What do each of them do to brain chemistry and what effects do they have? And how does a professional decide which one would be best suited for someone?
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Mood stabilizers are for the treatment of a different set of illnesses vs SSRIs, which are specifically antidepressants.
Mood stabilizers, like lithium, act to “level out” mood and brain activity. Exactly how they work is not yet proven. Some, like lithium, appear to slow down some neurochemical processes, which is theorized to result in a levelled out mood by, metaphorically, putting the brakes on. Others work in different ways, e.g. “antipsychotics” are designed to treat psychosis, the inability to distinguish what is real from what is not.
An SSRI is a “selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor”. We call them “selective” because they mostly affect serotonin only, as opposed to having more than minor effects on dopamine or norepinephrine. “Serotonin reuptake” is something neural cells do, where they absorb serotonin floating around in the synaptic cleft, storing it away (or breaking it down) rather than letting it be used. SSRIs reduce the rate at which serotonin reuptake occurs, hence, they inhibit it. Theory is that insufficient serotonin leads to a failure of the brain to properly respond to the stimuli it receives, causing feelings in general (but especially positive feelings) to be muted or deadened.
The purpose of mood stabilizers is to help folks with bipolar disorder, psychosis, or other *disrupted* mental states gain a healthier, normalized mental state. SSRIs are one specific class of antidepressant/anti-anxiety medication, designed to restore normal neurotransmitter function. Both types of drug affect neurotransmitters, though usually very different ones, and a psychiatrist would determine which medication(s) to prescribe based on careful medical examination and diagnosis of the relevant issues. E.g., a person can have both bipolar disorder and depression and anxiety, meaning that they might need both a mood stabilizer *and* an SSRI. Or maybe they don’t need the SSRI, because treating the bipolar disorder may address the underlying issues contributing to their depression and anxiety. Etc.
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