Depression ~ Expanding & Understanding new Science

Jul 8 / Linda Meredith
One of the most frustrating parts of living with Depression was this: “But I don’t feel depressed.”

I wasn’t sad all the time. I wasn’t curled up in a ball or struggling to get out of bed. In fact, I was happy in my life.
I enjoyed what I was doing. I had no suicidal ideation. And yet - every screening test came back the same: Major Depressive Disorder. It took years of persistence, misdiagnoses, and frustration before finally arriving at something more accurate - something that actually reflected what was happening inside my brain. Yes, that’s right: brain, not just "mind" or "mood."

We’re still in the process of identifying what works best for my brain’s unique wiring, but what finally started to make sense - after years of searching - was neuroscience.

The videos below are grounded in research, not opinion. No pop-psych takes or keyboard commentary.  Just brain-based explanations to helped understand how childhood developmental trauma changes the brain, and how those changes can shape our experience of depression across the whole system: body, soul, and spirit.

How childhood trauma affects health across a lifetime
Dr. Nadine Burke Harris

Key Points Summarised: 
🔬 Key Findings from the ACE Study (CDC & Kaiser Permanente)
In the mid-1990s, the CDC and Kaiser Permanente discovered a hidden exposure that increased risk for 7 of the top 10 causes of death in the U.S.

This exposure was not a chemical, toxin, or lifestyle habit—it was childhood trauma.
High doses of trauma affect:
  • Brain development 🧠
  • The immune system 🛡️
  • Hormonal systems 🧬
  • Even how DNA is read and transcribed 🧫

People with high ACE scores:
  • Have 3x the lifetime risk of heart disease and lung cancer
  • Face a 20-year difference in life expectancy

📊 Details of the ACE Study (Adverse Childhood Experiences)
Led by Dr. Vincent Felitti (Kaiser) and Dr. Robert Anda (CDC).

They surveyed 17,500 adults on childhood exposure to:
  • Physical, emotional, sexual abuse
  • Physical/emotional neglect
  • Parental mental illness, substance abuse, incarceration
  • Domestic violence
  • Divorce/separation
Each “yes” earned 1 point on their ACE score.

🚨 Health Risk Statistics by ACE Score
  • 67% of people had at least 1 ACE.
  • 12.6% (1 in 8) had 4 or more ACEs.

People with 4+ ACEs had:
  • 2.5x risk of chronic lung disease (COPD) & hepatitis
  • 4.5x risk of depression
  • 12x risk of suicidal thoughts or attempts
  • 3x the lifetime risk of lung cancer
  • 3.5x risk of heart disease

🧠 How Trauma Affects the Brain & Body
Alters brain regions like:
  • Nucleus accumbens (pleasure/reward → addiction)
  • Prefrontal cortex (impulse control, learning)
  • Amygdala (fear response)
  • Disrupts the HPA axis (fight-flight stress response): Meant for short bursts of danger (e.g., a bear in the forest)
  • Becomes harmful when stress is chronic, especially for children

🧬 Not Just Behavioural — It’s Biological
Critics said: "Rough childhoods just lead to bad behaviour."
But neuroscience now shows trauma changes:
  • Brain wiring
  • Immune function
  • Hormone regulation
  • Gene expression

👀 Who Is Affected? The Big Realisation
At first, Dr. Burke Harris assumed trauma was a “social issue” - for marginalised, poor, Black communities.
"I figured the minute that everybody else heard about this, it would be routine screening... but that didn’t happen."

She realised the original ACEs population was:
70% white
70% college-educated
Her conclusion:
“I had it completely backwards... Maybe we marginalise the issue because it does apply to us. Maybe it’s easier to see in other ZIP codes because we don’t want to look at it.”

Examining depression through the lens of the brain
Dr. Helen Mayberg

🧠 Depression & The Brain: Key Insights from Neuroscience
🔍 The Problem: “I’m Functional but I’m Drowning”
  • Many patients were high-functioning: they held down jobs, ran companies, had families, and were physically healthy.
  • Yet they experienced crippling depression that didn’t respond to meds, therapy, or even electroconvulsive therapy.
  • One example: a 37-year-old competitive cyclist, loving partner and employee - couldn’t escape the emotional black hole.

