How to Look After Your Mental Health this Winter

In the UK, Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) affects up to three in 100 people at some point in their life. Most people start to get symptoms for the first time in their 20s or 30s, but children can be affected too. Women are about four times more likely to have SAD than men.

With this in mind, it’s important to be aware of what the symptoms of SAD are, as they can be similar to those of depression. Symptoms can include…

• Feeling sad, tearful, or hopeless
• Have no energy
• Feeling anxious or worried
• Find it hard to concentre
• Be unable to enjoy things that usually bring you happiness
• Not want to socialise
• Feel sleepy during the day
• Find it hard to get up in the morning

Mental Health and SAD

If you already suffer from another mental health condition, you may find your symptoms feel worse when your affected by SAD. It’s something to look out for in yourself, your family, and especially your colleagues. As discussed in my last blog, 828,000 workers in our industry suffered from work-related stress, depression, or anxiety in 2019/2020. Since Covid hit in March 2020, these numbers will certainly have gone up.

The exact causes of SAD are unclear, though it can often be linked to the reduced amount of sunlight in winter. This can affect a number of different things that you need to keep yourself going on a day-to-day basis.

Your body clock can be massively influenced. Your body uses sunlight to regulate your sleep, appetite, and mood. Lower light levels throughout the winter can disrupt your body clock, leading to depression and tiredness

Reduced sunlight can also have an impact on our production of melatonin, a sleep hormone. People with SAD may produce much higher levels in winter, affecting how tired they feel throughout the day. Higher levels of melatonin may increase how tired you feel, but lower levels of serotonin can make you feel more depressed. Serotonin is a hormone that affects your sleep, mood, and appetite. The combination of all of these can lead to you having continued issues through the winter.

How Can I Look After Myself?

While the winter months may make a lot of us feel unhappy or gloomy, there are things you can do to help boost your mood.

One of the first ones is to keep active. This may not be easy for everyone (especially in the wet wintry weather), but if you’re able to take a walk midday, research has found that this could be as helpful as light treatment for coping with the winter blues. Going outdoors in the natural daylight as much as possible can help with those levels of melatonin I previously mentioned, but if the outdoors isn’t possible, sitting near a window for some extra sunlight is just as good. You can also use a light box, which works to mimic natural sunlight and can help to boost your mood.

Make sure you’re keeping warm as well. Being cold can make people even more depressed, and it’s been shown that staying warm can reduce the winter blues by half. You can keep warm with hot drinks and food, warm clothes and shoes, and keep your home between 18-21C. And make sure that the hot food you’re eating is healthy! A healthy diet can boost your mood and help to give you more energy.

Finally, if SAD is having such an impact on you that you can’t live your life as you normally would, please seek medical help from your GP. They can help to officially diagnose you and come up with a solution to get your mental health back on track.

Let’s Talk!

If you’re on one of our sites, your account manager is always available to help. Many of us at PSI Global have taken part in courses through i-act on managing mental health and can assist you with how to move forward if you’re unsure where to turn in the first instance.