Seasonal Affective Disorder and YOU!

http://www.mentalhealth.com/book/p40-sad.html

If I did not live in the lower latitude that I do, I would have long ago wreaked harm on many things about me during long winter months.

*shivers*

I hate winter.

Anybody else frightened by this turn of phrase?

SAD sucks either way, so you have my sympathies.

Up at 7.30 today, maximum light, I'll be outside a lot of the day. Let's see.

I have this too! So, of course, living in South Central TX is a walk in the park for me. ;)

No, really, I have to work very hard to muster up good cheer right now, because we're in the midst of a very lengthy "Indian Summer" right now and we're still having to use air conditioners and wear short-sleeved blouses and shirts over here. I mean, not even five days ago we had a string of days where the highs were steadily in the 90s. The only reason why the highs have dropped to the 80s is because we had a thunderstorm move through the area on Sunday and cool things off a bit. But... yeah. I really, really, really want lots and lots of continual cloudiness, chilly breezes, morning frost, and icy dampness. I really, really, really want that. And I want it SOON.

those who've had experiences with light therapy, tell me more.

i don't really have seasonal affective disorder but hell i live in the North and it has been snowing and cold a lot and it is february, so i think it's only natural to feel weird in some way at this time.
ANYWAY what i want to say is:
a co-worker of mine got a light therapy box for his office - it is like 1'x 2' big! and very very bright! i just sat in front of it for 10 minutes and feel great!! but maybe that is b/c it is the end of the work day and b/c i have gotten work done. but really it felt good. i took some pictures and in the pictures it looks like i'm sitting next to a window on a bright sunny day! (there's no natural light in his office really)

halp

oh no!

It's getting lighter out each day Elmo! I noticed this yesterday when I left work and it was still light outside. That provided me with a little happiness. :)

winter fucks me up hardcore

i think i get summer anxiety disorder. i'm intensely cranky and uncomfortable when it's hot and humid and bright.

― lauren (laurenp), Wednesday, October 27, 2004 9:44 AM (6 years ago)

otm

aw, thx e! i am trying to remind myself of increasing daylight. idk, it is maybe not so much s.a.d. as it is acute cabin fever coupled with haunting fears of being encased in a tomb of snow, forever and ever

Aw, I KNOW! I am sort of praying for a snow day tomorrow at work even though I have shittons of stuff to do. This is getting ridiculous.

yeah i'm feeling this. funny how the last post here was also a january post. january is just a miserable, miserable month.

Just misread this thread title as:
Seasonal Affective Disorder Has Gone Off The Net Because Of YOU!

If only.

i like january and february actually. at least the days are gettin' longer. this past december was fucking rough for me.

i made a january playlist. some of you SADdoes might like it. :-)

http://open.spotify.com/user/grannykart/playlist/1SaKgSdOyKYnbkW5Lvlxaw

I feel for those who must spend all daylight hours working indoors. Even here in cloudy, bleak Portland, spending an hour outdoors in sullen, dim daylight is enough to stave off the worst blahs of sunlight deprivation.

considering a light box -- anyone have any recommendations, hints, endorsements?

All summer long - in fact, from May through the end of August and into September - I had no problem getting up at 5am to get ready and bike in to work. Now I can barely drag my ass out of bed by 6:30am. Hate this time of year.

ugh it's the worst

i have been trying to regulate my mood by getting some cardio in each morning but that's a struggle right now, all i want to do is eat cheese and nap

I've used a SAD lamp for years, sort of a rickety old thing that I finally got rid of -- looks like something that should project school filmstrips or something. In the market for a new one maybe.

according to the psychologist who originally encouraged me to get one, it's the number of lumens/lux that matters, not whether it's "full spectrum" or stimulates daylight. I think they say 10,000. You need to spend at least 30 minutes in the morning sitting a reasonable distance from the thing (like 3 feet or so?) -- weirdly, it actually operates by stimulating something in your blood, and you have a lot of blood vessels in your eyes. I'm not making this shit up, a psychologist told me!

(even going outside is no good—precious little sun here, just light drizzle & cold rain for weeks)

(repeats 'I could be making this up. I could be making all of this up.')

