Was I Always Going To Be Like This

Send us Fan MailWas I always going to be like this?It's the question that shows up at 3am. When nothing else is working. Somewhere between despair and accusation.This episode goes looking for a real answer — not reassurance, not false hope, but what the science actually says.We go into genetics and what heritability really means for depression and anxiety. We go into epigenetics—the genuinely significant discovery that chronic stress and early experience can change how genes are expressed without changing your DNA. And we go into neuroplasticity—what the evidence shows about the brain's capacity to change and what that means for the question of whether any of this is fixed.This is the most scientifically complex episode in the series so far. It doesn't offer a clean answer. But it offers something more honest than the question you started with.Not Fixed, Still Here. Episode 4.If anything in this episode brought something up for you, support is available 24/7. Call or text 988 or text HOME to 741741.Genetics & Heritability Tabrizi et al.—Heritability and polygenic load for comorbid anxiety and depression—Translational Psychiatry (March 2025) Wray et al.—Genome-wide association analyses identify 44 risk variants for major depression—Nature Genetics (2018) Adams et al.—Genome-wide study of major depression in 685,808 diverse individuals—medRxiv (2024) Molecular Psychiatry — Genetic nurture effects in depressive and anxiety disorders (2025) Epigenetics Kretzschmar, Boldt, Targa — The genetics and epigenetics of mental health — Frontiers in Genetics (April 2024) Franklin et al.—Epigenetic regulation of brain development, plasticity, and response to early-life stress—Neuropsychopharmacology (2025) Talarowska — Epigenetic mechanisms in the neurodevelopmental theory of depression — PMC (2020) Frontiers in Psychiatry — From trauma to depression: epigenetic and molecular pathways (2025) Frontiers in Psychiatry — Clinical use of epigenetics in psychiatry (2025) Neuroplasticity Huizenga, Neuroplasticity and mental health: implications for depression and anxiety treatment, Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience (2025) Radulescu, Dragoi, Trifu—Neuroplasticity and depression: rewiring the brain's networks—Experimental and Therapeutic Medicine—PMC (2021) Journal of Neuropsychiatry and Clinical Neurosciences — The dynamic brain: neuroplasticity and mental health (2012 / updated 2025) Axis Mental Health—How neuroplasticity improves mental health (2026) Crisis Resources — Include in Every Episode Description Call or text 988 — Suicide and Crisis Lifeline (24/7, free, confidential) Text HOME to 741741 — Crisis Text Line (24/7, free, confidential) Support the show