Broken Brains? Not At All.

About ten years ago a virus somehow got into the vines of the kiwifruit in a small town in New Zealand. Problem was, this small town was the centre of the multimillion dollar industry - the kiwifruit capital of the world. Land was expensive in this town but the returns per hectare were enormous. There were a lot of resulting financially wealthy people in this town working hard when the virus struck. Overnight crops were decimated and livelihoods destroyed. The outlook was incredibly bleak as the vines withered under the strain of the virus. Within weeks what was once a prosperous centre of horticulture had now been covered in a pall of grey smoke as the source of the prosperity had been hauled out by the roots and turned into a bonfire.

The gloom cast over the town was as heavy as the smoke. Of course, there was a large local industry set up around this fuzzy green fruit and the business it created was almost the town was there. This gloominess was felt locally and nationally as the whole country was at risk of losing a lucrative export and reputation.

Orchardists were distraught and then depressed. Understandably, they were at a loss to see a future where their mortgage could be paid and their lives going forward as they had been and as they had looked forward to. Some growers who were completely wiped out, and facing no crops and plummeting land and orchard values, lost their businesses and were forced to sell at heavily discounted prices. Anybody could feel their distraught and pain.

And it seemed that overnight the depression got medicated.

The theory of antidepressants is that it creates a higher level of serotonin in the brain because the brain is not making enough for some reason and this results in depression. Essentially the brain is broken.

How can about 200 people of a certain profession suddenly break their brains, practically overnight?

As a pharmacist it never felt right or made sense to me that so many brains were broken so quickly, and from a particular group of people in a particular town, and therefore medicated.

In my pharmacy, I was dispensing thousands of the tablets that were supposed to make people 'happy' but they weren't. I would often get desperate customers and patients asking for other things they could do. I would have patients still taking these tablets after years and years of struggling - waiting for them to start working.

What is not done routinely is testing for these serotonin levels - it is just taken as fact that something is ‘wrong with the brain’ and that it must be not making serotonin. This is simply crazy - serotonin is mostly produced in the gut.

Back in 2008 The Media and the Chemical Imbalance Theory of Depression was published. It (not so) gently tips the commonly adopted misconception about depression straight onto its head. But the problem is, that now it is a belief within the community, that is perpetuated by advertising and versions of studies that don’t turn out to be as unbiased as they could be.

In his book Lost Connections: Uncovering the Real Causes of Depression – and the Unexpected Solutions Johann Hari has travelled and spoken to people over the world and realised that the old broken brain theory of low serotonin just doesn't stack up. That people can't be categorised by a set of diagnostic rules that shows certain symptoms which can then lead to a prescription. What he does find out is that it is the environment the person is in that can make the difference.

· The sense of control over the workplace,

· The sense of meaningfulness for doing what they are doing,

· The value of the connections with others that give purpose to their life.

"This pain you are feeling is not a pathology. It’s not crazy. It is a signal that your natural psychological needs are not being met."

Take for example the young lad, moving from teenager to adult, studying at university. The course is not something he even has a spark of interest in. He is finding it tough transitioning to being an adult in the world of electricity and phone bills and being in charge of his own nutrition. Just like most adults have. He is finding the world of marijuana a welcome escape from having no money and no purpose. Lost. Do you think medicating this young lad is the answer? How can a pill make any difference to his mind? Short answer. Not even close. He was miserable, looked sick – about 15 kg underweight, had no brightness in his eyes and was struggling to see anything good from the day – even if that meant that all that was, was the sun was shining. The medication had been taken for four months.

So what can you do?

Do something different. Find a coach to help you through this dip in your outlook. Start looking at what you really want to do and maybe how you can change your work or study to let you be closer to that. Reframe what you are doing and find the meaning within it. A coach may help you with this one. Get out of ‘yourself’ – join a club, a choir, a volunteer group. Get moving – walking, running, sport, gardening. Start noticing what is going well for you – gratitude diaries - https://www.paularalph.com/blog/how-gratitude-helped-a-broken-heart - are incredibly effective for doing this. Start a practise of breathing in a balanced way - https://www.paularalph.com/blog/resilience-is-easier-than-you-think - which gives you more peace and resilience. Notice when you are looking down (literally looking at the floor or towards your feet), and raise your head and your eyes. Notice how you are talking to yourself and the messages you are conveying. Add curiosity to your modus operandi. Speak to somebody.

Can you see how this is all about doing something, about movement? Actually moving your body to do something else. From picking up a pen to picking up your trainers. Maybe picking up a phone to find assistance. Doing what you have always done will get what you have always got.

So should we attribute the ‘broken brain theory’, to a person who is feeling lonely, working a job that just doesn’t inspire them, or studying a subject that they have zero interest in, has a gloomy, fatalistic outlook and sits around, not feeling at all in control of either where they work or how they are within their home life?

It just doesn’t make sense. It sounds a bit like tough love to say that we must turn it around ourselves, that a pill won’t make the difference. Medication seems to take away the blame and responsibility. Maybe it is a bridge to feeling better down the line, but the biggest thing you can do for yourself is to change something.

I do know how tough it is to feel so down and there seems to be no light at the end of the tunnel. To feel left out, to not feel happy. To have worries piling up, banging your head against the wall. To feel so tired and hopeless. To think that something is wrong with you. Just remembering to do something different is difficult some days. Forcing yourself to go for a walk is a monumental effort. But the way you will feel will start to change. And the that will help your thoughts, which, in a loop, will help you feel different. And you are completely normal. And this is a temporary thing. It might feel like it will stay for ever, but it is temporary.

And I understand that many people are struggling with horrific pasts, maybe unspeakable acts done to them as a child. That makes sense. To ask 'what is wrong with you' is simply wrong. To ask 'what happened to you' is right. It will set you free.

As for the young lad at university – he left (can always go back), he moved to a place where he got better nutrition, gaining 8kg within 4 weeks; he joined a badminton club and started hiking. He stopped the marijuana and tried to find something great from his day, every day. He started to think of what his future could look like if it didn’t have a degree in it. And what it could look like if he had a degree in something that he was actually interested in. He came off the tablets as he realised there was not one bit of difference they were making anyway. His mindset started to move, as his body moved differently. He got a job - it was a menial one of stacking shelves but it gave him income, purpose and changed his body physically, every day. He decided that he wanted to go back to studying. Something completely different but the space and the perspective let him realise that he hadn't been helping himself, and that he wasn't broken either.

Please, take charge of your own life. Do something different. If you do take the medication, don’t expect life to be different – the same people will be in it, the job will still be there and the day to day hassles that bugged you in the first place are still there to bug you again. Developing your resilience and taking charge of changing your life in some way is the key to enjoying your life again. And we have this one life to live so we may as well live it in the best possible way that we can.

Take charge.