Back on the lamp again after being off it for a few weeks, man it really makes a difference. I was getting seriously inward and antisocial.

yeah i should probably get one of these, i keep sleeping through classes and then barely getting out of bed in time to justify doing anything with my day

Honestly I can joke about it but it's a little scary what I get like, I feel like I start to shut down from everyone including my family

this is fucking brutal. how are you folks dealing with this? feels especially rough this year, it's been a hard winter in new england, just totally relentless. the darkness, even though it's getting better, is still fucking shitty. i'm sick of scraping ice and snow off my car. everyday i wake up and i'm like "it's STILL only february, fuuuuck." i'm just feeling a little desperate knowing that i won't feel like myself again until may, or late april at the earliest. we're going to florida to visit my vacationing folks for a few days later in february and i'm praying that it'll make some kind of difference.

hurting, what lamp are you using? i'm attracted the idea since i've heard it's actually effective, but it sometimes just feels like i don't have 30 minutes to sit in front of it in the morning (am i right that for it to be effective it has to be first thing in the morning?), my son needs a diaper change, breakfast, i need to get ready for work, etc.

my therapist suggested seasonal antidepressants, i've long resisted that option but this year i'm starting to reconsider. though i feel like i should at least devote a stronger effort to try some non-pharmaceutical options, e.g. lamps, more vigorous exercise, getting outside more, using my creative outlets, etc. but all this shit takes time and as a new parent working full-time i feel like i have none.

i've had SAD pretty much my whole life but this is one of the first years i've really felt like i need to get the fuck out of a cold climate. it's hard though, family is rooted in the midwest and new england, i'd move to southern california like right fucking now but it's rough to be that far from family, especially having my own kids now.

I think this is the one I have, http://www.amazon.com/Day-Light-Seasonal-Affective-Disorder-DL930/dp/B0009MFUWC/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1392143560&sr=8-3&keywords=sad+lamp (pretty sure I paid a lot less for it though) but they're all similar -- a 10,000+ lux light behind a UV screen. I've heard it's relatively easy to make your own lightbox if you're handy, although you may prefer something more adjustable.

I find time to do it even home alone with a toddler in the morning -- sometimes I just wake up earlier than her so I have time to do it, other times I do it while she eats her breakfast (I set it up on the kitchen table facing the kitchen so that I still get some of the light while I'm up scrambling the eggs or whatever).

Been bugging one of our comrades on twitter about this. Thing is, I hate light, so –

But I have to come clean with myself. This gets worse in the winter than it does in the summer. I blame the holidays mostly, but it does go on through spring. Weird thing is that when the flowers start blooming and we start getting the tornadoes, that's really when I start feeling those acid flashbacks.

So maybe it is seasonal. What say you. And how do you do anything for two hours in the morning?

keeping myself busy has helped a lot this year

I once went to New Orleans and visited a family in their big old crazy Gothic house that even had a framed painting of one of their great-great-grandparents in the foyer. We were visiting a friend of a friend who live there with her parents. Her dad sat by himself on the couch in this parlor room that was lit with either red light bulbs or some really, really dark amber bulbs. (Maybe it was the wallpaper.) Maybe it was the way his eyes were clenched shut or how he had his hands balled in fists, but I could tell he wasn't right. His name was Walter.

As we were leaving at a late hour, I passed through the parlor to get something. He stood up to shake my hand and one of the dogs jumped in the air or something. He pivoted around and performed the weakest-ass attempted kick at the dog, completely missing it. Maybe he was trying to more "shoo" the dog away with his extended foot, but that two-second scene repeats in my mind as one of the most pathetic displays of action I've seen.

And there have been many days since then where I have felt just like Walter. Wonder if he should've just changed the bulbs.

full spectrum light bulbs ftw

http://gawker.com/winter-is-a-black-hole-how-i-deal-with-seasonal-depres-1652408745

Staying simultaneously spontaneous and regimented is an important year-round strategy to ward off creeping sadness.

I saw that story, mp. Brought me here instead of going wild on Facebook in front of my kindergarten teacher.

i think this is the worst it's been for me. i was eager to go to bed by 7 p.m. i think i made it to 9 something. i was wide awake at 2 a.m. all week i've been awake at some point late at night. super cranky and mean. tired and hyper all at once. but i hate summer!

I feel ya harbl, it's like non-days - the sun buggers off so early.

This is rough lately, I feel like I'm being a bit of a bitter, grumpy jerk to my kids and they don't deserve it. And hard to find time to use the lamp in the morning with two kids.

lots of ppl at my office got the orbs, super weird lol

http://i.imgur.com/dd0uVNV.jpg

"So? Tell me what your plans are for today!"

_________________________________________________________

http://i.imgur.com/7lGUfsy.jpg

"And now I've gone blind, great."

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http://i.imgur.com/nrBS4eI.jpg

"It's ok, but my plants are still dying."

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http://i.imgur.com/d6nRvA9.jpg

"$209, and I'm already looking for the dimmer."

_________________________________________________________

http://i.imgur.com/WuRGQeX.jpg

"Preston, where does your dad keep his gun?"
"Shut up, Light."

