Beating Seasonal Depression: 4 Simple Yet Powerful Strategies I’m Using This Winter

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Ugh, summer’s officially over. I do love the fall here in Ohio – the changing of the colors makes everything beautiful outside.

However, that means it’s time for the weather to begin shifting, which always gives me that looming feeling that winter is right around the corner. And that leads to the winter blues…. seasonal depression… or the more technical term, seasonal affective disorder (SAD).

Whatever you want to call it, I’ve learned that I have an extremely hard time with winter. And I’m far from alone. There are millions of folks in the same boat as me on this one (comfort in numbers?).

I went into such a bout of depression a couple of years ago that I wasn’t sure I’d ever be able to get out of it. Fortunately, after several looooonnnng months, I was able to dig myself out.

So last year, we bought an RV and left Ohio for 8 months to travel the country. Strangely, the driving factor for that whole wacky idea was to help me avoid winter for a year and the seasonal depression that was likely to come with it (but the fun adventure was the added benefit!).

This year, we’re not leaving for the winter and I’ll be honest, I’m pretty nervous about it. I struggled profusely in 2022 – and that winter wasn’t even that bad!

So this year I have a plan. I have several strategies I’m going to utilize to help me fight seasonal depression for the winter. They’re not going to make me love the cold and snow, but if they get me through those months without sending me on a downward spiral, I’ll take it!

Why is seasonal depression only affecting me now?

I’ve hated the winter ever since I was a kid. I hate the gloominess, but more than anything, it’s the cold that I despise. I remember being in elementary school and being required to go outside for recess in the winter – that was insane to me. Who in their right mind enjoys that?

Of course, I was probably in the minority on this one. Most kids don’t seem to mind it and some even love it (insanity!).

But the point all comes down to this… I’m a freeze-baby. Yes, I’ll admit it – I can’t stand the cold and shiver like a hairless chihuahua even when the temperature drops below 60. It’s not my fault – it’s just the way I’m built.

Just because I get cold and have always hated the winter though, that’s not seasonal depression. I’ve never liked winter, but I still muddled my way through it (begrudgingly) every year for decades. Shoveling, snow-blowing, brushing snow and scraping ice on cars, bundling up to go out, fish-tailing on unplowed roads – how do some people look forward to that time of year?!

Then a couple of things changed: I got older and I retired from work. When I became an early retiree at the end of 2018, I no longer needed to go outside anymore if I didn’t want to. Interesting thought, right?

But that was at the end of December of 2018 and we had plans to move to the country of Panama that summer (in 2019). Think selling everything you own including your house and cars is easy? Not so much. We were so busy that winter, I didn’t even have time to notice that it might be snowing outside!

Then for the next few years, we lived in beautiful Boquete, Panama. I loved it. What’s not to love? The people are friendly, the prices are right, it’s amazingly beautiful, and, most importantly, the temperature is 75 degrees there every day of the year. That’s right up my alley!

Fast forward to 2022 and we’re now back in Ohio (here’s why we moved back if you’re new around here). Life hit me hard once we settled in. I got knocked down by the surprise of re-adjusting to life back in the U.S. (reverse culture shock as my good friend Fritz explained to me). But then my first winter of early retirement hit and I was Ok with knowing that I didn’t need to go outside if I didn’t want to.

It seemed like a good strategy. Stay inside away from the cold that I so dread and be cozy inside. I was still able to work out with my trusty Bowflex adjustable dumbbells (I love these!), workout bench, and pull-up bar. Plus, I would regularly walk about 1.3 miles up and down the halls of the apartment building we were in.

And I still did leave the apartment building periodically… just not very often.

What else do I need, right?

Wrong. I think the isolation actually made things worse.

And it was no joke. I was so depressed that I didn’t want to do anything. I essentially lost my sense of purpose and just wanted to sleep all day (but I didn’t). I was in such a funk for months.

Whatever you want to call it – seasonal affective disorder (SAD), seasonal depression, the winter blues – it can be crippling to a lot of folks. Unbeknownst to me, I was in good company with this…

About 5% of adults in the U.S. experience SAD and it typically lasts about 40% of the year.

— American Psychiatric Association – Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD)

In other words, millions of people get affected by seasonal depression that lasts for almost half the year! That’s insane!

That was the worst rut I’ve ever been in and it took a long time to get out of it. It was so bad that in the spring (2023), we were brainstorming a way to get out of Ohio for most of the winter but still be able to occasionally be around for family and friends. That’s when the whole “buy an RV, let the apartment lease lapse, move everything into storage, and travel the country“ idea was born. Credit goes to Lisa for that idea.

But here we are working our way closer to an Ohio winter in which we’re planning to stay put the majority of the time. Faith’s now 14 and we want her to be able to be around her friends more so she can continue to grow those relationships and have a somewhat “normal” teenage life.

