The Biochemistry Behind Anxiety And Depression

What’s the biochemical explanation behind it?

Mental health issues have been on the rise in the last decade. Part of that reason can be pinpointed at the idea of stress, which is “is how the brain and body respond to any demand. Any type of challenges — such as performance at work or school, a significant life change, or a traumatic event — can be stressful.”

According to the National Institute of Mental Health,

Stress affects everyone. Everyone experiences stress from time to time. There are different types of stress — all of which carry physical and mental health risks. A stressor may be a one-time or short-term occurrence, or it can happen repeatedly over a long time. Some people may cope with stress more effectively and recover from stressful events more quickly than others.

Examples of stress include: Routine stress related to the pressures of school, work, family, and other daily responsibilities.

Stress brought about by a sudden negative change, such as losing a job, divorce, or illness. Traumatic stress experienced during an event such as a major accident, war, assault, or natural disaster where people may be in danger of being seriously hurt or killed. People who experience traumatic stress may have very distressing temporary emotional and physical symptoms, but most recover naturally soon after.

And we do have to admit that the modern world provides many avenues and arenas for us to experience stress. Whether it’s rushing tight deadlines at work, cramming into the trains or driving at rush hour, or balancing out finances, loans, and debts — all that can be quite stressful.

People who have experienced traumatic incidents would be subjected to a higher level of stress loading, too.

And all that isn’t good for our health, especially when:

Coping with the impact of chronic stress can be challenging. Because the source of long-term stress is more constant than acute stress, the body never receives a clear signal to return to normal functioning. With chronic stress, those same lifesaving reactions in the body can disturb the immune, digestive, cardiovascular, sleep, and reproductive systems. Some people may experience mainly digestive symptoms, while others may have headaches, sleeplessness, sadness, anger, or irritability.

Over time, continued strain on your body from stress may contribute to serious health problems, such as heart disease, high blood pressure, diabetes, and other illnesses, including mental disorders such as depression or anxiety.

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The science behind being happy.

Many of us have heard of the biochemical known as “serotonin”. Medical News Today describes it as “the happy chemical because it contributes to wellbeing and happiness.”

Serotonin is a neurotransmitter that “is involved in a wide range of behaviors, including sleep, appetite, memory, sexual behavior, neuroendocrine function, and mood.” With insufficient serotonin, there would be a lot of “normal” human activities that we wouldn’t be in the mood for. Eating? Sleeping? Sex? All of them. Any unused serotonin is reabsorbed back by the neurons to regulate the serotonin concentrations in our brain.

What we have in the synaptic cells in our brains are receptors that the serotonin can bind to like a lock and key mechanism (Unlocking The Lock And Key Mechanism That Governs Our Body’s Cellular Functions.), and in doing so unlocks the feeling of happiness.

But how is serotonin synthesized?

According to this article:

1. Tryptophan, an amino acid that we can get from our diet, is converted into 5-HTP with the aid of tetrahydrobiopterin as a cofactor. Let’s keep that tetrahydrobiopterin in sight for now.

2. 5-HTP then gets converted into 5-HT, which is the serotonin that we are looking for.

This tetrahydrobiopterin molecule is also important in the regulation of our blood pressure. I wrote previously in You Don’t Have To Be Pressured Into Hypertension — Or Do You? that:

Our blood vessels contain a layer of cells known as the endothelium. These cells, known as the endothelial cells, contain an enzyme known as endothelial nitric oxide synthase (eNOS). The cofactor tetrahydrobiopterin aids in the coupling of eNOS enzymes such that coupled eNOS can produce nitric oxide (NO) from L-arginine. The NO that is produced signals the dilation of blood vessels to be able to accommodate an increased blood flow rate, such as in the case of vigorous exercise.

In simpler terms, coupled eNOS is necessary to produce NO, which signals our blood vessels to dilate.

When our blood vessels don’t dilate properly, it would be inevitable that our blood pressure would increase.

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How can stress affect the production of the happy chemical?

As I wrote in Four Ways That Our Lifestyle Affects Our Immune System, During periods of high stress, the stress hormones epinephrine and norepinephrine are released into the blood by the adrenal glands.

These 2 hormones help to increase the activity of the pro-inflammatory nuclear factor kappa B (NF-κB) signalling pathway in the body, hence resulting in an intensified inflammation signalling.

A properly functioning NF-κB pathway is key to maintaining the levels of reactive oxygen species (ROS) in the body. However, a dysfunctional NF-κB pathway would result in the production of more ROS, which can ultimately lead to oxidative stress, as I explore in It Only Takes That Tiny Electron To Cause Those Health Problems.

And when there are these ROS roaming around, they can oxidize tetrahydrobiopterin to produce dihydrobiopterin. In the case of hypertension, dihydrobiopterin cannot couple eNOS enzymes to get them to produce NO. In the case of stress, dihydrobiopterin cannot help to convert tryptophan into 5-HT, and serotonin production will also be subsequently affected.

Now, is it any wonder why people experiencing chronic stress tend to have higher blood pressure readings?

And unfortunately, when one is experiencing chronic stress, their sleep quality will most definitely get affected. Insufficient quality sleep can lead to a greater release of epinephrine and norepinephrine from the adrenal glands back into the blood — so a person undergoing chronic stress experiences a double whammy of them stress hormones!

And of course, the long term effects of all this unchecked chronic stress can also result in the brain producing more pro-inflammatory cytokines, which can translate into neurodegenerative disorders, such as Alzheimer’s/Parkinson’s in due time, which I do explore in Brain Degeneration Ain’t All That It’s Cracked Up To Be. Disorders of the central nervous system are also likely to occur, as it is in the case of multiple sclerosis.

In fact, stress also produces more cortisol hormones, which can also wreak havoc on one’s insulin resistance and potentially lead to Type 2 diabetes.

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What about SSRIs? What do they do for mental health?

A Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitor (SSRI) is a drug that is commonly prescribed for people experiencing depression. As I mentioned earlier, excess serotonin is reabsorbed by the neurons to regulate serotonin concentrations.

SSRIs prevent the reuptake of serotonin back into the neurons, and in doing so increases the serotonin concentrations in the brain to stimulate more “happiness” receptors. In doing so, it can then be used to treat depression or anxiety cases.

If, however, the problem were caused by insufficient tetrahydrobiopterin and/or oxidative stress/inflammation, then SSRIs may help to attenuate the symptom of depression, but they won’t address the problem of oxidative stress, for instance.

Perhaps that is why SSRIs may work for some people, but other people need higher doses, or higher doses may not even help for some of them?

Perhaps we might need a few more nutrients in our diet to help our brain produce these neurotransmitters in the right amount. While this article focuses mainly on serotonin, do bear in mind that there are many different neurotransmitters that can affect our mood - I do explore the effects of dopamine on the brain in What We Have In Common With Bananas, And How This Commonality Can Precipitate Parkinson’s Disease.

If you found this applicable to you or someone you know, you may also be interested in finding out what nutrients can support brain function and health at 12 Brain Boosting Nutrients and How They Work For Supporting Brain Health.

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This article was originally published on Medium.