Decoding Depression and How to Triumph Over It

Have you ever wondered how your brain's intricate wiring influences your mood and emotions? Are you or someone you know battling the blues and seeking ways to understand and overcome depression?

In this enlightening episode of me&my health up, host Anthony Hartcher, a seasoned clinical nutritionist and lifestyle medicine specialist, delves deep into the neuroscience of depression. This episode is not just another discussion; it's a journey into understanding the complex interplay between our brain chemistry and our emotions.

Anthony sheds light on the critical roles of various brain areas like the amygdala, prefrontal cortex, hippocampus, and nucleus accumbens in the manifestation of depression. He explains how these regions influence our emotional responses, decision-making processes, memory formation, and our experiences of pleasure and motivation.

This episode is a must-listen for anyone seeking to understand the complexities of depression and looking for real, actionable ways to beat the blues. Whether you're struggling with depression yourself or supporting someone who is, you'll find valuable insights and strategies to empower your journey towards mental wellness.

Tune in to this episode of me&my health up for an informative and transformative exploration into the neuroscience of depression and practical ways to reclaim your mental health.


About me&my health up & Anthony Hartcher 

me&my health up seeks to enhance and enlighten the well-being of others. Host Anthony Hartcher is the CEO of me&my health up which provides holistic health solutions using food as medicine, combined with a holistic, balanced, lifestyle approach. Anthony holds three bachelor's degrees in Complementary Medicine; Nutrition and Dietetic Medicine; and Chemical Engineering.

Podcast Disclaimer
Any information, advice, opinions or statements within it do not constitute medical, health care or other professional advice, and are provided for general information purposes only. All care is taken in the preparation of the information in this Podcast. [Connected Wellness Pty Ltd] operating under the brand of “me&my health up”..click here for more

Transcript

Anthony Hartcher: 0:08

Did you know that 50% of people will experience a mental health disorder? Whether it be anxiety or depression by the age of 75? Yes, that's quite large statistic and I suggest, its not fully encompassing of everyone that actually it tells me those that report it, obviously. So and this was a result of a study. And yes, you've actually landed on the me&my health up podcast. I'm your host, Anthony Hartcher, I'm a clinical nutritionist and lifestyle medicine specialist. The purpose of this podcast is to enhance and enlighten your well being. And today's topic is the neuroscience of depression, and how you can beat the blues. And I read this study from the Queensland University, and it was a very comprehensive study 150,000 People across 23 countries conducted over two decades, and they found that 50% of people will encounter a mental health disorder by the age of 75. And the most common been anxiety and depression. I've covered anxiety, the neuroscience of anxiety, and how you can unravel it in a previous episode. So today, we're talking about the neuroscience of depression and how you can beat the blues. So let's start with is that a real statistic? Well, I think it's probably understated. And, I think you'll find that majority of people will certainly they found 50%. But I think it's great, because some people don't report and some people are unaware, I've spoken to friends that were unaware that they were depressed, okay. And I was unaware that I was experiencing anxiety, I just had these physiological responses in certain situations that I didn't know was anxiety. I just thought I'm getting a bit hot and feeling a bit uncomfortable. But I don't know what it is, something's taking control of me. And yes, it was anxiety. So and I didn't report that. So we all experience it. And it's not a disease. It's medically called it a disorder. But yes, you are essentially, there's a disorder in the body, disorder in the mind, which expresses itself physically, and have a disordered mind disordered body. And yes, you can bring it back into order. And that's what we're going to be talking today about how to bring it back in order. But first of all, we've got to explore the neuroscience of depression. So what they've found now is that it's not a chemical imbalance. So that's been proven wrong. And that was a theory that was running for many decades, and drug companies jumped on the back of that, and produce lots of antidepressants, which are commonly known as SSRIs, which is the selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor. So it keeps the serotonin sitting around the synapses between neurons and that creates a or helps prevent the imbalance or the low serotonin. And what it does create is too much serotonin. Okay, so then it creates issues and side effects as a result of too much serotonin. So our body has been designed to find homeostasis, and the mind is looking to find that homeostasis. And that's what we're going to be talking about today, as much as our body is always working to restore homeostasis, that balance state, our mind is also looking to reestablish that balance state. So what causes depression? Well, depression is, in itself, a neurological issue associated with expectations being too high versus the reality of the situation. So with that distortion between expectations and your reality, can make you feel that you're hopeless, or life's pointless, or I really can't see the light at the end of the tunnel, because your expectations are so big, that they are unrealistic, and essentially a