Daylight Saving Time and SAD
I don’t clinically have SAD, but I’m certainly subject to a darkening of the mood in the winter months. So when Daylight Saving Time hits and we spring forward, I’m generally quite relieved. But an article on MSN.com cautions those with SAD not to put away those lightboxes just yet.
Daylight saving time has always been a difficult adjustment for night owls, who need several mugs of coffee or caffeinated tea to feel human in the morning. Unfortunately, the adjustment became a lot harder in 2007, when we started making the shift a full three weeks earlier—the second Sunday in March instead of the first weekend of April. The change means that many of us will spend the rest of March waking up in the dark.
This is especially bad news for people suffering from Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) ….
SAD is most common in northern latitudes where days are very short in the winter, but researchers are starting to realize it’s not the total amount of daylight that triggers the disorder—it’s having to slog through dark mornings. …
Even for those whose winter blahs don’t quite reach the level of clinical depression, the next few weeks may be tough. You may end up hitting the snooze button a bit more often, or taking naps during the day. Luckily, naps have been shown to improve productivity, so you can full rationalize getting some extra shut-eye.
I posted this a couple days after the DST switch because, um, I was napping.
[Get yer T-shirt here.]
liz | 10:37 AM | Uncategorized
i think companies should adapt to DST so we don’t have to suffer from SAD…ya know, like, start work later…mmm hmmm.
I was doing some political walking (door-to-door campaigning) with a buddy two weekends ago, and he mentioned that his wife had an auto-immune disorder – and she was from MA. This is California, BTW. I said that my (Pennsylvania) dad had MS, and we both posited that we exchanged higher risk of skin cancer for more vitamin D.
The “very next day” (trite), Dr. Whositz from Parade magazine said that vitamin D had been shown to prevent auto-immune disorder. Could it also, if taken in large enough doses, help with SAD? The vitamin D (400 I.U.) in milk is probably not enough to ward off auto-immune conditions.
We get 320 days of sunlight a year compared with your under 200…it makes a difference. Of course, as we generate vitamin D, we prematurely age our skin and set ourselves up for carcinomas and melanomas. Interesting trade-off for me, who has had two close relatives with MS.
Reply: