I'd like to begin just by responding to the final insight with which Dr. Pelcovitz offered. There is a beautiful story about a Rebbe who was having a Seuda Shlishis and just to set the scene, it's twilight, it's now later, no light in the room, the atmosphere certainly conducive to Dveikus and the Rebbe is giving the Divrei Torah. It's a time of Rava D'ravin, the highlight, the culmination of Shabbos, and the Rebbe is giving the Divrei Torah. The Chassidim are listening and the Neshamas are soaring L'eila U'l'eila. In the midst of this, a boorish, ignorant farmer, not even dressed in Bigdei Shabbos, pushes his way through and doesn't even speak in Yiddish, speaks in whatever the Eastern European vernacular was, and says, Rebbe, I have a problem with my horse. The horse doesn't pull the wagon the way it used to. So the Rebbe says, try putting a little bit of sugar in with the food and maybe that will make a difference. Then the Rebbe resumes the Divrei Torah. The Chassidim, who were aghast at that unimaginable, presumptuous disturbance, disruption, but they also, they're able to resume, and again the Neshamas are soaring. Just as again they feel like they're about to reach levels that they've never been at before, who pushes his way to the front again? The same boorish farmer and says, Rebbe, I don't think that's it. I've tried sugar in the past. There must be something more to it. So the Rebbe says, well, then I suggest going to the blacksmith and replacing the horseshoes. Maybe your horse needs different shoes and I think that might make the difference. The Chassidim barely, barely contained themselves at this point, but somehow or other they did. The Rebbe resumed the Divrei Torah, everything repeats itself, and sure enough, the farmer pushes his way to the front again. At this point the Chassidim are not going to be able to restrain themselves anymore. They're ready to tear him apart. At which point the Rebbe turns to the Chassidim and says to them in Yiddish, so the farmer shouldn't understand, so he says, don't you understand? He's not interested in his horse. He knows that I'm no big Mumcha about horses, but he wants to have some kind of Kesher, he wants to have some kind of connection. So when you want to have some kind of Kesher with me and obviously ultimately with the Ribbono Shel Olam, so if you're Oigel Likos, you're Koveia, you come, you ask me a question about a Pasuk Chumash. If you're on a higher Madrega, you have more background, you ask me a Mishna, you ask me a Gemara, you'll ask me a Zohar. He says, he doesn't know anything. He said from his earliest youth his father had to help him out to try to eke out a meager living. He doesn't know anything, but he wants the Neshama, he wants some connection, he wants some closeness. He has no other language in which to speak, so this is the only language he knows, so that's the language in which he's speaking to me also. So the Gadlus of the Rebbe in this story was exactly what Dr. Pelcovitz was depicting, was the ability to see things from the other person's perspective, which in general, both in the context of today's topic and in general, is a very, very important principle in our Bein Adam L'chavero. To come to this morning's topic, I mentioned to my mother that I was going to be speaking this morning and that the way the program was set up, I was sandwiched between two very distinguished guests. distinguished and rightfully highly acclaimed experts in their field. And I said to her, I'm not sure exactly what I'm doing on the program. So, you know, you can fool a lot of the people a lot of the time but you can't fool your own mother, at least I can't. So she says to me, so you'll just have to get up there and tell them that circumstances are such that you're feeling depressed. So without telling you how much truth there is to that comment, let's in all seriousness, I'd like to speak briefly about two areas and then along the way and maybe a little bit distinctly as well touch on a third. First of all, and in each of these it's just to review ideas and sources that I think are known to all of us, but first of all, what the status of depression in particular and mental illness in general is within halakha. The second area, the role of a rav or mechanech. And then third to touch upon, more identify than respond to, certain shailos which emerge from the challenges of dealing with depression. There's no question and it's min hamefursamos and there's no need to belabor the point that halakha recognizes and relates very seriously to mental illness. The whole category of a shoteh, the assumption lehalakha unless we have clear evidence to the contrary, let's say in a case of suicide rachmana litzlan, the person was not acting bedaas tzelula, that he was not acting lucidly and therefore that none of the ostracism which the halakha mandates for me'abed atzmo lada'at, none of these are applied unless there's clear indication that the person was bedaas tzelula, which is a highly, highly unusual occurrence. So mental illness clearly exists and it can and rachmana litzlan at times does render a person a shoteh and it can be so extreme that it can lead to suicide and the halakha recognizes all this. Matter of fact, the Rambam has an interesting aside, an interesting comment when he talks about the halakha, the gezeirat hakatuv that אין אדם משים עצמו רשע. So if a person walks into beit din and says that I committed an aveirah for which I'm chayav malkot, for which I'm חייב מיתת בית דין, so we know the din is that אין אדם משים עצמו רשע. So that testimony is not acceptable. So the Rambam says because שמא מן העמלים מרי נפש הוא המחכים למות שתוקעים חרבות בבטנם ומשליכים עצמם מעל הגגות,