fantasy. And the reality around is so far from it. And as much as that seems very simplistic, it is a reality. I see it time and time again, with my clients around unrealistic expectations of self and others. So let's explore this a bit further. So the unrealistic expectation of self is comparing yourself to someone else. So I can relate to that in terms of my karate experience, you can look at your sensei or your your master of karate that's, you know, showing how to how things should be done or what's a good example of how to do this and you look at it and think, wow, you know, if only if only I could be that good at then expecting yourself to be there within a year, and these masters of karate have spent decades working to perfect their art. And so it's an unrealistic expectation of self to think that you should be there within a year or two, or to be as good as that person within a year or two. And people know make that comparison in terms of wealth. So they look at people that are, you know, achieved massive amounts accumulating massive amounts of financial wealth. And, you know, like, for example, you could say, well, how come I can't have, you know, want the wealth of Warren Buffett, Warren Buffett's in his 90s now, and he's made the majority, or certainly something like over 90% of his wealth over the age of 75. And so if you haven't been around that long, how can you expect and he's been a fantastic manager of money. So he's certainly mastered the art of managing money. And how can you compare yourself to, you know, expecting to have what Warren Buffett's achieved by not having the years and not having that, you know, that intellect in terms of what how he's trained himself and taught himself around managing money. So they're really unrealistic expectations. And some people have this around beauty, for example, they're comparing themselves to someone else's body, and thinking, I want that on this person. And I want this sort of look from this person. And they've got a mismatch of all these people that they've created this illusion of who they want to be. And it's far from reality. And they have this unrealistic expectation itself that they'll become this illusion of this person that they've created in their mind, but which is a lot different to the reality. And so part of what I want to go through today is how can you bring order to that disordered thinking. And so when you have unrealistic expectations of self around career, for example, wanting to achieve a certain milestone within a career, because someone else has achieved it within that timeframe? Well, they could have had circumstances align perfectly for them. And they had a really smooth path towards that. And you know, a bit of luck that came into that rise up the ladder, so to speak. And you might be more challenged along your journey. Or you might have different priorities, which is most likely, the reason why you're not achieving this quickly as then their highest priority is most likely their career. And so other things become second to their career. And they put a lot of energy attention and focus into their career, and hence, they achieve success in their career. Whereas you might sort of dream to have that successful career, but you want everything else as well. And so that's not really realistic in terms of you might not value the career as much as they do. And you've got other values or other things that are important and high priority to you. And you put your energy and attention into those areas. Well, you're not going to achieve it as quickly that career, you're not going to have that rapid career, ascension. Okay, so it's important to get real with your expectations as to well, for example, I could say this podcast, right? I, you know, I love to be overnight, I love to achieve the success of Joe Rogan would be great, but I think what I'm enjoying is the journey, I'm enjoying learning and working out ways in which I can share that learning to you. And the people I meet along that journey and hearing the stories back from the listeners as to how much of a difference it's making in their lives. That's very fulfilling to me. And I'm on a mission to become the best version of me to become the best, you know, I guess what I want to achieve in terms of imparting wisdom on to you and helping you be the best version of yourself through education. And that's success for me. And as Earl Nightingale said that success is the progressive realisation of a worthy ideal. Well, my worthy ideal is to enhance and enlighten the well being of others. And I can see evidence that that's coming true through the feedback I get through the listeners, and also the podcast guests that I interview, they say that I'm a good interviewer, because I listen, and I'm looking to extract maximum value to my listeners. So and that's because I'm on mission. I'm not here just to chase numbers. I'm not just looking at the numbers every day, like the numbers give me some feedback as to whether I'm creating engaging content. So that's important and I seek feedback from you, in order to but I get fulfillment through just sharing my wisdom and learning from others. So I've learned a lot on my journey of being the host of this podcast by interviewing others and learning from their area of expertise. And so my health improves. And I'm hoping as a consequence of that your health is improving to you and the difference would only be that if you're putting into action. So I certainly put what I learned into action. And I'm hoping you're doing the same because you'd certainly get good outcomes. So having realistic expectations of self, and then looking for ways to measure. So it's setting realistic goals, that and then you've got tangible measures and so that you can measure the progress towards that goal, and then getting away from the comparison of others. Because that comparison of others is that they've got different goals, they've got different priorities, and the order of priorities is going to be different to your order of priorities. And based on where your attention goes, your energy flows. And that's where you're going to get success. So wherever you're putting your most attention to, that's where you'll get, you're going to start to see the manifestation of success in those areas that you're putting your energy towards. So I'm putting my energy towards enhancing and enlightening the well being of others. And I'm starting to realise that progressive realisation of a worthy ideal in terms of the numbers the numbers are getting, they're growing over time, steadily, which is fantastic, I'm making progress. And so I don't create this unrealistic expectation that I'm going to be Joe Rogan within five years or 10 years. And I, at the end of the day, I want to be the best version of myself, I don't want to be another Joe Rogan, because I'll only be the second best version of him. I'm not him, okay, so. So getting realistic with your goals, and making sure you've got some measures in place to and I often see this with weight loss. So weight loss, people, you know, want to lose weight quickly, they want to just get quick weight loss, they want quick wins, essentially, and they're looking for that quick result, or that that pill, that's going to give them the fast result. And what I find is they then adopt unsustainable behaviors, which they do for a period of time, they get some results, but they can't sustain them. So they go back to the old way of doing things because they get sick of what they change, too. And it's too extreme. So I think it's best to find that middle road for you, and measure yourself on how you're going towards your progress towards that goal. So I imagined myself by my daily action, so I have a goal, to at least record three hours of podcast content every month. That's my goal. And I'm working towards that goal every month. And that's how I can release an episode every week. And so I have a goal around making sure I have a edited version of an episode every week, and I'm looking for guests that would be appropriate, and I'm knocking back the ones that aren't appropriate. And I'm looking for what's going to be best value for you. Because this, this is ultimately for you. Obviously I do benefit in, in the process. I'm educating myself, and I'm getting better around my health, but I want to take you along for the journey. So setting up those realistic expectations of self, and then measuring yourself against hate not so not comparing yourself to someone else, measuring you against what you set as daily actions that you will do in order to get that goal. So my daily action around this podcast, is to research is to get educated in all aspects of health and wellbeing. And in particularly, I have a focus on neuroscience, hence why I'm bringing neuroscience to the title. So this rather unrealistic expectation of yourself, which is a fantasy of illusion of who you want to be that it's not the real, you get real, set realistic goals. And then measure yourself against your daily actions towards that goal. And don't compare yourself to someone else. Because they have different priorities different importance into in terms of what they value. So let them be the best version of you and you be the best version of yourself. Now, that brings me to the next point is unrealistic expectation of others. So expecting others to be like you. And so this is a bit pointless, because they're completely unique and special. And in order for them to be the best versions of themselves. They need to be themselves, just like you're being the best version of us. So letting others be the best version of themselves. And I see this with parents wanting children to be like them and behave like them. But the kids can't live up to the parents expectations because they're unrealistic. The kids are unique and special. And they've been brought into this world with unique superpowers. And we should be encouraging them to pursue their superpowers. And so my superpower was around health education and I'm in pursuit of constantly mastering or finessing that art of health education and finding ways in which I can articulate the message to you. So that's empowering to you. So don't lose you, okay? So I'm looking at ways in which I can improve the podcast and my communication to you and how I use examples. And to stay on track, of course. So, unrealistic expectations of others, it could be of your partner, so expecting your partner to do the do it the way you do things. And if they don't, then they've done it wrong. And they're, you know, they're hopeless, and you're, you know, you're looking down on them, and they feel that, ah, you know, I can't live up to your expectations, they're not succeeding, or they're not moving forward, they're not progressing, because they can't please you. And so this, this is another issue is when you expect them to know that they've let you down, because you've expressed that to them. And they're always going to let you down because they're not you. Okay. So, again, that is really unrealistic expectation on others, and then continuing to hold this illusion that people will be like you is making you feel thinking that, you know, the world's not in it, and people aren't behaving like me, and therefore they're hopeless. And, and then you start to question yourself as to whether you're the issue and you start to, you know, I guess, look down at yourself and become very self critical, okay. And one of the things that they found in terms of the links to depression is, well, first