🧠 Neuroscience Enters the Scene
A neurologist began asking: What if depression is a circuit failure in the brain, not just a chemical imbalance or mood disorder?

Early brain imaging showed depression wasn’t tied to one brain area, but to a circuit of brain regions that weren’t coordinating properly.

📡 Area 25 — The Key Node
A particular brain region, Area 25 (subcallosal cingulate), was found to over-activate in depression, shutting down other areas like:
  • Prefrontal cortex (planning, decision-making)
  • Motor cortex (motivation, action)
  • Emotional regulation centres

In deeply depressed patients, Area 25 dominated the system, creating a “vortex” of pain, guilt, paralysis, and disconnection.

⚡ Breakthrough: Deep Brain Stimulation (DBS)
Inspired by Parkinson’s treatment, scientists implanted deep brain stimulators to gently zap Area 25.

Patients were awake in surgery and described instant changes:
  • “The tension is gone.”
  • “It’s like a black hole lifted.”
  • “I can breathe again.”
  • “I feel lighter… like I could clean my garage!”

🔄 Two-Stage Recovery
Immediate Reset: Emotional weight lifted within seconds or minutes for some.

Ongoing Healing: With the “vortex” cleared, therapy, rehab, and psychiatric care finally became effective.

📈 Rethinking Depression
The team had to abandon linear models (e.g., 50% symptom reduction = success).

Depression isn’t always about being “less sad” - sometimes it’s about being stuck in a disconnected brain loop.
This model opens new pathways for treating those who appear fine on the outside but live with deep, unshifting inner torment.

🤝 Patient as Collaborator, Not Subject
The most powerful insights came from listening to patients’ first-person experiences.
Neuroscience evolved through empathy: Patients knew what was happening inside them better than any scan could show.
Currently I'm unable to find Deep Brain Stimulation availability for Depression. Speak with your Specialist asap for help.

How Depression Affects The Brain - Yale Medicine Explains

🧠 Old Model: Monoamine Deficiency Hypothesis
The traditional approach to depression is based on the belief that one of three neurotransmitters (serotonin, dopamine, or norepinephrine) is deficient.

This model has shaped the development of SSRIs and other antidepressants for decades.
Neurotransmitters = the chemical messengers of the brain.
But there are over 100 neurotransmitters and billions of neural connections, making this theory overly simplistic.

🔬 Modern Neurobiology of Depression
Researchers found that serotonin and norepinephrine don’t fully explain major depressive symptoms.

New focus: Glutamate and GABA — the two most abundant neurotransmitters in the brain.
  • They regulate neuroplasticity — the brain’s ability to change, learn, and adapt.
  • Chronic stress and trauma damage synaptic connections in mood and emotion circuits.
  • This leads to inefficient and noisy communication in the brain.

The loss of synaptic connectivity is now seen as a core feature of depression’s biology.

💡 Paradigm Shift: New Era of Psychiatry
  • Understanding how the depressed brain looks and functions differently helps researchers create targeted treatments.
  • When depression is treated effectively, brain scans show the brain returning to a healthier state.
The field is moving from:
  • ❌ Monoamine imbalance
  • ✅ Brain-based circuit dysfunction and loss of plasticity

🚀 Why This Matters
  • Many people with depression don’t respond to traditional medications.
  • New treatments (e.g. ketamine, TMS, DBS) are based on restoring brain connectivity and rebalancing disrupted circuits.
  • Depression is now recognised as a long-term brain-based disorder requiring more than chemical patchwork—it requires deep repair at the neurological level.

🧭 Final Thoughts: Keep Asking, Keep Seeking
If there’s one takeaway from everything shared here, it’s this: you’re not imagining it, and you’re not alone. When traditional answers fall short—when medication doesn’t work, when therapy feels ineffective, when your symptoms don’t match the textbook definition of “depression”—it doesn’t mean you’re broken. It means we need better frameworks, better tools, and more accurate science.

The brain is complex. So is healing. And sometimes, it takes time and persistence to find the right approach for your brain.

💬 So please—don’t stop at the first answer. Or the second. Or the tenth. Keep going until something clicks. Until someone listens. Until you find a health professional who’s willing to look beyond the surface and walk with you toward what actually works.

You deserve answers rooted in science, compassion, and curiosity. Not just a label. Not just a script.

Because your life matters. And your healing is possible.

wtih care,
Linda
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