Depressed ex-boyfriend

So I was in a relationship with a guy for about a year and a half and we got along really well. Never really had significant arguments or anything and just really enjoyed talking to each other and being around one another. When we were both in the same area while attending school he would come over and stay the night most days because he had a pretty unfortunate housing situation. We were very close and even when he graduated and moved a few states away, we still talked every day and managed to see each other a few times a month.

The only thing is that I always think he has struggled with depression. He's had instances where he's gotten extremely down, has mentioned being suicidal after the fact, and he just withdraws and doesn't want to talk to anyone. Not much seems to help when he's like this and it can last for a few hours or a few days.

Anyway, he is an army officer who will be leaving for training in Georgia and moving farther away in a few weeks. We hadn't really talked much about what would happen at this point, and were just enjoying spending time together and talking as usual. Then he had a really bad day a couple weeks ago that just kind of triggered things. He's been worried about money and stuff and then he had a frustrating day working for his uncle where he didn't really get paid and he was sick and that just seemed to be the beginning of his downward spiral. He was fine on my birthday (August 6th) and the day after we made plans to see each other a couple more times before he left. But the day after that, which was the day with his uncle, he just kept going back and forth between being totally normal and then just not really being himself or wanting to talk and was just down. He had mentioned being extra tired and not himself. He had mentioned kinda starting to distance himself a bit because he had been thinking about us a lot since he was starting to constantly think about leaving and what that entails. He seemed depressed and anxious then, so I gave him time and space and the next day he texted in the morning and was his normal self. Then Thursday he wanted to know if i was pursuing anyone else, which was out of the norm for him since he's not really a jealous person. He apologized for asking and said it was just part of the mood he has been in lately but seemed appreciative that I wasn't and was cheerful the rest of the day. And then on Friday he was back to having a rough day and I was a little short with him, and he texted me shortly after saying he had been thinking and he didn't think it was fair to me if we were still in a relationship. That he cared for me an enormous amount but he needed a break to sort his head out. He didn't think it was fair of him to be checked out like he had been and he had been going back and forth with things for a while and that he just didn't think a relationship should be when he's up for it. So I told him to take his time and he took a few days to himself to clear his head and make a decision. Then yesterday he just said he didn't want a relationship anymore. That his head isn't in the right place at the moment and he hadn't slept much in the past week and he has a million things going through his head and he can't keep up anymore. He's super anxious about leaving and just can't deal it seems. He just said that he feels like he's better off not having a significant other right now and that he wasn't in the relationship for the right reasons anymore. That it wasn't anything i did wrong or anything about me, but his mindset isn't one for a committed relationship. And then he just said he didn't feel the same about me or us as he did a year ago and he's lost interest and his leaving hasn't helped. That he cares about me and wants to be friends for now and for us to see other people if something comes up but he isn't ruling out possibility of us being together in the future. Mentally he just needs time. It was just a lot really fast. This all happened in a matter of two weeks, and it was (and kind of still seems to be) a lot of back and forth and being unsure and like he was trying to convince both me and himself. 

His behavior just concerns me and I worry about possibility of him being bipolar. Which worries me even more is that he's about to enter a really stressful period of time in his life and isn't seeking help. He said he's been talking to some other army friends about leaving and his anxiety, so that's good at least, but still. I guess my post is multi-faceted. How can I help him? And do you think the relationship breakup is driven by his current mental health? Is that something that is common? I guess I don't want to assume that it's due to his mental health when it really could just be him not loving me anymore, it just was very sudden and I'm curious. 

Anyway, thank you all for your input!

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