of all, it's a heterogeneous, multifactorial issue, or disorder, depression, it's not just one cause and effect. It's not just low serotonin, there's a multitude of factors that can lead to depression, and one of them is being overly self critical. And that over self critical illness can come as a result of realising that people can't live up to your expectations, and that everyone lets you down, okay, so your perception is that everyone's letting you down, they're just trying to please you, but they can't, because they're not you, okay, because you want them to do it, the way you do it, which is insanity. Really, it's, it's totally unreal. So, you know, parents really need to let go and let children be the best versions of themselves and to support their superpowers allow them to flourish in the areas that they that are important to them, that they value, and to encourage them to invest time and energy and to do well, as opposed to, you know, comparing your children to other and this is the other thing, parents will also compare their children to other children. And that is, you know, pointless because your children have a complete different genetic makeup and a complete, different upbringing. And the parents are different. And so the parents have different values, and they're imposing those values on their children. So that they're going to be different, and some children may be allowed to pursue what's important to them. And so they're succeeding, because it's highly valuable to them and investing a lot of attention and energy into that area. And so they're going to succeed in that area, you might not value what that kid is, you know, you want the success, okay? But if it's not a value to you're not going to impose that value onto your kids, and your kids aren't putting the same time and energy into that activity. So this self critical illness is then you know, looking at yourself and thinking, Well, you know, everyone's letting me down, and they're not. And then the other thing is, is when you set unrealistic expectations on yourself, you think you're letting yourself down, but they're just unrealistic expectations, you have a disillusion as to what is realistic, okay, so get realistic, and then set daily actions that will take you into the direction that you that's important to you. So first of all, it's got to be an area that's really important to you like, this is really important to me. So I don't need to motivate myself to do the research around the podcasting. Because it's important to me, it's meaningful to me, I really get inspired when I'm learning about it, and I love sharing it. So that's one aspect of depression is unrealistic expectations on self, others or unrealistic expectations of life versus the reality. So the wider the gap, the larger the gap, the greater you feel disillusioned with life. So if there's a large gap between your reality and how you expect the world to be, the larger that gap, the more you're going to feel let down by the world and your reality that you're perceiving. Okay, so you can narrow that gap by dropping the unrealistic expectations on self and others and the world and get real. And that will help lower that and shorten that gap. And then the reality will get closer towards what is real. So I set realistic goals. And I'm not in this illusion that you know, I'm going to be Joe Rogan overnight. Okay. And I actually don't want to be Joe Rogan, I just want to be the best version of myself. However, I do want to grow the podcast, because that helps me fulfill my mission, which is to enhance and enlighten the well being of others. So the more people I get that out to the more I'm realising that vision, but I'm really realizing that vision every day, because I get more and more listeners, the listeners are growing, they're not declining. So I'm progressing towards that realisation of a worthy ideal. So that's one aspect. The other aspect I want to cover, and we talked about it in the episode of neuroscience of anxiety. So prolonged anxiety. So prolonged anxiety is a can influence that depressive disorder. So you're feeling consciously anxious for long periods of time. So constantly feeling stuck, uncertain for long periods of time, you lose hope. And that loss of hope, then results in that depression, feeling your moods are down, because you lose hope. Okay, so prolonged anxiety, and what can cause prolonged anxiety is chronic stress. And so chronic stress is correlated with depression as well. And so that chronic stress can be driven from too much challenge and not enough support. So the greater the gap between challenge and support, the greater that gap is distress. And so what can we do to narrow that gap to narrow the distress so that it becomes use stress, and ultimately, use stress is formed when we have challenge meeting support. So when those two meet, then we have use stress that is good for us. That's when we're growing. Okay? When we're we have that greater gap between the challenge and support that's distressful. And that's when we, we essentially degrade, we put ourselves down, we think we're, we're no good, we're hopeless, okay? Because you feel like you're banging your head against a brick wall and going nowhere, essentially, that's what's happening. You feel stuck, okay. And the longer you feel stuck, the more you feel hopeless, and the more you lose that life in you, becomes like, life becomes pointless. What's the point, I go nowhere, no matter what I do, I just, this is all around me all the time. And it's frustrating. And so that can result in depression long term, if you have that prolonged stress. And so what can you do, you can reduce the challenges, so you can take on less, as I said, you can lower your your expectations, that will help lower