The wintertime blues
If the thought of chestnuts roasting over an open fire and Jack Frost nipping at your nose makes you feel more depressed rather than jolly, you may be suffering from the winter blues.
You can probably remember a time when you enjoyed the winter season, perhaps as a child. You may wonder what happened to that little child who went sledding or stretched out on the ground and made snow angels.
What happened was a change in your brain chemistry, leading to an onset, or what can feel like an onslaught, of symptoms that leave you feeling sad, lethargic and with a strong desire to hibernate until spring thaw. It's known as seasonal affective disorder, or it's appropriate acronym, SAD.
But research has caught up to those symptoms in recent years, offering options beyond putting your life on hold for several months every year. We now understand that the short days of winter—and the resulting shortage of light—is responsible for these mood changes. Our bodies are reacting to that lack in the winter months.
Light therapy is an effective way to combat those blues-y feelings. There are some people who don't respond to this form of therapy, but if it can help you gain back those lost months, I say give it a shot.
The therapy is done using a box designed specifically for that purpose. The box houses regular white fluorescent light bulbs, and a film to filter out harmful ultraviolet (UV) light. Plan to invest a couple of hundred dollars, but if you figure how much energy you'll get back in return, it's worth the price of admission.
Light boxes are readily available and easy to use. You need a product that supplies 10,000 lux (which is a measure of light intensity). One source that offers them is www.gaiam.com, or go to www.google.com and type in "light boxes." You can set a light box up on your desk at home or on your desk at work. I recommend you start with five to 10 minutes in front of your light box on a daily basis and build from there. People have individualized responses to light, but generally, it appears the happy medium is anywhere between 30 and 90 minutes treatment daily.
If you suspect that you suffer from the winter blues (and most people in the northern hemisphere are afflicted to some degree), I recommend you read Winter Blues by Norman E. Rosenthal, MD. It's a tremendous resource that will give you plenty of information on how light therapy works as well as other options for treatment. You'll come away with a better understanding of SAD.
Stay tuned for House Calls next week, when I follow up with some healthy menu changes that will also work to boost your wintry mood over the next few months.
