Seasonal Mood Issues

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February has been showing a pattern for me. Every year I feel like something is wringing all of the enthusiasm for life out of my soul right at this period. The circumstances never seem to matter; I could have a good job, decent friends, a girlfriend, whatever it is that's supposed to make me happy, and I always feel like crap during the late winter. Is it seasonal affective disorder? Well, from what I've read, that's caused by a lack of sunlight, and I hate sunlight. It gives me a headache. If anything, there's too much of it around here, during the winter; it's almost never overcast, and there's no leaves on the trees or any sorts of colors to catch and absorb the light. I hate the way it bounces off the dirty clumps of two week old snow that still hang around on one side of the street. It's not even a depression, exactly. I mean, I get depressed year round, often more intensely than this. It's like some new, unspoken of sh***y feeling. Like, if I'm depressed, I don't have the energy or enthusiasm to be full on depressed. I figured out this has been what's keeping me from sleeping. I can't meditate anymore. I just want it to f*****g end. Every year it comes and destroys whatever enthusiasm I've worked up for life over the past year. People will say, "oh, that's just the long winter blues" or something like that, but funny how it doesn't send anyone else into a coma. I could visit friends, but I don't even have the drive to do that, and what would be the point? Does anyone else have this?

I'm just sick of cold weather, especially when I have to get up in the morning.

I go through a very dark (pardon the pun) phase in December and early January. This far north, the days are very short in the winter (about 7 hours of daylight), so there's a period of time in which I walk to work in the dark, I walk home from work in the dark, and I can go an entire week without seeing the sun. It gets to me after a while, and my mood darkens considerably.

My dark period lasts from the beginning of December, until the end of February. The coldness and the lack of sunlight gets to me. I wonder if I'd have the same issues if I was living in California?

have you looked into Seasonal Affective Disorder?
http://www.cmha.ca/bins/content_page.asp?cid=3-86-93

It might have something to do with that, but the thing is, I love overcast and rainy days. It's anachronistic. (Is that the right word).

even if you don't like sunlight, over the long term it may make you feel better because its the uv rays you need, not the atmosphere.

anachronistic means something that is outside of its time, like if i wore 18th century clothing that would be anachronistic

Hmm. Are you sure about that? Where did you read that? It seems to me that if I don't like sunshine on a day to day basis, then I'm still not going to like it over long periods.

It's strange that you get it in Denver. Of all the places I've been in the winter, they do get the most sunlight (and that is a reported fact as well). For me it is definitely gray skies that do it. I hate it. I used to have horrible cases of it when I was young, living in MI and getting the lake effects during winter. The skies stay gray for the most part and the snow keeps you from doing much so you are stuck inside.

I still get it in FL. This winter has been particularly cloudy and it is getting to me. I just keep forcing my husband to move South trying to get away from it. Pretty soon, we'll be living in Cuba.

That article didn't say anything concrete, really. I thought it had something to do with the amount of Vitamin D you take in during the winter. That's the only thing I can think sunlight affects. It could be the internal clock though. I hate driving to work in the dark and getting home when the sun is going down. I love sunlight. On the other hand, if you don't like sunlight and it's still affecting you, it has to be the Vitamin D, something else the sun affects or the darkness. There aren't that many choices. Your symptoms do sound like it though. See a doctor about it. See if there's a supplement or something you can use to fight it. Or, be like me and just keep moving South until you fall off into the ocean! LOL


By the way, the word you wanted was oxymoronic.

I think it might be the humidity. The winters out here are notoriously dry (also suuny, like you said, as everyone here likes to point out all the time, every day). Listen to me, the way things are here, I would much prefer to live in a rainy, overcast region where at least the depression that this situation might cause is allowed to manifest instead of being caught in an awkward limbo. I grew up in Omaha, Nebraska, where it is quite overcast and humid, and I never had anything like this.

(The server isn't letting me edit)

Also, I visited in early January and the weather left me feeling natural and relaxed; sort of distantly sad, in a way, but alive. I remember my mom (who lives in LA) complaining about it making her depressed at the same time that I was thankful for it. The second we drove back into Denver I could feel the tension and emotional vacuum again (also my insomnia came back).

Maybe if you got a little humidifier if it would help. It is dry there! I was there in November and December and it was so dry that my nose bled almost the entire time. I had dreadful headaches. My sinuses are hypersensitive to barometric changes and changes in air moisture. It sounds like you are similar.


I've also been to Omaha as well. I fly in there when I go to see my friend in SD. She's in the Southeast corner, so Omaha has the best ticket prices even thought Iowa has a closer airport to where she lives. You're right. Omaha has a completely different feel in the winter.

I have an anion humidifier, but the motor broke and I was too lazy to look for a new one this winter. And I don't plan to be here next winter. But you see? The thin air and constant sun give you heachaches. I'm not imagining it.

My brother has SAD and when I started noticing that every October I was getting mood crashes, 'winter blues' he recommended I try a lightbox. It works! I was skeptical at first but now I have it on for 30 minutes every morning and I've felt a heck of a lot better, and not felt depressed this winter.
If anyone's interested in trying light therapy there are some companies who hire out lightboxes so you can try them before you buy. They should be in Google.