the challenges, some challenges will remain. And if they're linked to a value of yours, then they're probably going to perceived less as a challenge is just something that's on the way to achieving success. Whereas if they're not, if you're pursuing something that's not a value to you, then you're going to see it as in the way and just feel like you just keep running into it, essentially. And it and you get frustrated, but you're not willing to master it and get on top of it. Because it's not important to you. So maybe it's to let go of that, that challenge or to, to you know, focus on what's important to you, and take on challenges that fulfill you. So the challenge for me, is constantly coming up with new content and ideas and, and things that I can educate you in. And you guessed, so that's a challenge for me. But I like that challenge. I like looking at what's trending and what are people looking up searching? And now I'm thinking, Yeah, I can educate people on that I can help them on that. So let's create an episode around it. So let's either look at the challenge and see whether it's worthy. If it's a challenge that is there and you're not coping, for example, a challenge such as you've recently experienced a loss of a loved one. So that can be really challenging. So then you might be wanting to look at, well, that challenge is not going to go away, right? It's there. What can I do, I can bring the support up so you can reach out for support. You can get support in this area. You can get counseling, you can see a psychologist, you can see a professional that helps people that move through grief and trauma. So there's you know, you can then reach out for support and that brings us supporter and narrows the gap which reduces the distress. So we want to narrow that gap between challenge and support. Get them to meet one another and that creates you stress that when you are essentially there's enough challenge, but enough support to meet the challenge and You're growing as a person. And that's like this podcast, I don't have realistic expectations of this podcast, I just do daily actions towards making this better, and that's me. And I see that through the numbers that I can tell my daily actions have been fruitful, that are actually delivering results through the actions. And yes, they might not be where they where I want them to be. But how do I know where they should be? I don't really know. It's a bit like that weight loss target. You think, Well, I want to lose five kilos. But why five kilos. And there's generally some association with when I was that way I had, you know, I was on top of the world. So it's more the associative effect. So maybe if you're not on top of the world, you wouldn't need to lose the five kilos. It's okay. So, again, it's asking yourself, why, and why is that important to you, and really getting to the underlying driver as to why you need to achieve that target. So that's the other aspect I wanted to cover around depression, in terms of what you can do about it in terms of what's happening in the brain, when we have these unrealistic expectations of self or others, or we have a challenge that's far greater than the support. what the brain does is it goes into survival mode, essentially, it's thinking, Well, I'm so challenged, and my my life's a threat here, it just goes into a primitive mode of survival, that's our midbrain. So that's essentially our midbrain, so we, it's a midbrain area, which is where our amygdala is the fear center. So the amygdala runs the midbrain, when we're in this fight, or flight or freeze response, which is a survival response. So it's a response to get away from a predator, or to catch prey. And then we've got a stronger desire to get away from a predator. Because if you think about it, that predator is an absolute threat on our life in that moment, whereas if we miss that prey, we're not going to die in that moment. So we have a stronger, stronger instinct to get away from a threat than we have an impulse towards something. That's why they say that we have a stronger desire to avoid pain, which is to get away from that threat, that lie threat. And then a stronger impulse to, you know, that's much stronger than the impulse towards something, we're more likely to avoid pain than see pleasure. That's hardwired into us to be that way. Because that Tiger is a threat in that moment to our life. And we might wait, you know, we might die in that moment, right? Very hard. And that's it, it's like game over, so to speak. Whereas you missing that prey or not getting that chocolate bar is not going to be life threatening. In that moment, maybe if you didn't eat for weeks and weeks and months, then that becomes a big problem. Because you start to fall apart and start to break down and you're getting closer to death, the longer you go without eating, but you can miss plenty of times of capturing that prey versus the need to get away that instinctual need to get away from that pain or that threats that life threat. So this is that amygdala in our brain, the fear center, it's more responsive to threat to our life. Okay? And so that amygdala is wanting you to survive essentially, and so it's going to help you get away from something so what it was to do, it then changes neurochemistry in the brain so instead of telling you that life's good, and I you know, and all those pleasurable sort of neurotransmitters so it's going to produce less of them. So the the ones that are associated with good mood and feeling upbeat such as dopamine and serotonin there once you've probably heard about so you know, serotonin is often associated with the smiley emoji. Dopamine is probably associated with you know, winning and feeling elated and on top of the world, and I want more