How We Treat Treatment-Resistant Depression
October is National Depression Education & Awareness Month! You are probably here because you or a loved one may have experienced treatment-resistant depression and are looking for support. You are not alone: treatment-resistant depression is a condition that up to ⅓ of adults with major depressive symptoms experience.* Here at Woven, we want to be able to provide information and tools to help support you in your healing as best we can. We have a few blogs planned out for this month surrounding depression and the support available to you if you or a loved one are struggling with depression. Today we’ll discuss the use of ketamine-assisted psychotherapy (KAP) for treatment-resistant depression. Let’s dive in.
What is treatment-resistant depression?
Treatment-resistant depression is depression that does not respond to treatment. A response to treatment is seeing a decrease in the symptoms you are experiencing (read more about the symptoms of depression here).
Some of the treatments you may have tried:
Talk therapy
CBT
ACT
DBT
Psychotropic medications
Intensive-Outpatient Programs
Psychiatric hospital stays
You may have treatment-resistant depression if you have tried multiple treatments or medications and have not seen a reduction in symptoms.
If sounds like you, it is completely understandable why you might feel like there isn’t hope, or that you have to live with your depression. There is hope, and KAP might be a vehicle to see change.
When we are thinking about a mental illness such as depression, one important concept to understand is Neuroplasticity. Neuroplasticity is the ability of our brains to change their connections and networks in response to new information.** Our brains have the ability to change- they are not fixed, meaning that the connections and networks causing your depression (or PTSD, or Anxiety) can change and heal.
Ketamine Assisted Psychotherapy opens the door to allow these new connections between our neurons to take place. This is incredible news! Our trauma and depression don’t get the last word. We can change the pathways that have been formed in our brains.
When talking about neural pathways, here is our favorite phrase to describe how they work: "neurons that fire together wire together.” After a single dose of ketamine, a neuroplastic window in your brain provides time to rewire how your brain responds to trauma and depression. This window gives you a greater capacity to increase new pathways and creates greater resilience in times of stress. In contrast, it can take a few months for antidepressants to create this neuroplastic window.
In this neuroplastic window, we have the opportunity to change the ways that we respond to trauma, and we can also create new habits to support us during hard times. Working with a KAP therapist provides an environment to develop coping skills and relationships that are supportive.
Ketamine also enhances the therapy process and the therapeutic relationship you build with your therapist because of the increased ability to trust and receive care from them.
Woven Together Trauma Therapy therapists provide Ketamine Assisted Psychotherapy from a relational framework. This means that our therapists believe that the relationship you have with your therapist is a huge catalyst for change. This is why it is crucial to work with someone who is a good fit and who is experienced in working with the topics you are bringing to therapy.
This relationship with your therapist with help you build new responses to your depression and distress. You will be able to respond to your depression and trauma by learning how to ask for and accept support from a trusted person and practice using new coping skills. Therapy is a safe place to practice interactions that might feel very uncomfortable at first. Working on and practicing these skills with your therapist helps you build the ability to use these skills in other relationships in your life.
If you are living with treatment-resistant depression, KAP might be the answer. Change your brain’s pathways through the increased neuroplasticity that ketamine provides.
Want to learn more about Ketamine assisted therapy? We probably have a blog about it.
Not sure if ketamine would be a good fit for you? We wrote a blog about that. Check it out here: Who is Ketamine Assisted Therapy For?
Interested in learning more about what to expect from KAP? Check out this blog: What to Expect in Your First KAP Session
If you think that ketamine-assisted psychotherapy is a good fit for you, sign up for a free 30-minute consultation today (California residents only).