Friday, October 25, 2013

Seasonal Affective Disorder (reversed)

There is a disorder for anyone and everyone.  But...

There is no substitute for hard work and perseverance.  At least that is what those members of the (Greatest) Silent Generation and those of the Baby Boomers believed.

And then came the Xers, Millenials, and now, the new Silents.  I can only hope the new Silents have some of the grit that their predecessors, the xers and millenials, just don't seem to have.  How can two generations find so many maladies to keep them from hard work and perseverance?

I recently heard of a disorder called sunny day depression.

Evidently, this form of depression is the reverse of another malady called SAD (or seasonal affective disorder).  This disorder is said to be prevalent at this time of year.  It is caused, they say, by a reduced amount of sunlight during the fall and winter months.

The disorder called sunny day depression is weird.  I think it's weird because if reduced hours of sunlight can cause depression, how can increased hours of sunlight do the same thing?

Here's a thought.  The xers and millenials are the best educated generations, EVER.  The sunny weather brings back memories of vacation days and freedom from school and fun and no responsibilities.  The only decisions that were made were what do eat or who to play with or where to play.  Sunny days meant you didn't have to get up and get to class, so you slept longer in the morning.  And, who knows, maybe you went to the beach or the pool and dozed off while laying in the sun?

The xers and millenials didn't have to worry about anything, they had their moms or dads to do their worrying for them.

And then they became adults.  And the sunny days of spring and summer become work days.  The responsibilities of work and children and bills don't go away just because the calendar rolls over to May.  And then they get tired.  They can't sleep late into the morning.  They cannot stay up all night and enjoy a balmy evening on the beach or the porch.  They mourn the end of childhood and resent the responsibilities of adulthood.

Life has gone from being fun to being mundane and the sunny days of summer are just the thing to remind them of this.

Since they cannot go back and repeat their childhood, they find the next best thing to allow them to escape from their responsibilities of life.  Their depression settles in.  And sure, they are sad.  The sadness comes because there is more than just do than just what they would like to do.  This is not a clinical condition.  Instead of taking in the extended sunshine hours and taking these feelings and memories and being childlike in their enthusiasm of summer, and turn it into a disorder that allows them to avoid responsibilities.

Maybe a little hard work would help heal this disorder.


533.  A day devoted to helping a friend
534.  Waking up with a purpose for the day
535.  Catching up on chores hanging over my head
536.  Sunshine on a cold morning
537.  Hearing my husband tells me he loves me first thing this morning
538.  Believing he does love me
539.  Continuing in prayer for my son to find a job with hope that this prayer will be answered
540.  Hope

2 comments:

  1. that you call them the most educated generation amuses me a little....

    ReplyDelete
  2. I actually prefer the cloudy rainy days. Those seem the most relaxing to me. Maybe I have the sunny day syndrome. I know that I still get the Sunday blues.

    ReplyDelete

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