of this. It's that reward seeking neurotransmitter so that those two neurotransmitters are going to be mine is going to make less of them because it's life threatening. We don't need to feel happy, we don't want to feel content, okay. And we haven't achieved an award yet. Okay. The dopamine will go up after you get away from that threat right. And same with the serotonin but whilst that threat is there, your brain is down regulating the serotonin is down regulating the dopamine because they're not essential for that getting away from that threat. In that moment, you're perceiving a lot more negative, and so you shouldn't because it's life threatening. So, what the body then does is create neurotransmitters associated with getting you away from that threat, or towards the pleasure. Okay, and these are adrenaline and that will epinephrine and norepinephrine. And so our body produces more of them, which have a physiological response in our body. And part of that physiological response is the production of cortisol from the kidneys, right? So our kidneys produce the cortisol when it's signal from the brain to produce cortisol. And that's part of the stress response to the body. So we have a stress response in the brain, which is norepinephrine. And again, their stress. So they're taking us wanting like to just see one side, essentially, that only that that side is freedom, that side is death, okay. And, and so we have a really a really imbalanced perspective towards one side, we're very, we have a confirmation bias, we just see all the negatives, and we don't see the positives. And that's to get us to run in the opposite direction, it's to get us away from something. And once we get away from that thing, then our neuro chemistry will change, okay, it will change to say, Oh, you can feel content, now you're safe, okay, I'll start producing some serotonin. I don't need that epinephrine or norepinephrine, neurotransmitters are down regulate them. And yes, I'll give you some dopamine to say, Well done, Anthony, you got away from that threat. And I'll make sure I encouraged that amount of activity and the way you ran, and course you talk and that I'll make sure I, I store that in memory, I'll store that in the hippocampus as this is the path to take when this sort of threat arises, okay. And so this is how our brain is, you know, the how the brains chemistry is changing based on our perceptions of reality. And so if you perceive a challenge way to bigger, so it's becomes a threat to your life, right, there's just too much to handle and not enough support. So the supportive if you have too much support, you're producing lots of serotonin, okay. And oxytocin, they're, you know, transmitters associated with feeling content around support and feeling loved and connected. So you're going to produce them when you have high amounts of support. And too much of them is not good either. Because we get too content too complacent. And we don't do things that challenge us and inspire us and we get bored, and we end up just eating and we overeat, and we just relax and watch Netflix, we become prey, don't we? Because we put on too much weight, and then we become prey to a predator. So the predator in this case is our own minds where we start self sabotaging ourselves, how did you let yourself get like this? Anthony? How, you know, that's terrible, you should do that. And anyway, so this is the imbalance on the other perspective. So again, our brain knows how to rebalance its itself provided we shift and alter our perceptions, and which so we can change the perceptions. If it's not a tiger there, and we just perceiving a tiger being there. We can say, well, how is this event serving me? How is it benefiting me so that you're not seeing you don't have this confirmation bias to the negative you're then bringing the what's currently unconscious, the positives, you're bringing that to the surface by asking yourself, How is the better venue? How is this challenge benefiting you, and what's important to you, so then you can change your perception of the challenge to write and that will alter the neurochemistry because it will calm the emotions and you think, okay, it's not all negative, there is some positives with this challenge. So you can change your perception of the challenge. So if you can't remove the challenge, then you can change the perception of that challenge. So that it's not hard wired to produce the neuro chemistry of stress hormones because you're not perceiving as life threatening. You see, the order in its you see how it is serving you, you see the the benefits you're bringing, to your conscious awareness, the positives, and the unconscious initially when you perceive all negative, right or more negatives than positives, and that ratio of perception will determine how emotional you are and how distraught you are. So if you perceive way more negatives than positives, then you're going to be a lot more emotional and upset about the situation you can shift that perception by asking yourself that question. However, it can be challenging to ask yourself that question when the ratios are so oriented towards the negative you just see it's just all or nothing it you are really strong in your like all the blood glucose and oxygen are going to your that midbrain, that animal part of the brain that I talked about in the previous episode on anxiety, so that that part of the brain that hardwired brain to get away from the threat. So that's running hard to reduce the neurotransmitters associated with stress Okay, and so might be required in that moment is to actually calm yourself through regulating the breathing. And I went through that in the previous episode on anxiety, how you can take control of your breath, calm your emotions, and