that maybe this person is amongst those whose souls are embittered, who long for death, who will throw themselves on their swords or throw themselves off of roofs. The Rambam says that this is a possible perspective on the halakha of אין אדם משים עצמו רשע. Rambam says klal shel davar gezeirat hamelekh hu, it remains gezeirat hakatuv, we don't seek to reduce it to any rationale, but nevertheless he sees fit to tell us that this may be at least a lesson to be derived, if not the driving cause of the halakha. But specifically with regard to depression, so interestingly enough, and not coincidentally, but interestingly enough, one of the main marei mekomos in terms of depression and halakha is actually in Masechet Shabbat. The mishna in towards the end of Bameh Madlikin talks about המכבה את הנר מפני נכרי מפני לסטים מפני רוח רעה מפני החולה שישן
is patur. And the Gemara explains that this is actually patur u-mutar because in each of these cases there’s an element of sakana and therefore it’s patur u-mutar. So the Rambam there in Perush ha-Mishnayos on the mishnayos on the perek acharon uses the Arabic word, the Judeo-Arabic word that's a cognate for melancholic and said that the ruach ra'ah of which the mishna speaks is melancholy. And this is a word that one finds in the poskim. Now, it’s difficult to know obviously, you know, how the Rambam understood the etiology of the disease and but I’m not sure that that’s as important frankly as the fact that the Rambam says that the ruach ra'ah of the mishna in Shabbos is depression, is melancholy, depression, and that that catapults the person into the status of yeish bo sakana. Similarly, I saw quoted a teshuva from the Baruch Ta'am that he correlates this Rambam in Perush ha-Mishnayos in Shabbos with another Rambam. The mishna says at the beginning of the seventh perek in Masechet Gittin that if a man mi she-achazo kordyakos, a certain illness, a certain mental illness, if he’s in the grip, mi she-achazo kordyakos, he’s in the grip of this mental illness and he gives a tzivuy ha-ba'al to write and he commissions a get for his wife, so then since at the moment he has the din of a shoteh, he's a lav bar da'as, so as a result so we don't act on that and it has no validity whatsoever. So the Rambam writes in paraphrasing this that the person is gripped by a ruach ra'ah. That same phrase which, this is what the Baruch Ta'am in his teshuvos points out and then this is quoted subsequently by the later poskim, but the same phrase which the Rambam in Perush ha-Mishnayos in Shabbos identifies at least partially with melancholy, with depression, so here the Rambam again is using that same phrase in context of someone who’s a shoteh, someone who because of the ruach ra'ah has been rendered a lav bar da'as because of the, well, I'll leave it to the experts, but part of the depression is just a terrible state of confusion at times which the patient has, which undoubtedly must be exacerbated by the mental anguish which they suffer and that and whatever contributing causes as well can and rachmana litzlan does render a person a lav bar da'as. Not necessarily that the Rambam is saying that ruach ra'ah means depression exclusively, but ruach ra'ah is a category of shoteh, it’s a category of something which can pose a sakana and melancholy is one of the illnesses which the Rambam subsumes under this. It’s interesting that the Malbim in his perush on Sefer Shmuel when the Navi tells us that ורוח ה' סרה מעם שאול, the spirit of HaKadosh Baruch Hu left Shaul, ובעתתו רוח רעה מאת ה', and in its stead, so Shaul was in the grip of a ruach ra'ah. So what exactly is the ruach ra'ah? So the Malbim at first just describes it symptomatically and then later he defines it diagnostically. What was it symptomatically? Tachas ruach ha-nisgav that in place of this exalted spirit which he had when he had the ruach Hashem within him, ישכון בו רוח אחר שחורי, this black mood, this black mood resided in him, took hold of him, מלא בהלה ועצב דאגה והסע, filled with, brimming with terror, with sadness, with worry, with anxiety. Then in the next pasuk when the avdei Shaul I guess, I guess in modern terms this is I think the Malbim would probably have us translate it as they recommend music therapy. So here the Malbim actually gives a name; until now it was more of a symptomatic description. He says, שאול אחר סר ממנו רוח השם לא נשאר כגזע האנשים.
