Matrescent Integration via Neuroplasticity, Dyads, and Psilocybin (MINDS): A Novel Framework for Maternal Health and the Mother–Baby Dyad

Abstract

This thesis articulates the MINDS framework—Matrescent Integration via Neuroplasticity, Dyads, and Psilocybin—as a novel mechanistic model for supporting maternal and infant health in the postpartum period. Matrescence is conceptualized as a hormonally primed, high-plasticity developmental window comparable to adolescence. During this transition, hormonal cascades, structural brain remodeling, and reconfiguration of major networks recalibrate the brain to support an integrated matrescent identity and mother–infant bonding. It details how specific mechanistic pathways determine whether maternal plasticity consolidates into an integrated identity and secure attachment or patterns of fragmentation and disconnection, including depression and anxiety. It develops phenomenological and neurobiological parallels between matrescence and psilocybin states to demonstrate shared experiential arcs of exposure, expansion, and integration, with mechanistic convergence on 5‑HT2A–glutamate–BDNF plasticity in overlapping corticolimbic territories. MINDS proposes psilocybin as a candidate for targeted intervention to strategically harness critical period–like plasticity in the postpartum brain. Carefully timed, dyad‑centered psilocybin sessions could redirect stalled or maladaptive trajectories toward maternal identity integration and a strengthened mother–infant bond. This framework generates empirically testable hypotheses for future clinical research and directly challenges the routine exclusion of postpartum women from psychedelic studies. It positions the postpartum period as a uniquely promising, yet systematically neglected, domain for psychedelic‑assisted care.