then be able to access that prefrontal cortex, which I spoke about in the previous episode about how, because we need to access that area, the prefrontal cortex, which is the executive function, which is in charge of that strategic planning, having that vision, like so you actually have a clear vision of what you want. And you can actually see yourself achieving that, okay. And only, you can only access that when you have blood glucose and oxygen going to that area. And in that moment, when you you know, having so much you're feeling, you know, massive heart palpitations and huge amounts of sweat, then it might be very difficult to then. So one way in which you can orientate the blood flow and get the oxygen and the glucose to that prefrontal cortex and switch that back on. Because when we're depressed, or we're chronically depressed, there's very little oxygen and blood glucose going into that area of the brain. And the wires actually start getting pruned, so to speak, our brain starts trimming them because it thinks well, it's unnecessary, I need to have more focus on getting you keeping you alive. And so the neuro chemistry as well as the neural wiring of your brain is gets really strong hardwired, associated with survival. It's all about survival. And that's when you get stuck in this all or nothing thinking, I've got to have this I have to have this I must desire this. And this is the other area of the brain that's been associated with depression is the nucleus accumbens, right. So this is also in that midbrain area, which is where the amygdala is, and the hippocampus is, is this nucleus accumbens, and that is associated with that reward. Okay, and that reward and motivation center and that really reward and motivation center can be how someone then seeks to get immediate fulfilled externally through addictions, right. So they're, the dopamine is down. And there's the desire to lift yourself up and to make you feel better to change that neurochemistry. But instead of looking inwards, and self reflecting, and changing through changing your perceptions, then the person looks outside and goes to an addiction, such as alcohol, or gambling, or drugs to change the neuro chemistry of the brain, okay? Or could it be a shopping addiction, okay, so you can get a dopamine hit from shopping. And that nucleus, so accumbens that accumbens area is really active when we are getting that reward, and we're satisfying that we want and we get more motivated to get that reward. Okay, it's very much a survival thing thinking, Well, yeah, you got there, honey, you need to find more of these honeys, because that's a pot of gold, that honey, because it's highly, it's got lots of glucose, and glucose is the primary fuel for the body, it is the easiest fuel to burn. And you can obviously perform better operating on glucose provided you don't do it in excess. So I just wanted to cover off some other areas that are associated with depression, and really changing this neural wiring in our brain. So I've spoken a lot about how we can have an illusion and distorted disillusion with reality or lose touch with reality, because of our unrealistic expectations of self and on others, and then not being able to deal with the challenges. Because you've got that gap between challenge and support. And again, we can change our perceptions of both and reoriented our goals to be realistic. And we can set realistic measures daily activities realistic, so it'd be unrealistic for me to say Anthony to do you know, eight hours of podcasting in a day, that is really tiring, and I'll probably wouldn't be doing a good job by the end episodes are typically if I'm going to do a podcast, it's one per day, a maximum of two per day, I realized that's where I get optimal output in terms of me being very alert switched on and being able to share the message sincerely, hopefully, and, and coherently. Whereas if I went on for eight hours, you can imagine that last episode who want to listen to it, okay, so I set realistic expectations around that daily activity associated with podcasting, and you should to around your meaningful goal they see the goals have got to be meaningful, and therefore the challenge is a meaningful challenge. Otherwise, who wants to take on a challenge that is not meaningful to you? So I only take on challenges that are really meaningful to me that are really high value to me, because that that's the era I want to grow in. Whereas if you're sitting in yourself, all we have a challenge is an area that doesn't inspire you, then you're going to see it as a glass ceiling, you don't want to break through it, it's just not worthy. And some, and this is New Year's resolution goals, okay? So they're typically the New Year's resolution goals where you want to just copy someone else and think open mind that success, I'll I'll do that program or that challenge and, and then it's not really you, it's not a goal that's meaningful for you. Okay, and then then you beat yourself up, you become self critical, which is also associated with depression. The other thing is associated with depression is also the lack of sleep. So sleep deprivation. So sleep deprivation then takes us more into that survival thinking because when we're sleep deprived, we're just trying to get through the day, we can just, you know, with the minimal resources, we're not replenished, we're not fully repaired. And it's a survival way of which we just got to get through the day, okay, until you can get some sleep until you can get some rest. So the body then goes in the neurochemistry changes, more from that survival, such as more stress hormones are produced to get you through because the body has an adequately repaired and it's just got a push on, push them through the day. So