> Above and beyond Vitamin D deficiency? I know exposure to the sun gives you Vitamin D, and I know Vitamin D deficiency does put you in a sour mood, but I didn't know there were more serious problems that could result from a lack of exposure to sunlight. Would you mind, particularly, if I asked for details? You've piqued my curiosity. In any case, I'm glad things worked out.


Well, I'm speaking as a layman. It may not be as simple as the lack of light and heat affecting my chemical balance, or that might not be the best wording of the situation.

But SAD is not just a mental condition; as best I understand it, it's an actual physical response to the change of seasons. I have another friend with SAD similar to my own, and our bad times tend to coincide very closely.

I can't speak with authority as to exactly what the drugs did, I'm afraid. I first tried Paxil, which may have had an effect given enough time, but after several weeks we switched due to bad side effects. Then we changed to Wellbutrin, which worked wonderfully for me; while I still never felt like my spring-to-autumn self, exactly, I was a whole lot closer, and I never had any really bad days after that (crying jags, not being able to work, etc.). But in any case, it did work out. I'll be taking that drug seasonally from now on.

One of the things with SAD is that every spring, when I started feeling better, there would always be a point where I said, you know, I forgot *how much* the weather affected me! And I would realize that although all my depressed thoughts and feelings felt very real at the time, they really were primarily a result of the disorder. Which brings me back to the whole point: please see a doctor, Anonymous, no matter what you think is causing the depression. Maybe s/he will refer you to a psychiatrist, or maybe you'll discover that there's some imbalance, but you really need to find out.

-- Trip