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Light and weather seem to have a big influence on our mood. Already in the Greek era, Hippocrates referred to the importance of seasonal changes in the genesis of certain diseases, as well as bodily changes caused by cold or heat.
There are seasons of the year when some mental illnesses worsen or produce mild symptoms such as low mood, increased tiredness, difficulty sleeping and poor concentration. If these symptoms are very marked, it may be that a seasonal affective disorder sensitive to autumn and winter is being produced in the individual, disappearing when good weather appears and the days are longer.
What does seasonal affective disorder consist of?
The seasonal affective Trastorno or SAD occurs in about six every hundred people and is more common in adults, but can also occur in children and adolescents. The number of women affected by this disease is greater than that of men, although biology, family history, environment and individual experiences make some people more predisposed than others to develop it.
The TAS is a form of depression that coincides, according to the studies and the latest research, with the lack of light exposure during the months of autumn and winter and hormonal changes and neurotransmitters.
It is characterized by the presence in the individual of mood changes typical of depression, such as fatigue, feelings of hopelessness, irritability, sadness, anxiety, anhedonia, decreased libido, etc. also showing a predominance of vegetative symptoms such as hypersomnia, increased appetite and weight, physical fatigue and high sensitivity to interpersonal rejection.
Why does it happen?
There are many theories as to why these mood swings occur in individuals in relation to seasonal changes, but most researchers agree that they may be triggered by the brain’s response to dimming and the relationship with some key hormones in regulating sleep cycles. – wakefulness, energy and mood, such as serotonin and melatonin.
Melatonin is a hormone that we naturally secrete whose main function is the regulation of sleep-wake cycles. The secretion of melatonin starts to increase in the afternoon, staying at high levels almost throughout the night and decreasing when the sun rises. With serotonin, the opposite occurs, increasing when the person is exposed to sunlight, and its levels are very low in winter, being associated, therefore, with symptoms such as sadness and irritability. Therefore, if the light decreases, as it usually does in autumn and winter, hormonal imbalances can occur that affect our mood.
Thus, when the days are shorter in autumn and winter and the hours of darkness are longer, an increase in melatonin levels and a decrease in serotonin can be produced, sometimes creating biological conditions for bad mood, to which we must add the history the individual’s family, the context in which he/she is located and his/her personal conditions and experience.
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