again, it takes the blood glucose and oxygen away from the prefrontal cortex and the prefrontal cortex is also associated with self regulation. Okay, it is where we have governance over our emotions, we quieten down that amygdala that I spoken about, we quiet down that a nucleus accumbens, and that nucleus accumbens is that desire thing that really thing, that thing where you seek pleasure, aka, you want the reward and you're heavily motivated to do that. That's a survival mechanism. So we we quieten down that area of the brain, when we have blood glucose and oxygen going into the prefrontal cortex, we have less going there when we're sleep deprived, okay? It's because it's more survival. It's just to get you through we go into that survival mentality. And again, you're going to go towards more higher calorific foods to help you get through the desire because the the nucleus accumbens accumbens is taking over. It's saying, yeah, that is looking awesome. That's really going to be helpful for your survival is that highly calorific food? And yes, it is helpful for survival. When you when you're in the desert and there's no food and then you see that highly calorific food you're gonna eat as much as you want, because you don't know when the next meal comes. And when we're in that part of the brain, we have that scarcity mentality there all or nothing, it's all about survival. Okay, so having a good night's sleep can really help terms of staying and staying on top of that, and having control over your desire center or your limbic system. And that's, as I said, is the Animal Center the survival center. So getting that good night's sleep is important, I've covered that in plenty of previous episodes. Also, that's also very important is nourishment, making sure your body's getting adequate nourishment to be able to produce the neurotransmitters, okay, so if the body doesn't have the resources to manufacture those neurotransmitters and to be able to make the serotonin to be able to to make the dopamine and things like that. So if your protein deficient, that's the backbone of these neurotransmitters, we need to have adequate protein, we need to have the cofactors that support the manufacture of that neurotransmitter. So cofactors, such as the micronutrients such as we hear as magnesium and zinc, and we need to have iron, we need to have vitamin C's important and, and so all these micronutrients are important in small doses, micro doses, but we need to get the macros right and so also we need to have the good polyunsaturated fats. So omega three has been associated with healthy brain. Also, having making sure you've got the protein I mentioned, making sure you have adequate zinc in your diet, adequate magnesium, magnesium comes from leafy greens, so you need this well balanced diet. So if I look at all the essentials, Vitamin D is also linked to a good mental health. So vitamin D, you know, our body needs the sun to manufacture vitamin D, but it also needs cholesterol. So we need a balance of everything. And so a balanced diet really helps have a balanced mind. And then I want to get on to exercise. So exercise helps us balance our neuro chemistry because when we're feeling down and we do some activity, it lifts lifts us up, okay, so we feel high. We get that sense because we produce endorphins when we do activities, so it can really lift our moods and help balance the neuro chemistry. So that is really important. Breathing is really important. So dysregulated breathing It will create disorder in the minds, okay? Because if you have disordered breathing, it's saying there's something not right. And if you know you're, something's not right happening, I'm responding and it's not right. And so therefore, your brain gets worried about what feedback is coming from the body. So it's important to regulate your breathing and to make sure you are breathing in a way that's coherence, which is an equal in breath and out breath. And I covered that in the previous episode of anxiety. So I've covered a lot today, in this episode, the neuroscience of depression and how to beat the Blues have given you lots of tips around what you can do. Ultimately, it's up to the individual to find what works for them. So if the tips I shared with you today, doesn't resonate with you, then seek help seek further help. Okay, as I said, need to bring the support up in order to meet all your life's challenges that you're experiencing. So seek help if this hasn't resonated with you today. And as I said, Every one is unique and special. And so this will resonate with some people. Some people are receptive to receiving this because they're in a state of mind to be receptive to receive this information. If you're not in a state of mind to receive this information, then you can say that was pretty unhelpful, Anthony, well, then seek help that's going to be helpful for you and I might be just reaching out to a friend or family member. So please seek help if this hasn't been helpful for you. And until next time, keep healthy and keep helping up. Join the me&my health up club would be great to have you as a member the membership is membership base is expanding. We're becoming a wonderful community. And I provide additional insight beyond the podcast and to help this community grow and to be healthier. So I'll miss sharing and lots more additional insights to really help people along in their journey for an ultimate now what they ultimately what they want to achieve and just providing the right education and support for them to achieve their goals. And until next time, really keep healthy and look forward to sharing some more insight on the next episode of me&my health up.

Podcast Disclaimer: 47:18

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