Shaul, once he lost that special ruach Hashem which he had previously been privileged to have, he didn't just fall back to the station where most people are, אבל היה דואג תמיד. He was worried almost, I guess, obsessively, מהרהר בעונשו ובהפסד מלכותו בחטאו. He was thinking about the punishment, about the loss of his kingdom, umitoch kach, I'm not sure how to translate the next phrase, ומתוך כך נשרף דמו ונתהווה בו חולי המלנכולי. And as a result, it generated within him melancholy. And there's a lot in the literature of she'eilot u'teshuvot about, again, about melancholy in particular. The poskim also discussed, the Otzar Haposekim in Even Ha'ezer discusses this, and this is also in the encyclopedias about halacha u'refuah. So these things are discussed and reviewed. Also discussed the issue of depression. And again, the Baruch Ta'am in his teshuvah says very clearly, very clearly, that there are different degrees of severity of depression, and he dismisses the sho'el who thinks that depression never qualifies as a חולה שיש בו סכנה and says it's clearly the case as anyone familiar with the literature he says, anyone who knows the sefarim shehibru bo knows that it often does, it can rise to the level of being a bonafide shoteh, rendering a person a lav bar da'at, no longer lucid. So the first thing that we have to realize, again, is that the halacha does recognize this illness and the halacha does recognize, again, that depending upon the severity, it may represent a חולה שיש בו סכנה, it may represent, if it's not as severe a case, it may represent a חולה שאין בו סכנה, with all the ramifications and implications for chilul Shabbat if need be. And the same way in assessing a potential health threat based on a physical illness, so we're guided by the rules of safek nefashot. So the same applies when it comes to an illness such as depression in terms of safek nefashot as well. There's no question that there are times when it will constitute safek nefashot and Rachmana litzlan chilul Shabbat certainly will be mandated. What happens if you don't know? The same thing what happens when we don't know in terms of assessing physical illness. The most qualified person on hand, if one has at hand an expert, so it's לפי רופא מומחה באותו זמן ובאותו מקום, but in absence, where some decision has to be made, do you call, do you go to the hospital? So if one doesn't know but there is some basis for doubt, not just a hysterical reaction, but there's some basis for doubt based on some of the symptoms that we've heard about, that we will hear about, so certainly it has to be treated as safek nefashot if that seems to be the case, וכל הזריז הרי זה משובח. Even if it doesn't rise to the level of yeish bo sakanah as posing a potential and sofek sakona, it certainly will often be serious and significant enough to qualify as חולה שאין בו סכנה with whatever implications that has in terms of, there's no question that refuah is muttar on Shabbos, amira l'akum, etc. Let's move a little bit to the second area in terms of what the role of a rav or a mechanech is in encountering depression amongst congregants, amongst talmidim. You know, in general, Rav Meir Berlin in talking about what the role of a rav is, so he writes in his memoirs that he asked three of his illustrious relatives what the role of a rav is. So he asked the Aruch HaShulchan, so the Aruch HaShulchan told him the role of a rav is to pasken shaylos. He asked Reb Refoel Shapiro, and he said the role of a rav is a rav doesn't do anything. That's what Reb Refoel Shapiro said. And he asked Reb Chaim and Reb Chaim told him that the role of a rav is to do chesed. There's no question that certainly in the contemporary American rabbinate that Reb Chaim's definition occupies a very prominent place and the pastoral care which rabbonim provide and should provide for their kehillos is very important, and in that role of pastoral care, so a rav has much to contribute in dealing with depression. First of all, the rav or a rebbe in a yeshiva setting will very often become a confidant. People will confide in their rav, in their rebbe, things which they don't easily, if at all, confide in others. And oftentimes the data necessary to recognize that the person is depressed, that the person needs professional help will be available to the rav, will be available to the rebbe in yeshiva when it's not really available to others, which just highlights the importance of rabbonim, of mechanchim being sufficiently oriented to be able to recognize when a person comes and complains of whether it's lack of energy or some other persistent symptom or aggregate of symptoms of depression, it's very important that the rav be able to recognize it because this confidence may not be shared with others. And of course then his obligation is, in general, it's very important whatever a person does in life, in our field as well as in any field, a person has to know his limitations. The same way if someone comes to a rav, someone comes to a rebbe in