The pleasure paradox and why everything you've been taught about pleasure is wrong.

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There is a lot of nuance to this topic of depression that I didn’t address in this clip. If you’re struggling with major depression currently, this episode is not for you.

Four things I want to mention in particular:

1. Our propensity for depression can be related to our liver detox genes and nutritional deficiencies, I highly recommend working with a functional med doc before you medicate.

2. The dorsal “freeze” response happens when we perceive a threat that we don’t think we are capable of fighting of fleeing from. Our nervous system will choose sympathetic/fight-flight as a first line of defense typically, unless it assesses that something is too dangerous for those to be effective. I hope this gives you compassion for what is underneath depression— some fear, grief, or perceived danger that feels insurmountable.

3. Movement isn’t the only thing that helps us come out of dorsal. Co-regulation with other people can help, oxytocin from touch and loving connection can help, and turning towards the source of shame, grief, or fear and taking action can help immensely. This is what good therapeutic or coaching support should help you do!

4. I acknowledge there are people and circumstances in which the help of an anti-depressant can be life-changing. The concern I have is my years helping patients wean off those meds and how there is often a backlog of emotion that didn’t get processed in the chemically-masked freeze state. The reason many people can’t cry or orgasm on SSRIs is because the nervous system is still hypo-regulated. The fight-flight responses that come online again as they wean and unthaw can be really tough— insomnia, anxiety, nightmares, panic, racing heart, dizziness, brain zaps, etc. And these can absolutely be helped by a number of other interventions to help regulate the nervous system but the nervous system supportive tools need to be there.