I often get mad at the way he looks down on himself, calling himself worthless or "fail at life" as he likes to say. I know none of those are true. In fact, he's probably the brightest 20 year-old I've met by far. Before knowing him, I thought all the self-taught college drop-out prodigies only existed on some articles, or in a world that I don't belong to. Unlike most teenagers, when he got his first computer, instead of sinking into games, he learnt to build websites, obtained a skill, used the computer as a tool to provide a better life for his mom. But whenever I tell him he's ahead of people at his age, he wouldn't believe me. He'd think that I'm saying it for the sake of making him feel better.
As far as I know, he suffers from Dysthymia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dysthymia). Yet never told anyone or opened up to anyone, being in fear that people will be even more distant to him if they knew he has depression. I don't know what I can do, how I can help to make him pick up his confidence again. How I can help him fight his depression.
post too long continue here http://pastebin.com/drArHNhf