Seasonal Affective Disorder: Winter Depression

Come winter and many of us are left feeling sad and depressed for no apparent reason. We would not want to get out of bed or would eat a lot so that we could just get away with the “winter blue” feeling.

Seasonal depression is much more severe than those normal winter blues; it is an affective disorder in which the individual will feel depressed, sad during the early fall or winter season when the days are short and nights are of longer duration. Large numbers of people may suffer from milder form like winter blue and around an estimated number of 10 million Americans suffer from Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD).

There is another form of SAD known as “summer depression” which occurs among individual late spring or early summer.

Symptoms

# Overeating

# Anxious

# Irritability

# Lack of energy

# Tired most of the time

# Oversleeping

# Seek solitude

# Have difficult in concentrating

While in summer depression the symptoms will be

# Insomania

# Loss of appetite

# Weight loss

How common is SAD?

Nearly 20% of 8.5 million Swedish population is affected from SAD according to the doctors.

4 to 5% of U.S. population suffers from SAD and other 10 to 20% suffer from milder form of winter blues.

Women are more affected from this disorder and the age group that is more hit by SAD is 20s, 30s and 40s. The older population is less likely to be affected.

The place where an individual lives contributes a lot in developing this disorder. People living in places at high altitude are more prone to winter blues. Like you live in Maryland and than shift over to Toronto than there may be more chances of your feeling SAD due to change in place.

Individual who are working in offices where there are less number of windows will be more likely to get depressed. And, another individual could have dull mood on a cloudy hazy day.

What is the reason behind developing SAD?

The researchers have found that the onset of SAD is due to decrease in sunlight. In the winters the days are shorter and nights are longer and thus there is less availability of sunlight. Due to this the biological clock in our body gets affected and thus we are more depressed, sad and have lack of energy. Than other researchers have found that it could be due to the imbalance in the chemicals in the neurotransmitter in the brain, serotonin may be in lesser amount in the people with seasonal affective disorder.

How is SAD treated?

There are a number of treatment opportunities available for the disorder from light therapy to medication to cognitive therapy.

One of the most common methods used is light therapy. In light therapy a person is made to sit in front of bank of lights or light fluorescent light tubes covered with the plastic cover. The person should sit in front of light for a particular time limit. It should be continued for the entire season of low sunlight as it has been seen if the treatment is discontinued in between than the symptoms of SAD could reappear. Light therapy is safe.

One should spend some time outside even if its cloudy.

An individual can also take medication such as antidepressant like Prozac, Zoloft, Paxil etc which are also found to be helpful in treating SAD.