just saw your comment.

thanks for correcting my incorrect ucla info! :)

i went to bed and din’t see your informative comment ’til after the thread had closed.

(as opposed to epu’d…)

and pow wow –

totally agree with all of your post re sad, etc

are you a healer* person?

(*a good thing)

The advice I’d throw into the ring, FWIW, in addition to getting direct sunlight on your skin (rather than just through glass, which you probably know), and focusing on the fact that in a month the sun will start to turn back toward us, is a balanced essential fatty acid intake in your diet by, for example, reducing your consumption of high fructose corn syrup, which is Omega-6 heavy. Also meaning, especially, increasing your Omega-3 intake (from fish oil supplements as need be), including from such sources as 100% grass-fed beef, free-foraging chickens and their eggs (supplemented with grain probably in the case of the chickens), and green vegetables. The Omega-3 EFA comes straight from the energy of the sun that has been converted into grass/green vegetables and the plankton stuff of the sea that grass-fed cattle and wild fish eat, respectively, and then turn (probably better than our own bodies do) into a source of sun-energy for us when we eat the beef and fish/oil, or eat the vegetables ourselves. Our modern diet is very deficient in the Omega-3 EFAcid, and we are Omega-6 top-heavy (the former is anti-inflammatory, the latter is inflammatory, as one example of the need for balance). Force-feeding cattle cheap commodity corn kernels (that their anatomies are not designed to digest) that were grown with synthetic fertilizer (the run-off cause of the growing “dead zone” in the Gulf of Mexico) does not make an equivalent source of energy for our well-being and mental health (though that’s pretty much all you’ll find for sale in your average American supermarket). Factory farm food… [Highly recommended reading: The Omnivore’s Dilemma by Michael Pollan.]

One step at a time, egregious. Just keep patting yourself on the back about Jim Webb. That guy is a keeper.

[Thank you, too, for your thoughtfulness in alerting lhp to my message for her the other morning. looseheadprop - I’ve spotted both of your thank yous, and you’re most welcome - haven’t caught up to you in a current/open thread to say so, but I’m glad the links were of help.]

Falling once again into the abyss. Need help.

It’s late November, I am once again falling into the abyss. Pray for me that I may arise whole after the dark winter is over. It is hell on earth every year. Hope my creativity otherwise is worth this pain. This year I feel I have used this creativity to help Webb take back the Senate and others to take back the House.

I had decided over the summer to retreat, to rest, to give myself the space to recover from stress and not resort to unsatisfactory means of making things ok *cough*drinking*cough*. But the moment was upon us. Should I have sat this one out, hoping there would be enough other people to make things happen? Risky business. I jumped in with all 3 feet [one in mouth] with the hope that my involvement would be worth the cost.

Yes I am seeing a psychiatrist. Yes I am on medicine. Yes I have people at church praying for me and my health and our program in Russia. Yes my family is there for me. But it is still hell on earth every winter.

Democrats in Virginia and Alaska are probably glad of my decision to become involved. My doctor will have his own opinion soon. Hope it was worth it.

Egregious -

I just saw this – I am so sorry you are struggling; I’m glad your family and so many others are there for you.

We will be here for you through the waning of the days and when the light begins to return, just weeks from now.

Bright Blessings,

Kirk

PS – And the fall onset version of SAD really sucks. Really, really sucks. Takes all the fun away just as the holidays beckon.

Sorry to join the thread late.

When looking at seasonal affective disorder, there are multiple variables:

(!) Absolute length of daylight (number of hours)

(2) Rate of change in (1)

My friends who understand calculus tell me the rate of change (decrease) in day length dwindles as we approach the solstice.

They also tell me the greatest rate of change in day length comes around the equinii (veranl and autumnal).

Here in SF, I’m struck by:

(1) Increased intensity of manic symptoms around late March (in some patients)

(2) Increased intensity of depressive symptoms around late September (in some patients).

(3) A separate group of patients with seasonal affective disorder who experience maximum symptoms around the winter solstice.

I’d love to know if the underlying etiology is identical (but simply on two different efferent pathways) or if the two patterns actually refelct dissimilar mechanisms.

I’ll have to leave elucidation for my academic colleagues in chronobiology.

While true for some people, it doesn’t explain a steady descent into darkness and depression that begins every year mid October and intensifies mid November. [what happens in December is unspeakable. But I will try to speak about it here if you will allow.]

Please feel free to discuss what you feel comfortable with though I can`t speak for anyone else.

One thing that most don`t think about is that starting in late September/early October plants/trees are losing their leaves (photosynthetic oxygen generators) so the general level of oxygen in the atmosphere decreases as the winter season comes on & this lasts, of course, until the plants/trees once again return to oxygen generation in the early spring. Our biosphere/planet breathes as do all of us, just on a different scale – daily cycles as well as seasonal ones. Following from this observation is a suggestion that daily oxygen “therapy” would be one method to adjust for this.

[NOTE - the majority of the land area of our planet is in the northern hemisphere]

Not kidding about this BTW…YMMV of course depending on personal biological factors (blood oxygen capacity for instance) etc.

“Lack of awareness of the basic unity of organism and environment is a serious and dangerous hallucination.” – Alan Watts

Back to the Republicans now, they have reformed themselves by appointing Boehner, Blunt and Lott as leaders.

That was easy.

-GSD

P J Evans >

Post excitement letdown syndrome which is not an unusual experience; think post-Holidays ala January etc

While true for some people, it doesn’t explain a steady descent into darkness and depression that begins every year mid October and intensifies mid November. [what happens in December is unspeakable. But I will try to speak about it here if you will allow.]