How Winter Weather Affects your Mood

Are you feeling down or lack energy?

Are you feeling down? Are you wondering what’s wrong with you?

Nothing is wrong with you, being down might be just something seasonal if you don’t have any reasons to be and don’t worry you are not alone. Winter weather tends to affect your mood.

Do you feel like you lack energy or joy?

The reason must be the winter weather and for some people the winter blues are far more serious. This is called Seasonal Affective Disorder (aka SAD) and it affects millions of people.

The winter blues are real and it does affect your mind and body in the following ways:

Cold weather can really bring you down: Sometimes, days that are freezing can make you feel a bit more negative. A 2008 study found that while higher temperatures have a positive effect on a negative mood, more wind and less sunlight have a mostly negative effect on negative moods.

Less sunlight can make you more tired: The winter days are darker for longer. The lack of sunlight can cause your body to produce more melatonin, a sleep hormone that makes you tired. So this might be the reason you want to spend more time in bed or at couch under a blanked!

Darker days can make you feel depressed: Less sunlight can affect your body’s internal clock, which can make you feeling depressed (that’s where SAD comes in). It can also cause a drop in your serotonin levels, which can lead to depression.