Good Grief, It's Dark! 11 Tips for Tackling Winter Blues

When darkness starts to fall earlier, does your mood take a dip? Does winter start to bring you down physically and mentally, not even counting the stress of the holidays? Today we'll list eleven research-back tools to help counteract the effects of the winter blues. When we're exposed to less sunlight, our neurotransmitters take notice. And even if you don't have Seasonal Affective Disorder, this shift can be tough. If you've ever struggled with the gloom of darkness, no matter how you feel about Daylight Saving Time, you'll want to tune in to today's Baggage Check. Welcome. I'm Dr. Andrea Bonior and this is Baggage Check: Mental Health Talk and Advice with new episodes every Tuesday and Friday. Baggage Check is not a show about luggage or travel. Incidentally, it is also not a show about the ever-changin shades of your bathroom grout. So let's get started. I'm glad to be able to talk to you about winter darkness today because I think it's a problem that affects people in ways that we often trivialize, or we assume that it's just about holiday stress or the fact that the weather is cold and we have to bundle up. In reality, there's solid evidence that for many of us, not even just the folks who struggle significantly with seasonal depression, diminishing light affects our mood. So that's the first thing to remember: winter gloom for most people isn't really about temperature, it's about light, which means that even if you live in a warm climate, you might feel it acutely when the days get shorter. The other thing to understand right off the bat is that this can be very biological. Now, I am all for therapy, and if you have any kind of depression symptoms, including with a seasonal pattern, that can be helpful. But I also think that it's worth noting that the brain changes that we'll be talking about today may be more ingrained physiologically than with other types of depression, so that will affect some of the ways that we target them as well. Now, we won't be talking only about full blown seasonal affective disorder, otherwise known as SAD or otherwise known as the seasonal specifier of major depressive disorder. If you have that significant symptomology and it's really getting in the way of your day to day functioning, it's truly worth considering professional help in the form of therapy and potential medication. But today, let's just focus on some basic steps for combating winter gloom. Number one, prioritize sleep. Try to protect your sleep when you can. I feel like I could do a whole podcast show for many episodes on sleep, possibly putting you to sleep. But sleep disruptions, they play such a role in anxiety and depression. I know we've touched on this already. And of course, sleep disruptions are also symptoms of anxiety and depression as well, so it can be a vicious cycle. But often our sleep gets even more disrupted around the times that we're going to have diminishing darkness, our schedules might change a little bit. Moving our clocks put us out of whack. We wake up earlier than we would like because for a little while at least, there's more light streaming in our window maybe at 6:00 AM than there was before. Or as the holidays approach, there's more travel, there's more socializing, our food habits change. Our schedules might be getting out of whack for those reasons too. But if you can just try to protect your sleep in any way possible, having a more regular bedtime, trying to put your devices away a little bit earlier-- use blackout curtains if the earlier sunlight coming in right after Daylight Saving Time changes is causing a problem, protecting your sleep can make a real difference on your mood and anxiety. Number two, using artificial light. So when natural light starts to dwindle, it's time to use artificial stuff when we need it. And honestly, the fake stuff makes for a pretty good simulator in this vein. Fake daylight. Well, it can match real daylight pretty well. We certainly can't say that about everything fake. A fake fire extinguisher not a product you'd ever want to purchase. Seriously, I sincerely hope no one is selling fake fire extinguishers. Now I'm worried about people selling fake fire extinguishers. Okay-- but there are all kinds of light options to try to better simulate the daylight that's starting to dwindle outside. There are day light bulbs that you can put in any old lamp in your house. Just look for them at the hardware store. There are dawn simulators that can wake you up with the simulation of sunlight. And of course, there are light boxes, which are an actual treatment intervention for those folks that do suffer from Seasonal Affective Disorder. This is called phototherapy, and you can order light boxes online from a reputable dealer. But I'd really advise first that you just check in with a physician or a mental health provider before doing so, so that you can make sure you're getting a solid one that is safe and that you're going to be using it correctly and that there aren't any specific risks for you personally that you need to be aware of. Number three-- natural light. Of course, the light that comes from the actual sun is most coveted at this point when it's dwindling, so you want to maximize that