I don’t know about you, but February is a tough month for me.
If you live in the eastern half of the country, you have been buried in snow. The midwest has suffered bitter cold. It was 7 below this morning, and it didn’t feel too bad. What does that tell you?
Plus, I have bills that come up in February. Then there are taxes.
I hate February. Can you tell?
Here are my top tips to help you fight winter depression –
Take your Nutrients –
Nutrition is super important. Vitamin deficiency can actually make you feel even more depressed. You’ve heard the term chemical imbalance? A nutrient imbalance can cause many of the same symptoms. What’s even worse this time of year is that we are not getting our vitamin D. And then when you get home feeling blah, you really don’t feel like cooking. Treat your diet like its medicine and do it anyway. You need to take your nutrients!
Make a great depression busting salad with dark green lettuces or spinach, tomatoes, broccoli, onion, cheese, shredded chicken… You will feel so much better.
Make sure you are staying hydrated too. We are inside with our heat turned up and getting all dried out. My favorite analogy is to think about a dry sponge. How useful is it? But when you fill it with water, now it can do the job, right? Your body is primarily water. Do you think that your body and brain can work well when its all dried out?
Take your weight and divide by 2. That is how many ounces of water you need every day.
Talk to somebody –
I don’t mean texting or Facebook. I mean really talking to someone.
Pick up the phone and call someone.
If you can get out, meet a friend for coffee.
Isolation feeds depression. Human contact, even if just by phone, can make you feel a lot better. We need that human connection.
Laugh –
Watch a funny movie. Call a funny friend. Be silly with your kids.
In one of my stressful jobs I had a friend who would do off the wall stuff. He would send joke lines to your phone. I don’t know if they even have these anymore? He would do his crazy Indian routines and have us rolling on the floor. Don’t go getting all politically correct on me. He is Indian.
Everyone is so uptight these days. No wonder everyone is depressed. Don’t take everything so seriously!
Depression can be a downward spiral if you let it. Like we talked about above, you don’t feel like cooking so you don’t eat well. So you feel worse and you don’t feel like putting effort into how you look. So you look in the mirror and feel even worse…
You have to break the cycle.
When I went to the gas station the other day, the cashier had tears in her eyes. I asked if she was OK. She said no. I asked if I could do anything. She said no. I asked if it was a man. She said yes. I said, “They suck.” She laughed.
Don’t be afraid to help someone else break their cycle.
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