Shortly after graduating high school, I developed a passionate love (... or unhealthy obsession) for those fleeting southern Alberta summer months. I had always especially loved the summer, but it felt different all of the sudden, stronger maybe. Perhaps it was because that was the time of year that I could move back to my small town home from the city and sink back into the comforts of a slow and familiar environment. That's a good enough reason to really, really love a season, right?
With this new found fervor for summer came an equal and opposite reaction to winter. Being sentenced to life in the city for what felt like a never ending winter each year was the equivalent to hibernating in my books, because it sure wasn't living.
It wasn't long before my love for summer reached new heights, comparable to that of a clingy girlfriend.
PLEASE DON'T GO!!!
LOOK WHAT YOU'VE DONE TO ME!! I TOLD YOU NOT TO LEAVE!!
I spent the winter months stalking summer. I reminisced. I desperately tried to stay in contact with my "summer" friends. I belittled anything good or fun that occurred during the winter. And I counted down the days until I would be back with my love.
This all sounds super healthy, right? Believe it or not, it wasn't. This was the birth of the very seasonal aspect of my depression.
Seasonal depression, or seasonal affective disorder (SAD), is where it all began for me. I never learned coping techniques to get me through the winter each year, I just chose to be emo all winter because nobody knew how I felt because nobody could possibly love summer and hate winter as much as I did. I'm confident that because I never developed any sort of resilience in coping my way through the winter, I set myself up to fall a lot harder when things really hit the fan, or when a real major depressive episode came in like a wrecking ball. Fortunately, after learning to understand myself and my depression and developing a heck of a lot of resiliency, I feel confident in saying that I have a healthy relationship with summertime. Don't get me wrong, it's still hands down my favorite season of the year, just now I'm actually able to say I'm "living" during the rest of the year. And I didn't even feel sad that today was the last day of August.
What do you do during the winter to stay happy? (That is, if the winter is kind of blah to you too...)