yeshiva with a shayla, so a person has to know his limitations in terms of what he's capable of handling, what he's not capable of handling. And the same is certainly true, it is as true in the capacity of giving pastoral care and pastoral guidance and direction, the same is true there, that we also have to know what's within our competence to deal with and what's beyond our competence. As a rule of thumb, and again, talking now about let's say rabbonim who are not also simultaneously psychologists, who don't have the benefit of advanced training, rabbonim who for the most part are operating with whatever common sense and life experience and empathy that they bring to bear, so probably a good rule of thumb is that, you know, if someone is, that you can draw a line between what a person says, you know, rebbe, I have a problem, can you help me deal with a problem? So that's one type of issue which may come to your attention. But then there's when it isn't just an issue, but again, is something which is dominating a life. It's not an issue, it's not a problem. But it's an illness, it's a disorder. So that usually means, unless the Rav again simultaneously is also a trained psychologist, that's got to be beyond his competence and it's very important that the Rav make a referral. Now here, Dr. Pelcovitz before cautioned about how treatment for depression isn't isn't instantaneous and and that there has to be patience and perseverance in letting the treatment run its course. Now the the other side of of the coin and and this isn't to contradict, but the other side of the coin is that a little bit this morning you're going to get a misleading you're going to be misled in one issue. And that one issue is that unfortunately it's more difficult to find a a highly qualified mental health professional than it is if if you have an orthopedic problem it's going to be a lot easier to find a good orthopedist than if there's something in the area of mental health it's going to be much more difficult to find someone who's highly qualified. And just the percentage of experts, the percentage of competent people in mental health profession unfortunately is not as high as it is in other areas of medicine. And that's it's very important and and again this is something you know when when your talmid or your balabus goes into the goes into the mental health profession you know he's not going to be the one to tell them you know have your wits about you. I may be an incompetent and I may be a quack and I may have you sitting on the couch for two months and and not not be help you. But that is something which he needs to hear on the contrary from the layman, from the Rav, from his Rebbe that and not so much the idea is not to not to engender within the person a cynicism about the profession because that's not at all warranted. The profession has much to offer, but it's very important that people be realistic that sometimes it may not be the first doctor they consult and sometimes it may not be the second doctor they consult. So the idea is not to undermine their confidence in the profession, not at all. The profession has a tremendous amount to offer and there is no substitute for what a again a well-trained person with who's also just blessed with an innate intuition for for dealing with people, there's no replacement, there's no substitute for what that person can offer. So the idea is not to again not to engender cynicism, but it's very important that there be realism that it may take time to find the right person. It may take time to identify the right person and therefore there shouldn't be a sense of despondency or it's a waste of time. I've already been to one or two people. Sometimes it and halevai as in everything halevai that the first one should be the should be the right match but but it often is not the case or at least sometimes is not the case. And it's very important that psychologically people be primed for that and that the disappointment of not of not finding the right person for the first time that that shouldn't translate into the field has nothing to offer me. Now as as Dr. Pelcovitz mentioned and and alluded that Dr. Schwartz is going to elaborate, you know depression is very complex and the the interplay between biological and call it circumstantial factors is a very complicated one and obviously varies from case to case. So what I'm about to say obviously is only going to be relevant in some cases and how relevant it is will vary from case to case also. But in some cases, even if there is a a strong biological predisposition to depression, there is a trigger which brings it to the surface. Right, often people who perhaps have this biological predisposition but yet it happens it's at a certain point in their lives, it's at a certain point in time, something triggers it, there's some catalyst, some which brings it to the surface. talking about some people in some cases. It's the only generalization you can make is that that you can't generalize. But in some cases there