Tired, discouraged and sad: how the cold affects mental health

“The terrible thing about the winter blues is waking up. You wake up tired and you have to make a big effort to be able to connect and get the possibility of a flow, a way of realizing the activities to be carried out. The problem, for me, is not so much the cold as the grey, the problem is the color. There are times when you just want to lie down and sleep.

The story is by Nicolás, a millennium up and down —35 years old— and who lives in Santiago de Chile. But his feelings and his experience are far from affecting him alone, and even less that they are exclusive to this generation and to our time.

In a parallelism that breaks time and space, in 19th century France something similar happened to the writer Gustave Flaubert. Or at least that’s how he said it in his novel November: fragments of all styles“Are sunny winter days sad for you too?” When it is foggy in the evening and I walk alone, it is as if the rain fell on my heart and made it crumble into ruins”.

The music also addressed the melancholy of winter. Starting with Jorge González himself and his highly quoted words of “paramar “, passing by the Smashing Pumpkins with”my love is winter » or Tori Amos in «Winter ”.

Of course: the cold, the rain, the sunsets with psychedelic colors – and why should I say snow – are very favorable scenarios for the emergence of deep, complex and nostalgic emotions.

Excellent breeding ground if you are an artist, but not so much if you are an ordinary person who has to study and/or work and whose numb inner world hardly matters to anyone.

A scroll through the various social networks allows us to elucidate that apart from the inclement cold there is a sensitive thermal sensation, of murria, that even if you try to soothe with good slippers, thick socks or first technological layers , in the end it goes through all sorts of coats because this coldness reaches the very soul.

We spoke with a pair of expert professionals on the subject, whose words will hit you like a warm, comforting cup of tea with honey.

Catalina Aguirre is a mindfulness psychologist at Medismart.live and explains that there are several sources of information that indicate how and why the climate affects our state

“The Chilean Society for Emotional Development , for example, pointed out in a 2008 study that cold days can worsen the mood of people prone to sadness. it also proves it an article from the American Brigham Young University done with over 16,000 adults, who found greater symptoms of anxiety and depression during times with fewer hours of sunlight.

This is due to factors such as temperature, sunlight, wind and precipitation, all conditions that are culturally linked to “negative” moods (she emphasizes the use of quotation marks). Cold weather also slows metabolism and therefore both tend to lower energy and mood. .

“When we have intense winters, with very low temperatures or very cloudy and rainy days, to warm up, the body tends to generate greater activity in the first place,” he explains. “But if the cold persists, what ends up winning is sleepiness and bad moods.”

Who is most affected by this? According to the expert in mindfulnessit takes more force in people who already present “a picture of depressive symptoms or in those who live alone, because with this climate it is easier to activate emotions such as melancholy”.

It’s similar, he says, to what happens to people who tend to feel down or down during the holidays and on family days like Christmas or New Years.

One of the most recurrent phrases these weeks is the diminutive of “it’s cold” or “it’s frozen”, which in colloquial Chilean is expressed phonetically in a pseudo-Asian tone like “tae lao”.

However, explains psychologist Yenny Martínez, in this case, SAD stands for Seasonal Affective Disorder. “As its name suggests, it is directly linked to the transition from warm to cold seasons, which produces a series of symptoms associated with depression in people,” Martínez describes. What are these? Sleeping longer than usual, low desire to do activities or have social interactions, poor ability to concentrate and low mood.

A study, carried out in 2014 at the University of Copenhagen , seems to have found a chemical explanation for this disorder. Using a brain scan, they found significant differences between summer and winter months in serotonin transport protein (SERT) levels in patients with SAD.

The conclusion? For some people, when the days are shorter and there is less sunlight, the adjustment the brain has to make to levels of serotonin – known as the “happiness hormone”, responsible for controlling emotions and humors – less affects its secretion and therefore in a greater tendency to depression.

This is accentuated by the changes in lifestyle that occur when the weather changes, which involves getting used to and adapting to these new conditions in a very short time. “That’s why many times there are usually feelings and states of depression and anxiety when winter comes,” he says.

According to Martínez, one of the factors that most influences this disorder is the reduction in hours of sunlight, “which causes a reaction in people’s biological clock. Less sun exposure influences serotonin’ levels, while increasing melatonin, the neurotransmitter that helps induce sleep.

Although it affects more people with a certain type of bipolar disorder, “a person with optimal emotional states can also suffer from mild forms of SAD,” warns Martínez.

“Many internal variations are generated —in each person— and external —to the rest of society—: from changes in clothes and schedules to the reduction of views or access to many places. People in winter have to spend most of their time sheltered in their homes, and all of this can affect mental health. The human body adapts physically to different conditions – in this case to cold – but it does not always work in the same way with the mind: it requires preparation and constant work to keep it stable”.

Just as it is important to keep the body warm and ready to face low temperatures, it is also essential to take care of our mental health, at a time when, in addition to the cold, many stressful situations occur, it is the least we can say.

“The most important psychological thing is to avoid being afraid of the future,” advises Yenny Martinez. “Human beings are constantly thinking about what’s going to happen and how we’re going to feel later, but that’s one of the causes of anxiety and depression.” Although it is not easy in these conditions of political, economic and social uncertainty, it is essential to try to live from day to day and know how to take advantage of it, he says. “Trying to think ahead just to build your goals properly.”

On top of that, Aguirre places great importance on sleep cycles, diet, and routines in general. “Taking care of these rhythms will always work as a protective factor for our mental health.” As there is less direct sunlight and sunrise is later, the sleep cycle is altered —fatigue is anticipated in the afternoon and it is more difficult to wake up in the morning—it is therefore advised to “maintain a regular rest schedule, so that the circadian cycle is not so affected and therefore does not increase irritable mood.

A study of University of Michigan found that taking a 20-30 minute walk a day, even in cold weather, can have a positive impact on winter mood.

And the same study from the University of Copenhagen suggests that certain habits can help avoid falling into the clutches of SAD, such as eating a balanced diet, reducing caffeine intake and exercising daily. But perhaps the main thing is to maintain exposure to fresh air and receive sunlight, with which the secretion of serotonin is stimulated and melotonin is also regulated, in addition to promoting the synthesis of vitamin D .

Aguirre concludes by insisting on not giving in completely to the inertia of the cold, the one that makes you want to spend the whole day curled up in bed. “It’s important right now to strengthen social ties, engage in self-care activities — like exercise or relaxation — and, most importantly, to look good in bad weather. This previous attitude helps us to face difficult times, whether personally or climatologically speaking.