To wonder if those who love winter have very robust mental health or very happy lives?

[Comedycook]

So I was thinking about this after reading a thread about weather. Lots of posters saying how they loved winter...some even said they love the dark evenings and what really surprised me was the poster who said they loved dark, cold mornings. I assumed everyone hated these!

Now I'm not in a terrible place mentally and I'm not depressed but I do find the dark, rainy, cold days do affect my mood. When the evenings are warm and light I feel so much happier.

I'm really interested in how others don't feel that the winter brings them down and actually enjoy it. Are they naturally happier, more positive type people?

If I never had to endure another Summer I would be happy. I get stressed and irritable in the heat. I have hyperhidrosis on my face and scalp, and attract every bug, insect and midge within 10 miles. I react so severely to mosquito bites that I often need steroid injections. I absolutely fucking hate the hot weather. Always have. Even as a very little girl, I used to cry if it felt too hot. But I'd get an excited thrill in my tummy when there was an Autumnal nip in the air. I loved my matching wooly hat, mittens and scarf.

Our house is old so very much lends itself to cosiness. We have velvet curtains, thick carpets and rugs. I have several sets of fairy lights twinkling about the place and there's always at least one scented candle burning. I much prefer my Winter clothes and chunky boots and big coat. I love being indoors with a book, jigsaw or tapestry to work on.

I suspect a lot of people (not all, but a lot) who like winter are those who like an excuse not to do a lot and just sit on the sofa watching TV.

How dare we? No we're not all lazy like that. I am retired but don't sit around doing nothing,

I love the hot weather of summer and do find being cold in winter very difficult to deal with.

However, I agree that there’s less pressure to socialise, so I get more opportunities to recharge my batteries all cosied up in blankets at home.

I like the dark evenings, but hate the dark mornings (am an early riser)

I just hate being hot!

I’m a happy and positive person and I love winter. We just got the first snow today where I live in Sweden and it makes me so happy. We have more extreme seasons though where in summer it doesn’t get dark at all and in the winter we only get 4-5 hours of daylight. I love both but wouldn’t want either for the entire year.

I didn’t mind winter when I lived in the UK but the relentless rain and poor house building techniques definitely made it a lot harder to love the winter.

I don’t see dark mornings. I get up at 7 and by the time I’ve showered and eaten breakfast it’s light so I’m none the wiser. I need dark to sleep so it’s nice to have that as I sleep with the window open and get a break from the dawn chorus.

This is exactly me. The change in the seasons is the best thing about the UK.

When I got all my winter clothes down from the loft at the weekend, I instantly felt better. I love my leggings and thick dresses and boots and all my winter coats.

@RoachFish that must be so hard to have so little light in winter.

The weather and season in and of itsef just does not affect my mood at all; I can find good and bad in all of them. I really do not understand people who feel bad just because it is dark outside, not to say I don't believe that they do feel that way.

SUMMER
Good - easier to get up early, hang washing out, don't have to think about a bulky coat, ground not muddy

Bad - hate being too hot and sticky, hate the clothes and shoes, more socialising means more expense and eating and drinking more, louder neighbours, sunburn and suncream.

WINTER
Good - trousers and jumpers, boots and socks, colourful autumn and orangey sunsets, sparkly frost, rain on the windows, quiet, the houses lit up from the street.

Bad - scraping the car, harder to feel awake in the mornings, getting wet in the rain sometimes.

I far, far, far prefer winter.

I used to hate winter evenings but when i had kids i started to love them.
I had a v unhappy childhood and one of the things i wanted was they never had to worry walking into the house after school. I was lucky to be able to be at home when they did, and having the fire lighting and food or baking ready always made me very grateful for what i had.
Putting them to bed in the lashing rain or wind howling, they still now as adults will say, arent we lucky to have a warm bed on such a night.
One of the ways i managed to rise above my rearing was to make sure I found something good in every day, no matter how small. Things like that were those things.
Prob a bit silly really, but winter makes me grateful for what I have.

I think they're all goths/ex goths OP and goths are prone to depression. They make a pose of liking Winter maybe, just to seem different.

I'm the other way. I cannot BEAR November!; my least liked month on the calendar. It's just so - grey. And damp. And dank. And some days a perpetual twilight hangs over everything, and it never feels as though it gets properly light. And the clocks have only just gone back and it's going to be getting darker and the days shorter for aaaaaaaaages before the light starts slowly coming back.

I'm glad November's one of the 30-day months. And I really think that for this reason winter solstice/Yule is one to celebrate!

Give me January, February and March any time: February and March in particular where the lighter nights become much more noticeable and spring is only just around the corner. But January does it for me too. I love watching the light last just a little longer, one day at a time.

But there are some things help make my winters less onerous. A beautiful, roaring log fire lifts my mood no end. A lovely casserole rustled up in the slow cooker. Candles. Proper stargazing, being able to spot the beautiful constellations and slow turn of the lunar cycles. Sometimes, when it's a dry night, I hang out in my garden after dark: just watching nature, hearing the skeins of pink-footed geese flying overhead to roost, a sepia sunrise or sunset, that beautiful, brilliant but deep sea-green colour the sky sometimes goes just before dusk, that you never seem to see during the summer.

The darker days have many beauties and I find them less difficult to deal with as I get older. But I shall always love spring the most.

@Doteycat thats lovely 😊 Are you Irish?

I hate it, hate it, hate it. It's cold and it hurts. Running is boring cos it's dark and you can't see anything.
Mornings feel like night time.
It's dark.
I need light. All the light. Sky. Grass. Colour.

I'm definitely a spring/summer person and would be very happy to dispense with the other two seasons permanently.

To me, the darkness and cold of winter is too symbolic of death and decay and the end of things. I don't like endings.

Just a bit ☘

I love the winter. I have struggled with depression and I think I love winter because I can hibernate and have the excuse to cosy down and spend the nights indoors

Ah it’s just my Nan would use the term of endearment, dote/dotey. She’d call me a dotey lamb! 😊

There's levels of depression in each major season, and it depends on the person.
Some people hate the winter because of the cold, bleak weather and dark mornings and night. Sometimes the holiday season too, that can be really hard for some.
But some also hate the summer and really struggle there too, seeing everyone else happy and out and about when they can't do that for whatever reason.
It's not fair to assume either way.
I like each season for its own unique reason, but I wouldn't like to choose just one.

Irish nan? Cant beat them. 😍

I loved winter until I moved to the UK. I don’t understand people who like the change of seasons here. The seasons seem to be wet, too hot/wet, wet, dark/wet.

I like each season for its own unique reason, but I wouldn't like to choose just one.

Easy. I'd want summer all year round.

I get depressed in the warmer months. Especially when heat involved. Feeling sweaty and irritable all the time, not being able to sleep, feeling physically unwell, pressure to be out and about all the time etc. I much prefer autumn and winter. Prefer the food which is in season, I sleep better, no headaches or feeling sick and generally it all feels better

I actually quite liked winter when we lived in Copenhagen because they did great lighting and it seemed to me we had more sun , a bit more snow and frost and less rain and wind than uk- although we still had lots of dull gloomy days- they somehow 'did it better'. Xmas decs up till mid February in lots of places too.

Must admit I don't think I've ever sat snuggling under blankets etc- or wearing PJs in the day so clearly am not a typical mumsnetter. I find the UK depressing in Jan and feb unless it's proper cold with snow etc- which it often isn't.