will be a trigger and it's amongst potential triggers and again and certainly if we're talking about a depression which isn't so strongly biologically based, but one which is more due to life experiences, due more to the nurture than to the nature, stress plays a very important role and in terms of dealing with stress, coping with stress, here the Rav or the mechanech has a lot to offer his talmidim. Dr. Pelcovitz mentioned that Rabbeinu Bachya in the Chovot Halevavot talks about how one of the emotional corollaries to a sense of bitachon is menuchat hanefesh. That if a person has deeply profound bitachon. And again, by having profound bitachon, what Rabbeinu Bachya means is it's not just intellectual, it's not just that intellectually I believe such and such, but I feel it. That belief has been sufficiently internalized. I don't just believe it, but I feel it. Rabbeinu Bachya says if a person not only believes, intellectually subscribes to bitachon, to trust in Hakadosh Baruch Hu, but feels it, so he says the emotional corollary to that is menuchat hanefesh. Why is that? Stress, anxiety, things are going wrong. How am I going to cope? What's going to be? So all of that is engendered by a sense of things being out of control, right? Things are going wrong. How can I cope with this? What's going to be? So the common denominator there is that things are out of control. Rabbeinu Bachya says if a person again not only knows but feels, there's no such thing as things being out of control. Because the hashgacha pratit which Hakadosh Baruch Hu exercises is such that things are not out of control. They may not be intelligible to me, but that doesn't mean they're out of control. It means that what's happening is supposed to be happening. In terms of external factors in one's life over which one has no control, so what's happening is supposed to be happening. That Hakadosh Baruch Hu is exercising that hashgacha pratit. With that sense, so Rabbeinu Bachya says that engenders within a person a sense of menuchat hanefesh. A true ba'al bitachon doesn't doesn't get stressed out. And to the extent that we experience stress, so according to Rabbeinu Bachya, that's a reminder that we need to deepen and to internalize our sense of our sense of bitachon. The story is told of Rav Aharon Kotler zecher tzadik livracha when he was on his deathbed and his rebbetzin not necessarily sort of reacting to the objective circumstances, not necessarily to any cue that her husband had given, was looking to encourage him, looking to encourage him. So she says to him, אהרן דער דוקטור זאגט אז מארגן וועט זיין בעסער. The doctor says that tomorrow things will be better. So Rav Aharon shook his head and says, what is, has to be, and what has to be is good. Rav Aharon answered her that what's happening now is not not an accident. What's happening now is Hakadosh Baruch Hu decreed it. וואס איז דארף זיין. And if Hakadosh Baruch Hu decreed it, so then so that is good. So Rav Aharon told her that he wasn't he wasn't anxious. He wasn't anxious. Obviously, when it comes to tefillah, so we're supposed to be mispallel from our vantage point. Our vantage point is that a person that we're supposed to live, so we daven for refuah. But to the extent in hindsight that we see that until this point our tefillos haven't been answered, so then in terms of processing what's happened until now, so then a person processes that from the vantage point of bitachon. Looking forward to the future, what are we mispallel for? So we're supposed to look from the human perspective. That's the only perspective we have. In terms of processing what's happened or what's happening, so then וואס איז דארף זיין and and that's what Rav Aharon told her. And he had total equanimity, total menuchat hanefesh. And and certainly that that method of of dealing with with stress is very very very relevant. In terms of trying to address at least one of the possible triggers in some cases for depression and also in terms of to whatever extent in an individual case, it's not only medication which is warranted but psychotherapy as well, so certainly the Rav has a lot to contribute there. Two other areas just very, very quickly, two other areas in which the Rav can and and should do his best to contribute and and to help. First of all, it's been mentioned already and and it's very important in a person coping with depression is the support system that he has around him. If the Rav, together with the family members, together with friends, empathizes, shows not only care and concern but also understanding, doesn't downplay it as, you know, no, just snap out of it, but recognizes that there's something which is often involuntary within the illness, so that that support is is crucial to help maintain the ruach ish yechalkilehu, to help maintain the patient as the patient copes with the depression. The Rav zichrono livracha in in talking about the mitzvah of bikur cholim, he used to depict so beautifully, he says what the experience of the choleh is. He says above