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.

Mid May and I've got the SAD lamp on😩

It’s not been tooooo bad here but the weather changes from one minute to the next! It was pouring down this morning and is lovely now 🙈.

I couldn't face getting dressed today. It's been a toughie.

This really has been a dreadful ten days of absolutely miserable weather. I feel conned! May. MAY - and it’s cold grey and windy. Bastards.

@Bonden I so agree😡😰😡

Dare we say it … that sunshine is coming?

Wow! More 🌞. I feel like a different person to the one I was last week. I'm having breakfast in the garden- cafe au lait snd croissants to enhance the holiday feeling.

I hope you all have sun too and make the very most of it.

@lyingonthebeach yes!

It's the sunshine that makes such a difference. (My flat is boiling, I just got home and switched the Aircon unit on even though it's horribly noisy).

But my brain! This is how it works at max power! The difference is phenomenal!

It’s the perfect weather for me, so whyyyyy am I feeling so dammed anxious??? FFS 😡.

@Idstillratherbepaddleboarding has too much sunshine made you a bit manic maybe?

@Idstillratherbepaddleboarding it might be the shock (and, for me, the worry of the end of the sunshine). I hope you feel better today and enjoy this wonderful weather 😀

@Idstillratherbepaddleboarding I’m feeling anxious at night, heat is it difficult to sleep in, and any difficulties with sleep make me immediately anxious. Could it be that?

I hope you don’t mind if i join. This thread made me very excited as i too suffer with horrible SAD but came here to say while i appreciate the sun, the excessive heat and being unable to leave the house triggers a horrid cycle of worry and feeling down.
Im almost close to saying that while its dark and depressing in the Autumn, we can physically leave the house for a walk while now i just feel like im suffocating out there and at the verge of passing out
A couple more days and it should be a bit better i hope.
Virtual hugs to you all 🌷

For me, anxiety stems from knowing the lovely weather won't last. I love it like this but sadly for me it's temporary. I try to appreciate every moment but the feeling of loss is never far away.

Basically, we're all massively impacted by weather one way or another

I'm so envious of these people who just glide along completely unaffected by weather!

There was the perfect amount of sunshine outside about 5 am. I don't do 5 am. So this is not much use to me 😂

I would like spring to come back. I feel as if we've not had it the last two years.

Thanks all, I think it is a combination of the shock, the worry that it’ll be back to winter tomorrow, it being genuinely too hot to pole dance so I’m disregulated and the fact that you’re expected to eat so much more in summer due to BBQs etc. so I think it’s more of an autism thing than a SAD thing.

@Idstillratherbepaddleboarding when you say "shock" it sounds as if you're like me and you find it hard to cope with a dramatic change in temperature?

I don't find anyone's expecting me to eat more - they'd get very short shift if they did.

Tomorrow is meant to be a a few degrees cooler (but not much ) and then go straight back up again. It's still really hot outside so I don't actually think it will be cooler.

The weather has changed 😢and with it my mood. It's tangible. I want to go back to bed

I don't like it either. I want the heatwave back.

Me either, it’s forecast to rain forever more here 😭.

It's June and it feels like November 😢.

Heatwave please, pleeeeeaaaase comeback. We need you

Sending big sunny hugs of strength and solidarity to you all on this vile day

I don't know what to make of it but I just feel flat as a pancake

I suspect it's not seasonal - unusually I found that May went very slowly this year. Possibly connected to the incredibly extensive dental work I'm having to have done.

It's quite scary to think that I might feel flat all of summer. I don't know. Having 35° was just far too much for me so that didn't help. I would like my gentle English spring and summer back. Someone on another thread said that with 35° you're effectively trapped in doors as if you were in winter.

or maybe it's totally unrelated.

Did you guys all head out in the Sun at that temperature?

Just to add, it's basically gone down to about 20° and raining.

So my flat is still boiling. But it's not cold outside either. @lyingonthebeach I noticed you said it feels like November so I'm guessing you're in a totally different part of the country.

@EmeraldRoulette yes, i was out as much as possible in the heat. If it was very hot, I kept in the shade but could still enjoy the blue sky and warmth.
This weather today is just crushing me!
I hope you feel less 'flat' soon

@lyingonthebeach I see
I can't manage 35° any better than I can manage 5°

In fact, I think possibly 5° is better

Not helped by the fact that my flat is ridiculously boiling hot so you can't get a break from it unless you make a point of finding somewhere with air-conditioning. This is not a realistic way to spend your whole day. Well, not in my case.

It's still so hot and humid in my flat - I don't know how to get it to recover from an early heat wave. Obviously we had lots of hot weather last summer and I coped much better but there was air coming in in the evenings. We are on our umpteenth day of no air coming in.

Again, I wish I could be more weather resistant! I have to try and focus on being resilient, basically but I often feel very trapped in the flat and coupled with feeling unmotivated to do anything else, it's not helping.

It's on my list of things to do next week to see if I can find an external workspace. I'm not thrilled about it, but I think it's time to look at that.

it's raining now, but that's just bringing in humidity rather than freshness.

I hope everyone feels better soon.