in any way that you can. That includes going outside at lunch if possible. That includes taking more walks, if that's possible, which also checks the moving your body box, and that includes trying to sit in your windows and be exposed to daylight even when you're indoors. Maybe a slight schedule tweak is wise as long as it's minor enough to be able to be maintained and you're not taking away sleep. But maybe starting your day a little bit earlier so that you can be exposed to more of that morning sun can be helpful. Number four-- social connection. Social connection is one of the great boosts for our mental and physical health. We can never talk about it enough, or at least I think so. But often darkness leads to a subjective feeling of isolation. We're all crawling into our proverbial caves, and nowadays we don't even live in tribal caves. We live in our own individual ones. We spend less time outside because it's colder. And so that means fewer chats as we're walking our dog. That means just less time waiting around at the bus stop or being around other human beings at the farmers market. Even the idea of bundling up is kind of like a disconnection. It's sort of putting us against the elements and cutting ourselves off. I have a winter coat that basically evokes Nanook from the North. You can barely see my face in it because of the big furry hood. So that's less interaction, it's less camaraderie, less warmth, metaphorically and literally. So try to counteract this by being more proactive and scheduling social time. Not just all the holiday obligations, or your office gift exchange that everyone secretly groans about, but truly making time for the people who make you laugh and who bring a different kind of light into the room. Number five-- sensory experiences. These are so important and can be so soothing, and also they can be stimulating depending on what you need in that moment. Our eyes are being starved for light, but we can try to make our other senses happy. Think about bringing more music into your environment, more positive smells. It's probably not just because of the holidays that people tend to bake more when it's cold and dark outside. Think about hot baths or stimulating your taste buds with interesting new foods. Think about seeking out visual beauty in terms of art or immersive film experiences, giving your senses something to feast on. It really does make a difference in expanding your world and helping your days feel less closed off and dark. Number six—Hygge! So my Danish listeners, all one of them—Hi, Valdemar!! They might groan at how much we Americans have tried to coopt this concept of hygge. You likely have heard of it, or at least you've seen marketing trends that have responded to it so that somebody can make more money on throw pillows. But it's spelled h-y-g-g-e, and it's a Scandinavian mindset of coziness. It sort of blasted onto the North American scene a few years ago. It's about textures and warmth and light and candles. It's reading a book by the fire. It's fuzzy socks, it's the smell of bread baking. It's connectivity, it's safety. And I really think there's something to it psychologically. My clients who struggle with seasonal mood dips often embrace this idea and find some real joy in it. Winter is not summer, and we can embrace that about it. Hygge is about embracing the coziness of winter, bringing candles and light into the space, and, yes, using those throw blankets. And though my own knitting borders on the compulsive, and I have been known to knit at the beach-- hey, here's your sandy sweater. You like it? The truth is, things like knitting that allow us to use our hands and get different textures, there's nothing quite like the coziness of that. I'm probably getting a little too woo woo for some of you, but why not give working with your hands a try? Number seven-- exercise. Exercise or any body movement can feel like such a drag when it's dark and it's cold, or we're still recovering from eating that entire cheese log by ourselves at that holiday party. But the science is very clear. Body movement really can help us counteract seasonal blues. It can increase our energy levels. It helps release endorphins that directly improve our mood. Controlled studies really put it up there as an antidepressant with a pretty impressive level of efficacy. But of course, when we can most use body movement, it's hardest to get into a groove about it. So if you already have a way of moving your body that you like, let yourself prioritize it and truly carve out the time for it. And if you're stuck in a rut where it feels like there's not much physical activity you like, start small. How about dancing to just one song that you like in the privacy of your room that increases your heart rate and gives you a cardio boost? Or how about doing five minutes of stretching to reduce your muscle tension? How about taking the stairs instead of the elevator just a couple of times per week to your office? This doesn't have to be about joining a gym or working out per se. It's about letting your body move in a way that feels best to you. Number eight-- stay close to nature. So we know how good exposure to nature is for us. And we know that part of what happens with seasonal symptoms is that