and beyond whatever the the precise ailment is and whatever symptoms are generated by the ailment, but the choleh has a sense of abandonment. The choleh has a sense of the whole world is going on, and the whole world is going on and it's going on without him. Nothing has come to a stop. And he's and he has a sense of being abandoned, forgotten, which again to the extent that maybe a lack of meaning even contributes to depression in the first place, so then it becomes a vicious cycle. And when and when you show that you care, and when you show the person is not forgotten, and when you tell the person, 'You know, we miss you, we we need you,' it's impossible to assess just how much that potentially can mean to a person. Someone coping with depression as with many other illnesses may be bothered theologically with the problem of tzadik vera lo. Again, this problem is and certainly to the more biologically based the depression is, the more likely it is that the person may be bothered because then the person struggles with how come I'm how come I'm why seemingly I'm just wired the wrong way? How come I'm wired in such a way that I have to cope with this depression? So I think here there are a few again and and here we're not talking in particular about depression but in general in terms of when when people are confronted with yisurim and have to deal with yisurim so how how do we cope, how do we help others cope? So the first thing is to recognize that that it's totally unrealistic to expect that we're going to understand all darkei Hashem. It's totally unrealistic to think that everything hashgacha does is going to be intelligible to us. And the mashal is a very simple one. If you have parents of of an infant or a two-year-old child and you ask, well, when when you parent your two-year-old child, so should you be limited to what the two-year-old can understand and appreciate that that it's warranted and that it's appropriate, or do you have to parent according to the level of your understanding? So obviously the answer is that the two-year-old may may not begin to understand or know that he did anything wrong by running into the street after the ball and can't begin to understand why the parent is is yelling at him or maybe the parent even gave him a slap for running into the running into the street. The child can't begin to understand why the parent is is torturing him or her by by bringing them to the doctor and getting injections, so they can't begin to understand. But obviously it would be the height of and I'll have to parent on their level. So obviously we understand, just everyone understands intuitively that that can't be the case. So the same is true, the same is true Lehavdil between ourselves and Avinu HaRachaman, it's totally unrealistic to expect that everything that happens in the world we're going to understand. If we were to understand everything that happens in the world, that would mean that HaKadosh Baruch Hu wasn't exercising hashgacha pratis according to חכמה שאין לה סוף, but it would mean that he was exercising his hashgacha pratis on our level. So there is no, it's a totally unrealistic expectation to think that we that we that we should expect to understand, that we're entitled to understand everything, that there aren't going to be mysteries which leave us confounded. Beyond that, in terms of relating specifically, it's very important to understand that when a person has to endure suffering, suffering which is visited upon him, גזר דין מן השמים, so a person should recognize that that's also an act of avodas Hashem. The talmidei HaBaal Shem quote the בעל שם טוב הקדוש says in the pasuk in Shir HaShirim of שמאלו תחת לראשי וימינו תחבקני that HaKadosh Baruch Hu kivyakhol his his left hand is underneath is supporting my head v-yimino techabkeini and his right hand is is embracing me. So we know that לעולם תהא שמאל דוחה וימין מקרבת that yamin, that right represents chesed, rachamim, whereas the left hand represents din. So the בעל שם טוב הקדוש says שמאלו תחת לראשי וימינו תחבקני, there are times of avodas Hashem in the bechina of yimino techabkeini where the avodas Hashem is that HaKadosh Baruch Hu gives us optimal conditions to to learn, to do mitzvos, to do chesed, to daven. And then there's also a bechina of smolo tachas leroshi. And when a person accepts, if that's what the Ribbono Shel Olam wants, so then this is the ratzon Hashem. The ratzon Hashem is that that I should struggle with these yissurim, so that's also. And often what what is so devastating in terms of yissurim is when people have a sense of futility, that the yissurim seem futile to them and what's more, it's just frustrating, everything which they feel they could be accomplishing and otherwise would be accomplishing. And it's very important to understand that our perspective on yissurim is smolo tachas leroshi. It's not frustrating, but it's rather HaKadosh Baruch Hu hamatmein k'musim imo is redirecting our avodas Hashem and saying that right now is a time not of yimino techabkeini