Does everyone feel low/seasonal effective disorder on some level?

[ErinAndTonic]

I'm in such a funk! Dark mornings, non stop rain, minimal days in the office so feeling like a recluse as have barely seen anyone other than my partner in a few weeks..

Is this normal and are we all feeling a bit meh? Or do I need to look into this?! Think I might get a SAD lamp to see if it helps but I'm unsure if it's that or just general winter funk?

Hope I'm not the only one!

Me too. The impending heat and the not getting a real from bright sunshine till so late in the day makes me really tetchy. I feel far more relaxed once we start getting into Autumn and love the clocks changing. I would keep GMT year round if it was up to me.

And the endless worrying about suncream and if everyone is wearing enough.

This is how I feel about the summer. I don’t mind the heat but I hate the fact that all the grass dies, it just looks so yellow and depressing.
I love autumn and winter. I find it much easier to exercise when it isn’t too hot so I feel healthier.

Seasonal depression/SAD is very normal in the winter months. Difficulty getting out of bed in the mornings, feeling low and tearful in the evenings, lacking motivation to do anything etc People have varying degrees of coping with it and are better a hiding it and managing. Personally, I yearn for the summer. I mean, hell, despite tropical storms and humidity, Florida looks more appealing than winter in the UK at any rate to me.

That sounds grim @Puffinshop Scotland's bad enough in winter, anything further north would be very difficult for me. Agree with getting out at some point, it's so important - but not particularly appealing in the heavy rain and damp weather which makes up a lot of our winter.

I'm another person who dreads summer and finds it tough to get through. I consider myself to have mild SAD (summer type)

BUT what I've also noticed recently is that I still find winter physically difficult (perhaps I'm just a miserable cow 🙂). My birthday is in early February and by then I'm just absolutely done with winter even though by April I'll have shed tears at least once about the prospect of summer coming.

So even though I intellectually love autumn, winter, dark frosty nights, Christmas, fog etc etc., physically it's probably not doing me as much good as I think.

I think an overlooked element of winter SAD is the lack of growing and green plants. I'm sure it's why ancient cultures prized evergreens at this time of year. I now start my seeds in January under a grow light now which is a bit too early for the seeds but makes me feel way better. I would also recommend visiting botanical gardens or winter gardens if you can. Our nearest has a heated glasshouse for tropical plants, and as well as being warm it smells of summer, so might give you a boost. Smell is probably more important for mood than we think, so you could also experiment with fragrance oils in case it might help?