Quite often, depressed people can’t even begin to do those things without help. Asking them to do and identify all those steps is like asking the impossible when most of the time they don’t even want to face getting out of bed in the morning. Jeez, when I was in a really bad depressive state, it threw me into such a state just trying to decide if I should do the laundry or vaccuum first. You’re paralyzed. Indecision and clouded thinking is a huge part of true depression. You can’t ask someone like that to make reasonable decisions right off the bat and on their own.
Yours is a good description. I know someone who was trapped in such a severe case of indecision and compartmentalized thinking that she didn't vacuum for five years, because that would have meant they needed to move a box of photos which brought back bad memories.