New York psychotherapist Colette Dowling, LCSW, author of the following article on mood and the brain, has written eight books, including The Cinderella Complex: Women's Hidden Fear of Independence, which was published in 23 languages.
Mood and the BrainColette Dowling, LCSWMood disorders such as depression and anxiety are caused by shifts in the levels of hormones and neurotransmitters in the brain.Shephard Kantor, a noted psychiatrist and researcher at the Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons, believes the mental "productions" of depressed people--the negative thoughts and even, in the case of psychotics, hallucinations--come from chemical changes in the central nervous system. The so-called "crazy thinking" that can sometimes accompany depression and anxiety is caused by a chemical imbalance in the brain. Kantor has suggested that the mental changes produced by depression may be due to certain sensations and memory traces that go back to childhood. Events from that time, he theorizes, produce changes in the brain--in the neurotransmitter levels or receptor sites. And it isn’t just childhood trauma that can produce neurochemical vulnerability to depressed mood and anxiety disorders. Emotional wounds at any point along the way, from childhood through adulthood, can create mood-changing alterations in the brain. One of the breakthroughs of modern neurology was Wilder Penfield’s discovery that stimulating certain areas of the brain with electrical impulses produces visual and auditory images and memories. Dr. Shephard Kantor asks this provocative question: Isn’t it possible that the signals generated by brain neurotransmitters might function as "the internal equivalents" of Penfield’s externally applied stimulating electrodes? If so, he says, it "would cause patients to report feelings, recollections and ideas generated not by conflict, fantasy, or drive derivatives, but by chemical stimuli." There are differences in all of us--differences in the amount of trauma or stress we experience and in the degree of chemical vulnerability we inherit. No one exists in a perfect state of chemical balance. Where, then, should the line be drawn with respect to neurotransmitter deficits? Do they exist in all who become mood disordered or only in those suffering from severe forms of these illnesses? These are questions neuroscientists continue to wrestle with. The answers, when they come, will go a long way in explaining the biological undepinnings of mood disorders. Those suffering from depression and anxiety can get medical help in the form of antidepressants. Or they can get help from psychotherapy. Often, a combination of the two is ideal. Brain imaging studies have shown that both psychotherapy and medication can produce changes in the functioning of the brain, leading to increases in emotional wellbeing
Click here for Colette's article on anxiety.
New York psychotherapist Colette Dowling, LCSW, has a private practice in Manhattan. Colette did her graduate studies at The Smith College School for Social Work and completed advanced training in psychotherapy and psychoanalysis at The Institue for Contemporary Psychotherapy, in New York. Colette can be reached at 718-594-0201, or by e-mailing dowlingcolette@earthlink.net. To hear Colette speaking about what it's like starting therapy with someone new, click on the audio button.
For information on Colette's psychotherapy practice see her profile at Psychology Today.
See Colette's articles on women's mental health. |