask yourself am I doing thisbecause I truly want to, or am I
attempting to cover up withwhat I'm feeling internally by
(09:05):
making myself look really goodexternally?
So that way, if I look good,people will think I feel good
and they won't ask me how am Ireally doing?
You know, that's what you gotto do.
When you want somebody to tellyou how they're doing, you got
to ask them twice, sometimeseven three times, because if you
only ask them once, they'regoing to give you the oh man,
(09:27):
I'm good bro, or I'm good sis,I'm hanging in there and that's
going to give you the oh man,I'm good bro, or I'm good sis,
I'm hanging in there and that'sgoing to be their escape.
To just go to a differentsubject, all right.
And then the last over is beingover sexual or hypersexual.
And this is because, especiallywith men, if I say man, look, I
(09:48):
just I'm messing with her, I'mdating this person, I just got
it in with this person, it'slike, oh dude, tell me a secret,
tell me more.
Or you're getting a lot of kudosand praise from your boys, but
that's a lot of times.
That's because you don't wantto feel the real pain or address
some of those old wounds.
(10:09):
Maybe you grew up with pain, amom or dad who wasn't there, so
it's hard for you to get closeto somebody.
So what you do is you'll beclose to them physically, but
there's no real emotionalconnection.
So on the outside it looks likeagain, you have the best women,
you're always on dates, you'realways on trips, you keep them
(10:30):
going right, you got the little.
Your conveyor belt is theyrolling in, rolling out.
But truly, you're not happywith that.
You're not pleased with thatbehavior or that person in your
life.
They're not happy with howthey're showing up.
So these are some of the signsthat I want you to look for,
because depression can show updifferently in black men.
(10:53):
Now let me go to some of theresearch, too, before I talk
about my own experiences WithBlack men.
We are less likely to receivetreatment.
We're less likely to open upwhen we are in treatment because
of the mistrust that we havewith a lot of our medical
providers, and then we're lesslikely to remain in treatment.
So we may show up once or twice, but when it comes to staying
(11:17):
for long periods of time whereyou can actually say, yes, I had
a counselor and it was great,or I've met with my psychiatrist
and I'm feeling much better, itjust depends, and this is why
we want to be informed about howcan we better approach these
conversations, because themajority of men will not seek
(11:40):
out traditional professionalmental health services.
So if you are a brother, asister, an auntie, an uncle, you
can still provide a lot ofgreat peer support or support
being their loved one by justasking questions around these I
won't even say difficultconversations, but around these
(12:02):
subjects that a lot of times aretaboo.
I'll say for myself, kind ofswitching gears.
I said I wanted to share my ownexperience with depression.
I remember vividly when I wasworking at a job where I just
literally hated that job.
And for me, work is a part ofmy identity, it just is.
I love what I do.
(12:22):
I've always enjoyed the workthat I've done, but I was
working at a place that just themorale was low.
I had made a move from adifferent place and I was
thinking that this was going tobe great.
And it wasn't.
It was absolutely horrible.
But I didn't want everybody toknow that.
So the treatment I was gettingthere was bad.
I was not happy.
And it wasn't, it wasabsolutely horrible.
But I didn't want everybody toknow that.
So the treatment I was gettingthere was bad.
I was not happy and I rememberjust feeling like man, what have
(12:44):
I just done?
Is this going to work out forme?
Waking up like I really got togo in, I just felt like a dark
cloud was over me for longperiods of time.
Y'all know I love to work out.
It's just been a part of mylifestyle, but during that time
I had no energy to go to the gym.
I had no desire to go to thegym.
(13:07):
So I would come home from work,sometimes I would eat,
sometimes I wouldn't Go to sleep, get up, do it all over the
next day.
I just dreaded my life at thattime.
So, thankfully, I was not inthat situation for a long period
of time.
I wasn't there long enough tobe burnt out, but just my life.
(13:28):
There was feelings ofhopelessness, isolation,
avoidance, a lot of telltalesigns that, again, if you didn't
really know me, I coulddefinitely I'm good.
You and you will just leave mebe.
Other times where I experienceddepression, where I knew like,
okay, hold up, I'm starting towake up feeling just like numb.
(13:49):
I'm not feeling like I want toengage with people.
I'm going to work, but I'm justgoing through the motions.
I knew okay, I felt this backin.
I think it was like 2014 or 13.
So I knew to get myself into agood therapist.
So I wanted to share that withyou, because sometimes you won't
know what somebody's goingthrough.
(14:10):
So I want you to ask them, havethe time to have the
conversation, make sure you askthem a couple of different ways.
Maybe them a couple ofdifferent ways, maybe even a
couple of different times,because you want them to give
you a real, genuine, authenticanswer.
And then, lastly, if this isyou, if you're noticing, wait,
hold on, jason, I feel likeyou're talking to me.
(14:31):
Don't wait to seek out the care.
Too many times we're waitingfor the ideal situation.
I want you to get the help now.
I'll list some resources in theshow notes and in the
description, but I'll say them acouple now.
You can look atpsychologytodaycom,
therapyforblackgirlscom,therapyforblackmenorg,
(14:52):
safehavenorg, and find you agreat therapist for yourself.
All right, y'all, we havewrapped up another dynamic
episode and, as always, listento another one, but I want you
to, for real, for real, beblessed Peace.
Thank you all for listening toanother episode of the Peace and
(15:16):
Prosperity podcast.
Again, if you are feeling like,hey, I'm experiencing high
functioning anxiety, don't beatyourself up about it.
It is OK.
We all experience anxiety fromtime to time and I gave you a
couple of things that you can doon your own, but don't hesitate
to reach out to a professionalto better manage what you're
(15:39):
going through.
Okay, and lastly, make sure, ifyou have not like share,
subscribe to the podcast andsend this out to a friend.
And if you want to hear certainepisodes or have certain
conversations, let me know.
You can shoot me a DM or justleave a review and I will
(16:00):
definitely follow up.
All right, y'all be blessed,peace.
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