2025/26 SAD thread

[Idstillratherbepaddleboarding]

It’s 1st September tomorrow so we’re back for another year’s SAD thread.

Welcome all old and new who struggles in the cold and dark months for advice and general moaning!

The only rule is no talk of snuggling under blankets, crunching in leaves (which will realistically be a soggy wet mulch, or pumpkin spiced anything!

Advice from previous years’ threads:

A SAD lamp can help as can a daylight alarm clock.
Try to get outdoors when the weather/ light allows it.
Try to keep up with your exercise routine or start a new one!
Remember to take your vitamin D and multi vitamins.
Try to have something to look forward to.

It's cold but sunny and there's a bright blue sky. Such a mood-lifter😁. I hope you all have some sun too

It’s been mild and sunny today, which was nice but I’ve had a super stressful couple of days mostly due to traffic and it delaying other things I need to do. I feel like I’ve been quite meltdowny too which doesn’t really work as a nearly 40 year old woman 😭.

I keep my lamp kind of at the side too ,it actually hurts to look at it .
Mines very old ,about 10 years and it flickers a lot ..might invest in a new one at some point

I think I need to start going for a lunchtime walk instead of sat on my ass with a lunchtime coffee .. exercise and sunlight will definitely help me help myself

Plus I've got two whippersnappers that would definitely appreciate me taking them out ,as I've been leaving it to my DH ,after the recent dog attack at the park on our rescue

A sunny morning here. I’m psyching myself up to go out and walk the dog. Need an enormous amount of motivation which is severely lacking at the moment! Sending positive vibes to everyone, hope you all manage to have a good day.

@Fukcedoff hope your dog is ok! That must have been scary! It’s a beautiful day here and we’re taking the dog to the beach but first I have to tackle the essay I’ve been putting off due to having no motivation that’s due tomorrow 😭😭.

Thanks. I don't look directly at it anyway as I read not to, but I will try angling it more to the side.

V wet start but now lovely bright 🌞!

Hello everyone

ANNOUNCEMENT - sorry for the capitals. You are not supposed to be looking directly at your SAD lamp. It's too bright for that. The light is supposed to reach your eyes. Do be careful with that otherwise you'll get headaches and goodness knows what else.

Sorry people are feeling so bad, it's all going on here, isn't it. Or not going on, in my case

I have done almost nothing of the things I was meant to do this weekend and indeed this week. And it's again stuff I did actually want to do so it's pretty poor.

Also, I'm really struggling to sleep. I do always have insomnia, but I'm having an old pattern come back which is that I can't really wake up properly until the evening. And then I can't sleep. Really annoying. I don't know what that's about. It doesn't happen every winter. I seem to remember it from a really long time ago but who knows how these things work!

I might need to learn something about dopamine. I can get stuff done in the morning if something is pushing me like work. But I can't seem to do anything else.

I also only worked out twice this week and I've eaten a stupid amount of chocolate, which is bad. I'm doing reasonably well losing weight and I've gained 3 lb this week. I know it's probably just water or probably not real weight gain so to speak.

but I was shocked when I got on the scale this morning.

@EmeraldRoulette I’m better in the mornings too. I have a window of about 10-2 and that’s it!

On the weight gain, could you be due your period?

I’ve had a good day today actually. I got my essay finished and handed in before 1pm and then took the puppy for a nice, sunny walk. I even had to take my coat off! I practiced my pole dancing routines then we had one of those bags of Indian food for tea, which I enjoyed and then a massive firework display started behind our house. I was worried the puppy would be terrified as our other dog was but he loved them so we went out in the garden to watch. He keeps going of the back door to see if there’s any more 😂.

So all in all a good day! But it’s back to work tomorrow so it’ll be crap again 😭.

Ok so o didn’t do my planned yoga on Friday… or Saturday… or Sunday but I did this morning 🎉🎉🎉 so celebrating that little win!

Ok so yoga doesn’t help… 😭

Sorry to hear that @Idstillratherbepaddleboarding

They kept saying that this week was going to be warm in Southeast. Not seeing any evidence of that so far.

I will join!

My energy feels totally sapped at the moment - I feel like I'm wading through treacle no matter how much I've slept. I feel like if I let myself, I could sleep all day then sleep at night as normal. Sometimes forcing myself to do stuff helps, sometimes the grogginess persists.

The last few days I've had an awful feeling of generalised anxiety that isn't even related to any particular thoughts or worries.

This is my third winter of being a dog owner and I can confirm that 'you just need to get outside' is a total myth. Today we walked for an hour in the drizzle and I felt worse when I came home than when I went out. At least he enjoyed it.

I feel somewhat pathetic for feeling this despondent as I have a lovely life. I love my partner, my dog, I have great friends, I'm lucky enough to work from home full time, we live in a lovely place. I'm keenly aware of how privileged I am. How can the weather override all of that?!!

@EmeraldRoulette the only thing that brightens me up is pole dancing. I’m seriously considering going to work in a strip club just so I can dance for a whole shift 😂😂 (I’m not actually going to!). We’ve had mild flooding here today! 😭

@Strawberrypicnic welcome! I know what you mean, I see all the awful stuff going on on the news and should think myself lucky but I can’t snap out of it. My puppy did not fancy the rain, as it really was (and still is!) torrential so we just took a quick walk to the pet shop for a buffalo ear that he lobbed round the living room for a while before eating it 😂.

@Idstillratherbepaddleboarding you could teach pole dancing!

@Strawberrypicnic yes, it is rubbish. I remember Monty Don saying the same thing.

i've actually been much better today but I really hope I get some sleep tonight.

What sort of puppy have you got ,how old

@Fukcedoff a 6 month old fox red Labrador called Rory 🥰 ( I’m aware this is very outing but so are all my other posts 😂). Here he is sniffing the wind, please ignore the long grass, our garden is a bog!

@Idstillratherbepaddleboarding he's very handsome

It's midday and I have no motivation. I guarantee it will kick in around 9 pm. This is not a practical way to live.

Also, I have to get to a meeting tomorrow morning and I need my brain and it will not go well on a couple of hours sleep 😱

Oh my ..he's lush ..lucky lucky you

I'm not sleeping well at all
I feel like I'm falling apart since the clocks changed ..my sleep is worse at night ,and I'm falling asleep at teatime .
Roll on spring,and wearing dresses again

I'm the same. Today's so crushingly dark and grey. I feel teary and tired and if I didn't have to work I'd hibernate in bed😫

@Fukcedoff try Sleep Cove sleep hypnosis (I don’t believe it’s actual hypnosis!) on Spotify. It really helps me to fall asleep. I’ve been sleeping ok with it but I’ve been having awful stress dreams that wake me up feeling more exhausted than ever!

But thank you and @EmeraldRoulette he is a gorgeous boy and sooo good!

@lyingonthebeach it’s taken me all day to do one thing for work 😭. I am not coping at all. I have a doctors appointment at 2pm, we’ll just a phone call one and I’m experiencing the freeze now.

@Idstillratherbepaddleboarding when you say the freeze, you mean you can't be bothered to do anything?

I'm the same today. I'm bored and I cannot be bothered to do anything. It's ridiculous.

it's actually been quite nice here today. But it's the lack of sleep that's a problem I think.

@EmeraldRoulette not can’t be bothered as such, more that I can’t do anything because I know I have something coming up, so more like waiting if that makes sense. The doctor has put my prescription up to 100mg but she seems really reluctant to try a different medication, probably because sertraline is cheap 🙈.