we're less exposed to nature because of the time of year. And that, in turn, can increase our negative moods. More fluorescent lighting, less ventilation, less open space, less green. Just picture a shopping mall in December and it's enough to give a lot of people hives. We've talked about letting daylight in, but letting plant life in can be very beneficial too. This is probably connected to how the tradition of Christmas trees got started, going all the way back to pagan celebrations during the winter solstice. This idea of keeping nature close even when things feel barren. Did you know that modern research actually shows that house plants can improve your mood? I haven't yet figured out if that applies to house plants that you inadvertently murder-- my gardening skills, they're really a work in progress, and they're a contradiction, because I can grow enough zucchini to feed a national vegan conference, but I can't seem to keep a pot of basil alive on my windowsill. Anyway. All of those Instagrammers with the macrame hanging planters. They're onto something. See if you can bring some nature inside and if you can take a winter hike or run and jump in some leaves or bundle up and go on a walk around trees or a natural body of water, all the better. Number Nine-- check your vitamin levels. Now I would never advise you to change anything up in terms of vitamins or supplements without talking to your doctor. But there has been some research that seems to connect vitamin D levels with winter blues. Now it is mixed and clearly when we're not synthesizing vitamin D in our bodies to the same extent because we're getting less sunlight, that might play a role in some people's mood dips. And in turn low vitamin D has shown an association with some depressive symptoms. But again, some of this data is correlational and we don't want to just start supplementing without knowing what is going on for you individually. But if you're having some physical sluggishness, if you're having some mood dips it really can't hurt to get some blood work done and see if there's some mineral or vitamin deficits. And it's worth a conversation with your doctor. Number ten. Plan a break. One of the reasons that all the research shows that experiences tend to be more rewarding of gifts than objects are, it's because you get to have the anticipation beforehand and also the recollection afterward as an added bonus. So looking forward to taking a trip, that's a gift in and of itself. And even if you don't have the budget or the possibility of time off work enough to go on an actual vacation somewhere-- though I would urge you to be as assertive as possible in trying to actually use the vacation time that you are rightly owed. We talked about that in episode three when we talked about unhealthy workplaces-- But even if you can't take an actual trip, plan a little break, a special night out, a staycation, some Saturday activity that you've never done before, the anticipation of that sometimes can give you just enough of a mood boost to not be so mired in the winter blues. And Number Eleven-- introduce novelty. Winter doldrums-- they seem to be not even just about a dip in mood but almost sort of an existential boredom. Especially after the hubbub of the holidays. Things can start to feel really monotonous in January and February. The word slog comes to mind. What a great word that is by the way. That really just sums it up, doesn't it? SLOG. Anyway, seek out some novelty that helps build new pathways in your brain. It stimulates you. It helps you wake up a little bit. Change up your indoor space. Try a food that you've never tried before. Pick up a new hobby that's a little weird that you just want to give a little bit of a try. And if you quit that's fine. But introducing something a little different than what you're used to can give us a mood boost. As an added bonus, it also increases our cognitive flexibility, our ability to sort of think in different ways and not be stuck in rigid patterns, which is a super important aspect of mental health. We'll talk about that quite a lot in the future. So hopefully, among these eleven things, you found a couple of tools that you can start putting into use today. Remember, we can kind of think of winter blues as existing on a spectrum. If you are full on suffering from significant depression symptomology, and it's really affecting how you behave, it's affecting your relationships, it's affecting how you eat and how you sleep and you're really having trouble finding pleasure, let's take that seriously. That's not just winter blues. That could truly be seasonal depression and professional help could be really important in those situations. But for the rest of us, we can also try to put some of these tips to use just to take the edge off of the winter blues. Thank you for joining me today. Once again, I'm Dr. Andrea Bonior and this has been Baggage Check, with new episodes every Tuesday and Friday. Join us on Instagram @baggagecheckpodcast podcast to give your take on upcoming topics and guests. And why not tell your chatty coworker where to find us? Our original music is by Jordan Cooper, cover art by Danielle Merity and my studio security is provided by Buster the Dog. Until next time, take good care.