Why Antidepressants Take So Long To Work
New research on how SSRIs work, and some ideas for making the wait a little easier
When my doctor told me that the antidepressant she had just described would take up to six weeks to take maximum effect, I didn’t know what to say. It had taken all the energy I had just to make that appointment and show up to it. I had no idea how to think about, let alone make it through, six more weeks of anxiety and exhaustion.
More than a decade later, those six weeks now appear as just a blip on the arc of a lifetime. But in the throes of depression, the prescription to wait weeks for relief is hard to hear.
Why do the most commonly prescribed antidepressants — selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, or SSRIs — take so long to work? And how do they work? Answers to these questions have proven surprisingly elusive, but new research has brought us closer to a full understanding and also pave the way for insights into what causes depression to begin with
Can you hear me now?
Nerves communicate to each other by releasing chemical signals — including serotonin — at small connections called “synapses” between the nerves. While the brain sends some signals to the body by way of the bloodstream with hormones that hang around…
