Question:
If a parent suffers from depression and does not get it treated, is it
possible for them to transfer that depression on to a small child?
Answer:
i'm not sure. as a kid, i remember becoming frantic with anxiety while
watching my mother having frantic anxiety symptoms, without even knowing
what she was anxious about. to this day we share some identical anxiety
behaviors. same for depression maybe, although my memories of that are
less clear. i think some people have their moods more contagiously than others, but with
the degree of empathy that typically exists between little kids and their
parents, it makes sense that this might happen.
and of course there's the age-old debate about how much of what is
transferred is hereditary and how much is transferred behaviorally.