_________________________________________________________

http://i.imgur.com/6ZnLatv.jpg

"Just call me later?"

_________________________________________________________

http://i.imgur.com/OLyV22D.jpg

Works better with your eyes OPEN, Aubrey!

_________________________________________________________

http://i.imgur.com/itXMW9a.jpg

"You've been on that page for ten minutes, Susan. Can I get you a stress pill?"

_________________________________________________________

http://i.imgur.com/aj9c78F.jpg

Also didn't know Hipgnosis designed these things.

http://i.imgur.com/Iygy2G6.jpg

all of those are me

I noticed a resemblance to the dimmer guy!

well I am one of the dimmer guys tbf

i bought one of these years ago and only used it that one winter and now i don't think i'm allowed to use it without getting the bulbs replaced or something, idk

it didn't seem to do much

you have to use it consistently for a few days to really feel it, 30 mins+, not long after wake up time.

"Preston, where does your dad keep his gun?"
"Shut up, Light."

Rofl PP

i basically am bummed out all year round but the lack of sunlight definitely effects my energy levels drastically. spent some of yesterday during the day doing basic household chores like sweeping floors, laundry, feeding the cats of the next door neighbor who is out of town, taking out the garbage and recycling, doing grocery shopping etc. and felt like i was on the long march

this blows

i don't know if it is the extra shittiness of this particular week or what but i don't know how i'm gonna make it until spring

considering actually using my gym membership (lol) and paying the extra so I can use the tanning bed

years ago I did that, and you have to deal with all the garbage involved in going to a tanning place (who the hell regularly does this in 2017 wtf) but doing it for a brief amount of time, less than the "omg I want to look beach-ready"/"I am a weird bodybuilder who looks bronze" amount of time, actually lessened my seasonal blahs.

vitamin d supplement seems to help a bit

Every year this seems to hit me hardest in February even though the days are getting longer and are far from peak shortness. February is the month of despair.

"Peak shortness" is kind of a contradiction I guess. Nadir shortness?

Nadir length?

It's hitting me worse than ever right now, but I'm not surprised. Even without the pandemic, the full force of winter has been bearing down on Chicago over the last two weeks. We've had almost nothing but snow and subzero temperatures without a break, it's been relentless.

(Yes I'm aware other regions get it worse, but this stretch has been really unusual for us. We usually get a little bit of a warm up between snow events.)

It’s been the same where I am (lower Hudson valley). We’ve had massive amounts of snow on the ground for a few weeks now with temperatures rarely going above freezing. Grey all day today. I function much more than I used to under its weight (meds also help) but I feel this constant gnawing sadness and darkness under the surface.

Doesn’t help that you pretty much can’t go anywhere indoors or have people over.

Yeah, even when the snow lets up, the wind chills kick in to double digits below zero. Even getting outside for walks has been pretty much impossible, between the wind, temps and snow/ice covered sidewalks.

I live in a "walkable suburb" but not in the most walkable part of it. In better weather there's a trail from near where I live that goes to the downtown, and even though it's a long walk I enjoy it. But right now the trail is very icy and the other way to walk downtown is kind of roundabout and long. Even in very cold weather I don't mind the walk but it's tough with the ice.

Of course we're not double digits below zero, still not chicago.

I'm using my sad lamp now even though you're supposed to do it in the morning. Coffee isn't helping, nothing else is helping, thought I'd give it a try.

I sincerely hope that both you and your sad lamp feel better.

I will risk being obnoxious and say that moving to California has made a tremendous, tremendous difference in my winter mood. I didn't think I had a big problem re: SAD but now that I have experienced the difference--damn.

UGH, now through february is always the worst fucking time for me. Everything just feels off and dark, everything has this unhappy patina on it. I've learned with age to disrupt some of the worst thought patterns that used to really get me in trouble, but I'm just feeling dismal.

Thankfully I have been noticing it getting slightly lighter on my walks home from work in the evening.

I feel like there is some kind of lag for me -- you would think things would get steadily worse as the days get shorter and steadily better as the days get longer, but I don't immediately feel improvement (although admittedly it's nice that the sun is now at least rising when I wake up).

Endless work, endless doomscrolling, endless winter

This fucking sucks and I hate it.

At this point, I can't tell what's seasonal affective disorder, what's perimenopause, what's being in the middle of the school year, and what's just me.

Yes. The ambiguity around wondering “is this depression? seasonal depression? following the news depression? or what?” is vexing. I can’t speak to perimenopause, but last year I was TAing and the school year definitely affected my mood. These days it doesn’t necessarily feel like I’m experiencing a deficiency of vitamin d or uv exposure, so much as winter just makes everything a little harder, makes it feel like every activity is higher cost and lower benefit.