It Gets Dark When?!
I don’t know how you feel about the moving of the clock forward and backward each Spring and Fall, but I hate it. Without fail, it kills my circadian rhythm and my kids’ rhythms as well.
Another common companion of the time change in the Fall is SAD. SAD stands for Seasonal Affective Disorder. It is when a person begins to experience the symptoms of depression as a result of the seasons beginning to change.
This most commonly happens in the Fall/Winter as the days get shorter. I know that for me, shorter days that eventually become colder are just the worst. It is likely that this statement is true for most of us.
But those who experience SAD experience a version of this that is heightened to the point that they can’t function in the way they used to.
So what are some symptoms of SAD? They are very similar to depressive symptoms and include feeling depressed most of the day, losing interest in hobbies, low energy, oversleeping, overeating, irritability, and weight gain.
They typically begin toward the end of fall or beginning of winter and then abate once spring arrives. It can be tricky to diagnose someone with SAD because the symptoms are exactly the same as depression.
Unless the person with SAD can report their symptoms and when they began with a high level of accuracy and reliability, it is likely that they will be diagnosed with another depressive disorder.
If you suspect you are experiencing SAD, be as specific as you can be when you talk to a doctor or therapist about your symptoms and when they began. This will give you the best chance at an accurate and helpful diagnosis.
Given the innate difficulty in diagnosing SAD, we don’t know a whole lot about who suffers from it. We do know that it affects women at a significantly higher rate than men (4 times higher, to be specific).
We also know that people who struggle with SAD generally begin experiencing symptoms in early adulthood. The final fact we know about who it is that experiences SAD is that the farther north you live, the more likely you are to experience these symptoms.
So if you’re reading this in Florida, you’re most likely in the clear! If you’re reading it in Maine, I’ve got some bad news…
At this stage of the game, no one is sure of exactly what causes SAD. What research has shown is that those who are diagnosed with SAD appear to have less serotonin activity in their brains, they appear to have abnormal melatonin production, and they often do not have enough Vitamin D.
There is a common factor among these three facts and that factor is sunlight. Serotonin levels are controlled by other molecules in your brain. Those molecules are directly influenced by how much sunlight you are exposed to.
Less sunlight exposure leads to a wonky balance of those molecules which leads to lower serotonin. A very similar action is occurring with melatonin. Melatonin is a hormone that assists your brain in maintaining a natural sleep-wake cycle.
As the sun goes down, melatonin production increases in order to prepare your body for sleep. However, as the days get shorter and there is an increase in darkness, people who experience SAD begin to produce too much melatonin.
This leads to feeling sluggish, oversleeping, and an increasing sense of malaise.
Something similar is happening with levels of vitamin D. We consume vitamin D in the food we eat. Our bodies also produce it when our skin is exposed to sunlight.
As I’m sure you can guess, shorter days and colder temperatures lead to less skin exposure to the sun, thus less vitamin D.
It is believed that lower levels of vitamin D lead to lower levels of serotonin. This increases the likelihood of a person experiencing symptoms of SAD.
So here is the good news, SAD can be effectively and easily treated. There are two basic options to help out with symptoms of SAD. The first is light therapy.
Doctors frequently tell patients who are experiencing SAD symptoms to purchase a lightbox and sit in front of it for 30–45 minutes just after waking up in the morning.
These lightboxes produce a light that mimics the sun. Because of this, it allows your body to produce vitamin D, reduce its production of melatonin, and in the process hopefully increase levels of serotonin.
There are a host of options when it comes to purchasing a lightbox. A quick Google or Amazon search will turn up plenty. However, light therapy can have negative impacts on individuals with certain eye conditions, skin conditions, or who take medications that cause light sensitivity.
So before you run out and by a lightbox, have a chat with your doctor to make sure you get one that won’t cause you any harm.
The second treatment option is talk therapy with a licensed counselor. Talk therapy will provide a safe, confidential space in which to process any negative thoughts that are occurring along with the other symptoms of SAD.
Talk therapy can teach methods for challenging negative thoughts and learning to move beyond them to a healthier and more positive mindset. There are a host of counseling methodologies that can be used very effectively for this purpose.
The most important aspect of therapy is the client/therapist relationship. The more connected with and comfortable with the therapist you’re seeing, the more productive your time together will be.
In addition to light and talk therapy, there are some general steps that can be taken to help with symptoms of SAD. None of us like hearing them but they are pretty important, even if we aren’t experiencing symptoms of SAD.
They include being physically active, watching what we eat, and finding ways to reduce our stress levels. All of these contribute to our general health and will have an impact on any mental health symptoms we are experiencing.
I don’t have any specific Biblical insight to share with you when it comes to SAD but I have some general thoughts. The first is that God has created our bodies to be pretty incredible machines.
Our brains are unbelievably intricate and no matter what anyone tells you, we know VERY little about how they work. But God knows exactly how they work and what they need because he created them.
He also knows that sometimes they don’t work exactly the way they are designed and this is because of the Fall. Back in the beginning, Adam and Eve sinned and introduced death and decay into the world.
This has had an ongoing ripple effect across time and continues until now. It is what introduced things like cancer, the flu, and schizophrenia into the world. And it is why SAD is something that many folks face each year.
But God has given us a pretty awesome ability to battle against the symptoms of SAD. He has given us the sun! That’s a big deal. He has given us technology like lightboxes and insight into human thought and behavior that has been distilled down to therapeutic models and interventions.
He has given us the ability to move around and eat delicious and healthy foods. He designed our brains perfectly, we have boffed that up, and he has stood in the gap and given us the tools we need to begin addressing some of the ways we have messed up, especially when it comes to SAD. And that is pretty awesome!
As we all move forward, I’d like to encourage you to be on the lookout for any of the symptoms listed above. Be aware of your emotional health and well-being.
If you see any of the symptoms popping up, tell a friend or family member. Reach out to a professional for some extra support if you need to. There is no shame in needing help and no shame in asking for it.
This is particularly true if you are a member of the Body of Christ. We are here to love one another, support one another, and carry one another's burdens.
If you find yourself needing some extra support, check out the Resources page. As always, leave me a comment or shoot me an email with your thoughts and questions.
Sources:
Mayo Clinic: Seasonal Affective Disorder
National Institute of Mental Health: Seasonal Affective Disorder
NPR: ’Tis the Season: Coping with SAD or Seasonal Affective Disorder
Originally published at https://www.graceanddepravity.com.
