You might also know this type of major depression as seasonal depression or seasonal affective disorder (SAD). Seasonal depression involves depression symptoms during certain times of the year, usually when it's dark, wet, and cold.
Rainy days are most often known to contribute to depression and sadness. This is due to the dip in serotonin levels caused by lack of sunshine. The dip in serotonin levels also contributes to food cravings for comfort foods and carbohydrates because they boost serotonin levels.
Seasonal affective disorder (SAD) is a type of depression that comes and goes in a seasonal pattern. SAD is sometimes known as "winter depression" because the symptoms are usually more apparent and more severe during the winter. Some people with SAD may have symptoms during the summer and feel better during the winter.
Take, for instance, seasonal affective disorder (SAD), which is defined as having significant mood changes related to the changing seasons. The most well-known example is winter SAD or the "winter blues" — a depressive mood felt only during the shorter days of the winter.
For some people, that can lead to seasonal affective disorder (SAD), a type of depression that affects people at the same time each year, typically over the winter, says Ken Yeager, PhD, clinical director of the Stress, Trauma And Resilience (STAR) Program at The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center.
If you feel down during a downpour, it's not your imagination: Bad weather can indeed have a negative effect on your emotions. According to one study, nearly 9 percent of people fall into the “rain haters” category. This group feels angrier and less happy on days with more precipitation.
Precipitation – There are variable amounts of rainfall as a depression passes. A depression usually takes about 5 days to pass and this can bring a wide variety of rain, sleet and snow during that time.
When there is a change in temperature, it's not unlikely to hear people complain of “bipolar” weather. When technology isn't working properly or when something is unpredictable, a frustrated and uninformed person might call it bipolar.
One possibility is that the effects of weather on mood are primarily physiological. Excess heat causes discomfort by taxing our capacity to thermoregulate, and this causes irritability and aggression. Exposing skin to sunlight produces vitamin D, promoting the brain's production of serotonin, which lifts mood.
People with astraphobia feel extreme anxiety or debilitating fear when preparing for a thunderstorm. They may watch weather reports obsessively or have panic attacks (rushes of anxiety that cause intense physical symptoms) during a storm. Another name for astraphobia is brontophobia.
You may have noticed how a gray, rainy day makes you feel gloomy and tired, while a sunny day can leave you feeling cheerful and energized. The longer, sunnier days of summer are often associated with better moods, while the shorter, darker days that begin in late fall often align with an increase in SAD symptoms.
Symptoms and Causes
But mental health professionals believe it results from a combination of: Frightening experiences associated with rain: If a person has a traumatic experience with rain, that may lead to ombrophobia. For example, surviving a terrible storm or flood can make a person ombrophobic.
The reduced level of sunlight in fall and winter may cause winter-onset SAD . This decrease in sunlight may disrupt your body's internal clock and lead to feelings of depression. Serotonin levels. A drop in serotonin, a brain chemical (neurotransmitter) that affects mood, might play a role in SAD .
When there's a rainstorm, atmospheric pressure drops. As soon as your body detects this change, it makes your soft tissues swell up. As a result, fluid in the joints expands. Unfortunately, the expansion and contraction that takes place around the joints can irritate your nerves and cause pain.
What are 'monsoon blues'? This is a Seasonal Affective Disorder or a mood disorder caused by the change in weather. There are many people who feel gloomy and lazy when it's raining.
Find gratitude in the storm
Watch the rain, enjoy the sound it makes as it falls and be grateful to the water for feeding our environment. Meditate and use these feelings of gratitude to stay positive and grounded in the present.
Climate change and related disasters cause anxiety-related responses as well as chronic and severe mental health disorders. Flooding and prolonged droughts have been associated with elevated levels of anxiety, depression and post-traumatic stress disorders.
Snowy weather has unique positive effects on your health, energy, and happiness.
Christensen and colleagues (18) found that several meteorological factors, including changes in minimum and maximum temperature, rainfall, atmospheric pressure, and cloudiness, might contribute to triggering new episodes in bipolar patients.
Bipolar disorder is characterised by extreme mood swings. These can range from extreme highs (mania) to extreme lows (depression). Episodes of mania and depression often last for several days or longer.
The main sign of bipolar disorder is extreme mood swings that go from emotional highs to emotional lows. Manic episodes cause people to seem very energetic, euphoric, or irritable. During depressive episodes, your loved one may seem sad, upset, or tired all the time.
Overview. Bipolar disorder (formerly called manic-depressive illness or manic depression) is a mental illness that causes unusual shifts in mood, energy, activity levels, concentration, and the ability to carry out day-to-day tasks.
In most cases, SAD symptoms start in the late fall or early winter and go away during the spring and summer; this is known as winter-pattern SAD or winter depression.
The net result of the processes in action is that the cold front moves faster than the warm front and the warm air in between the fronts is squeezed up and away from the surface.