but it's rather a time of smolo tachas leroshi. And and the final perspective which which we should have for ourselves or which we should try to offer others in terms of coping with yissurim is that when HaKadosh Baruch Hu gives us a nisayon, he also gives us, he also gives us the kochos hanefesh to withstand a nisayon. The whole point of a nisayon is again, it's to elicit, it's not to it's not to torture rachmana litzlan, it's to elicit. When HaKadosh Baruch Hu gives a nisayon, it means HaKadosh Baruch Hu also gives the kochos hanefesh. And when a person is struggling, when a person doesn't think he has the kochos hanefesh, so that's a message which has to be constantly reinforced again and again that if the Ribbono Shel Olam is giving is giving us such a nisayon, it means he's also giving us the kochos hanefesh to cope with a nisayon. Finally, there's only a couple of minutes left, just to maybe identify some of the the the questions which can emerge in terms of depression, more to identify them than to try to answer them. I'm not the person and this isn't the forum for it. One question, again Dr. Pelcovitz alluded to this, certainly has to do with shidduchim. And and the question is sort of bilateral. The question is how much a person has to reveal about his own psychological history and background and from on the the other side of the relationship, how much the other party should be weighing it and and taking it into account. Now, there's no question, there's no question that if there's any serious history of a mental illness if we're talking about depression with with a capital D rather than a small D there's no question that one is obligated to reveal that. That's certainly a part of who one is, and Dr. Pelkovitz mentioned the statistic about the possibility of recurrence if a person has suffered through one episode of depression, the possibility of recurrence and that too is mentioned in the Shailos Uteshuvos that it's known that that that the machla tends to tend to recur. So lichora it's certainly the case that one cannot hide that that information. Me'idach gisa one doesn't have to distort it either. What do I mean? That if a person has suffered from depression and because of that statistically what a 50% chance that there will be a recurrence, absolutely that's something which the the other side in the shidduch is entitled to know. However, they are entitled to know it, they should know it in the context of the person. Meaning if upfront before the before the young man and young lady ever meet, so before before you experience who the person is and you're able to see something in context, so you hear oh he's depressed or she's depressed. So it's factually correct but it's not in context. So on the one hand there's absolutely an obligation to disclose information and to disclose the information before before a shidduch is clinched, before you're you're engaged or officially engaged. But me'idach gisa it's lichora not the case that it's something which has to be shared before or or on the first date. It's when it will be seen in the context of the person. Once the if the relationship progresses to to such a point that it's it's serious and there's a sense of who the other person is and now you can see the depression in context, so at that point it should be it should be disclosed. The more difficult question and and one which is much more needs to be individualized and therefore I'm not going to try to to even give guidelines is what one should do with that information. If one is on the other side of the picture and and that information is shared is is very much an ad hoc and ad hominem deliberation which has to be made, but it certainly should be made. One should not you know it's it's nice to think that that love conquers all and maybe it does maybe it doesn't I don't know but but it certainly is a deliberation which has to be made with a lot of koved rosh and in consultation with people who are older and with with more chochmas hachayim than people of shidduchim age usually usually have. Another area again just to sort of just identify the area just to that we should be sensitized to the need to to ask questions is when when you have a woman who's on antidepressant medication so then it becomes complicated in in terms of pregnancy, in terms of whether what degree of of risk there is in terms of birth defects rachmana litzlan if she stays on the medication and and conceives during the medication. Is there a difference between the first trimester and after the first trimester? What's the risk to the woman if she's weaned from the medication? And again obviously such cases need to be dealt with on a on a one to one basis and and decided accordingly but clearly again the the there's no room for just you know throwing all caution to the wind and שומר מצוה לא ידע דבר doesn't doesn't apply in in this context. It's something which in consultation A with doctors who who are big experts on psychopharmacology and B rabbonim has to be decided on a case-to-case basis.