How do I keep my relationship while I’m depressed?

Im a 34 yo man with a girlfriend I live with. I love her but she can be pretty callous in general. I’ve learned to deal with it since the benefits of her strong personality have created a lot of joy in our relationship.

I’m dealing with depression right now and honestly compared to many episodes in my life, I think I’m doing a better job than I could. I honestly feel like just sleeping all day, but I’m actively pushing through.

Yes, I isolate myself and mope around the house slowly, don’t make eye contact, but I showered today and got dressed and am going to pick up a Perscription for my psoriasis, which is also embarrassing. I’m feeling hopeless, and I don’t want to be around anymore. I don’t want to kill myself, I just don’t want this feeling. I’m really trying things to get me to ease out of it.

I broke down in an emotional panic cry in front of my girlfriend the other day because she is asking me to be better at remembering her feelings about things she brought up previously, as to engage with her about things she brings up but do it later on my own, and have a better mental map of things around us that need to be done.

I do my best to tackle the things I can. I cleaned my whole studio and our living room one day from stuff that was disorganized everywhere from our move a few months ago. I even did a bunch of food prep on the BBQ yesterday to help us have protein readily available. I feel like I do a lot for how depressed I am, but I feel like I’m still getting constant judgement from my girlfriend. It’s embarrassing that I’m even asking her to notice that I’m doing these baseline things even though for me they are huge accomplishments. I’m struggling with that cognitive dissonance.

I really want to be free from this. I am freelancing and don’t have a job, and my mom is helping me with finances and recently helped both of us with rent too, so I feel guilty now that not only am I a piece of shit who can’t work for myself, now I asked my mom to extend her finances further into my life, for my girlfriend.

I walk around with feelings of guilt, shame, and emptiness, and today after I made breakfast—which is a rare occasion when I’m depressed—I wanted to reconnect with my girlfriend, and tell her how sorry I am I’m depressed and I know it’s hard to be around. I have male friends that lost their relationships because their girlfriends were tired of them being depressed. So I already have a lot of fear talking about depression in front of her, almost as to avoid bringing it to life; sometimes it feels safer to pretend it’s not even there for the sake of her not being annoyed by my presence.

So I told her how I’m sorry and I know it’s hard to be around, and I’m feeling empty and sad and I know it’s hard to know what to say to me. After I told her, she didn’t even say, ‘it’s okay’, ‘I’m here for you’, ‘you’re not a burden’, ‘this will pass’, or anything like that, she paused and looked at me while I was looking down and said, ‘I know you’re going through it, but do you have it in you to just smile at me when you see me?’

I instantly broke down on so many levels. I feel like my worst fear of her not accepting me or understanding depression are real, and she simply is exhausted of me and wants me to just snap out of it. I feel like my bringing this up brought me one step closer to her leaving me. She did give me a hug as I left the house in frustration. I’m now sitting in the parking lot processing these feelings.

I am so fearful she doesn’t have the capacity for empathy of someone who is depressed, or if she does, she withholds it out of her own fear, but all I want to hear from her is supportive statements, but I often feel like she withholds those only for moments she deems worthy of positive affirmation; like she’s scared to give it to me out of the blue as if I’m going to take that and now expect it all the time. I feel like she treats positive affirmation the same way you wouldn’t just give a dog their favorite treats all the time as to not spoil them.

I feel like the situation of telling her I feel ashamed and sorry and having her basically say ‘okay well could you just smile more?’ is tone-deaf to the essence of depression but I also feel like an jerk to be the one to deem it that, since I’m the one with depression. I’m stuck in this realm where I feel like I see things clearly in terms of what I need from a partner for my depression, but scared to ask or to talk about it since I feel being the victim of depression removes any of my authority to ask for what I need. I just need help parsing this out and seeing things clearly, because I know having depression skews my perception. What can I do to make my relationship work even when I have depression? What are things I’m supposed to say to stay connected with her?