How to Stop Negative Thoughts from Racing in your Mind - Overcoming Depression

According to the National Institute of Health, 17.3 million adults, 7.1% have experienced a major depressive episode in the past year. 5% of adults experience seasonal depression. 1 out of 6 adults have taken an anti-depressant in the past month. In the past 15 years, there has been a 65% increase in antidepressant use. Is our society getting more depressed and unable to deal with the pressures, stresses, and people in their lives? I’ve seen in my practice that a sense of being stuck or too fatigued to deal with life’s challenges can results in depression. It is reported that over 50% of patients who are diagnosed with depression also have anxiety.

What Causes Depression?

-Low levels of serotonin or dopamine

-Elevated or depleted stress hormones such as cortisol, norepinephrine, epinephrine

-High carbohydrate and high sugar diet

-Lack of physical activity

-Chronic inflammation

-Imbalance in sex hormones such as estrogen, progesterone and testosterone

-Life stress, Type A personality, perfectionism

-Subconscious negative belief systems

-Depleted energy levels in the body, adrenal fatigue.

-Low Qi levels, Liver qi stagnation

-Depleted basic, navel, solar plexus and spleen chakras

-Inability to assimilate and store energy in body

-Weak boundaries, and energetically melding with other people’s problems

Thoughts in Getting to the Bottom of Depression

Taking an anti-depressant is only as good as the placebo effect according to studies. This is approximately 33% improvement. The only problem is that the anti-depressants initially will dull the sensations of sadness or negative feelings that are present making the patient temporarily feeling better. However these medications also decrease happiness, motivation, creativity and other positive emotions. So patients taking these drugs often feel flat. They don’t feel as sad, and they don’t feel happy. This is why some psychotropic drugs are linked to increased suicidal ideation.

To get to the bottom of depression, we do need to correct some chemical imbalances in the body such as hormones, neurotransmitters and dietary nutrients so that the body can make the brain chemicals that contribute to positive emotions and balanced emotional regulation. We also need to work on the thoughts that seem to automatically swirl around the brain. These thoughts include imagination of the worst-case scenarios, sense of impending doom, and those of self-doubt.

Counseling and psychotherapy are helpful in bringing awareness to one’s thought life. But many patients are unable to implement the affirmations, and positive thoughts they are taught to think in their counseling sessions. This can lead to discouragement because negative thoughts just seem to automatically appear and it feels almost impossible to stop the anxious and depressing thoughts. Photo Credit Gareth Williams

What Works Better?

I’ve been blessed to come across some highly effective therapies over the years that have been life changing in so many patients’ moods. I utilized a couple techniques best done when the patient and I are on the phone or video conferencing called Neuro Emotional Technique (NET) and Pranic Healing. Distance does not matter when dealing with these types of healing frequencies. In short these techniques help remove the negative (depressive) information stored in the body and mind. It is like an extraction technique. After giving the body a clean slate, it easier to insert new positive thought patterns.  I also work to energize the patient’s electrical field, because most depressed individuals have a very low energy frequency, and this energizing is very helpful in lifting the frequency of moods. They have measured frequencies of emotions. For example Apathy/Hopelessness logs in at 70. Fear/Anxiety logs in at 100. Optimism/Hope logs in at 310. Love logs in at 500. Higher and healthier emotions have higher vibrational frequencies which is the reason for the effectiveness with energizing techniques.

A study published in the Australasian Psychiatry Journal in 2018 Amelioration of mild and moderate depression through Pranic Healing as adjuvant therapy: randomized double-blind controlled trial, shows amazing results using Pranic Healing, a technique I use with my patients. In the study, one group of patients were given Pranic Healing for 20 minutes once per week for 4 weeks, the other group was given a mock/fake treatment for the same duration of time. Using the Hamilton Depression Rating Scale HAM-D as assessment tool, 69% of the mock group improved, and 100% of the Pranic Healing group improved.

I do believe that utilizing physics methods of therapy such as Pranic Healing increases the effectiveness in treating depression dramatically because we are both biological and electric beings. When we influence the electric memory and signally systems, the burden on the patient to “try” so hard to change their thoughts is significantly minimized. They feel lighter, see the world more hopefully, feel more ease associated with daily tasks because proper electric wiring is restored and takes a lot less burden for the system to operate.

 

How does dietary fat consumption affect the brain?

Did you know that the make up of your cell membrane depends on what you eat? In that sense, you are what you eat. The way your brain talks to your body is via cell-to-cell communication along nerves or neuronal tissue. If you eat a lot of trans fats such as those found in vegetable shortening, fried foods, and arachadonic acid found in red meat, these fats send an inflammatory signal to the nervous system.

Inflammation in the nervous system causes in increase in glutamate, which is an excitatory chemical in the brain. This can lead to symptoms of anxiety, hyperactivity, addictive tendencies and in-attention. Increase in inflammation and glutamate in the brain long term from chronic excessive brain firing causes neuron damage. This contributes to degenerative diseases like dementia, Alzheimer’s or Parkinson’s disease develop due to the oxidative damage this excessive inflammation produces. Also, consumption of inflammatory fats make cell membranes hard and rigid, blocking cell-to-cell communication.

If you eat lots of omega-3 fats found in fish, flax and walnuts your cell membranes are nice and malleable improving the structure and function of receptors on the cell. This allows for brain chemicals like serotonin, dopamine, and acetylcholine to communicate better with the cell helping positive mood, attention and memory. Another large component of cell membranes are phospholipids such as phosphatidyl choline and serine, which are found in high concentrations in the brain. They help balance stress hormone levels, decrease anxiety, improve memory, improve mood, and decrease aggression. Phospholipids can be found in lecithin, soy lecithin, egg yolks, sardines and nuts.  

Many studies show a correlation between depression and deficiency of omega-3 fatty acids. According to the journal of Nutrition and Healthy Aging, DHA, which is an omega-3 fatty acid is “one of the major building structures of membrane phospholipids of the brain and absolutely necessary for neuronal function”. The British Journal of Psychiatry, Did a study on prisoners. One group had their regular prison diet, and the other group was supplemented with Omega-3 fats. The prisoners who were given omega-3 fats had a 35% reduction in violent crime in prison. I’ve seen in my practice patients having great symptom improvement from depressive mood, anxiety and improvement in focus on a therapeutic dose of EPA and DHA.

Often times we think of supplements that are neurotransmitter specific first when seeing brain issues, but it is important to remember that basic nutritional sufficiency can make a very large difference in neurology. Be careful of low fat fad diets, as these diets often compromise brain function and lead to teenage learning problems and depression. Your brain needs fat to function, so eat the good fats.