That’s all fine and dandy, but that means I need to prepare to try to fight off seasonal depression again. So I’m planning to implement several strategies to do the best I can with it. I know this likely won’t help me to defeat seasonal depression altogether, but if I can minimize it, that’s a win in my book.

Here’s what I’m planning to do…

#1 Utilize a sun lamp

I’ve had several folks tell me that a sun lamp has made all the difference in the world for them and their seasonal depression. Honestly, the whole idea sounds a little hokey to me, but I’m willing to try it since it’s not a huge investment of time or money.

I bought this NEXPURE 12000 Lux sun lamp from Walmart for under $30 (love my Walmart+ membership!). But if you’re more of an Amazon shopper, here’s a similar one on their site.

The idea is that you’re supposed to try to use it for a half hour each day, preferably first thing in the morning. It’s a little early in the year, but I decided to start using mine last week.

One of my absolute favorite parts of early retirement is that I wake up (to no alarm) around 7:15 to 7:45 each morning… and then I just lay there for about a half hour or so without getting up. I’ll grab my phone and check my email, do the daily Wordle puzzle, see what my workout will be on Fitbod, and do a few Spanish lessons in Duolingo (with more lessons before bed). It’s glorious and I love every minute of it.

So I thought, why not just use the sun lamp while lying there? It’s the perfect amount of time and I don’t need to make any other changes. I have it on my nightstand, so just turn it toward me, turn it on, and do my morning routine. Easy peasy!

And just so you know, it’s not like the sun tanning lamps. These don’t give off any UV radiation so they’re safe to use. It’s just an extremely bright LED light sometimes with different color temperatures available.

There’s not much to it either…

• Place the sun lamp on a table or desk 16 to 24 inches away from your face.
• Position the sun lamp 30 degrees overhead.
• Do not look directly at the light.
• Sit in front of the sun lamp for 20 to 30 minutes or the time recommended by the manufacturer or a doctor.
• Try to use the sun lamp at the same time every day.

Healthline – Do Sun Lamps Really Lift Your Spirits and Treat Seasonal Affective Disorder?

I can’t say whether or not this will help with seasonal depression but there are plenty of studies that show that it does. Here’s one example. So, it’s worth a shot.

#2 Suck it up and get outside

Well, this one stinks, but I think I’m just going to have to toughen up and get outside. I’m sure there will be some horrid windy and snowy days where I’ll take a hard pass, but I’m going to try to go outdoors more often this winter regardless.

Vitamin D from the sun is important and something I’d skimped on when I hit my low a couple of years ago. I’m going to try to get out there and walk as much as I can. Of course, that’s easy to say right now while it’s still beautiful outside. When it’s 25 degrees out, it’s going to be a tougher mental battle for me to get past.

When I was working, I didn’t have a choice – I had to get out and head to the office no matter how cold it was outside. Having the freedom to not do what I don’t want to becomes a hurdle in itself that I need to overcome.

Speaking of Vitamin D, I started taking both a men’s multivitamin and a vitamin D3 supplement every day for the past year (alternatives on Amazon: multivitamin / vitamin d3 supplement). Hopefully, these will be helpful as well.

#3 Keep busy

I’m not one to sit around and do nothing – I constantly feel like I need to be doing something. It’s hard for me even to sit and watch and movie and just, well, sit and watch a movie. So that’s not a problem.

But I want to try to stay more immersed in something I can put all my focus on this winter. The idea is for me to be so entrenched in what I’m doing that I don’t even have time to get beaten up by seasonal depression. I can’t say if this will work, but it’s another one I feel is worth trying.

Luckily, there are two big things I want to concentrate on this winter:

• Continue to learn to develop in Kotlin
• Possibly take a course (or courses) for financial coaching

Kotlin is something that I was working on learning a couple of winters ago. That’s the programming language I want to become more versed in so I can develop a couple of Android apps. When we did the RV trip last year, I didn’t have time to continue with it.

I’m ready to get back to it though and this winter will be the perfect time. When I’m coding (or learning to code), I get lost in my own little world, which is probably the right place for my mind to be.

The financial coaching thought is something I mentioned in my recent post, Why a Part-Time Job Might Be the Next Chapter in My Early Retirement. I’m still not positive this is the direction I want to go, but I plan to dig into it some more. If it is, I want to do some training that I know will take some focus. Winter will be the perfect time for this to help avoid seasonal depression.

In other words, staying very focused on other things leaves little time to dwell on the gloominess outside.

#4 Get the heck out of dodge at least a couple of times

Call this a cheat if you want, but leaving the bad weather in Ohio altogether can be a good fix. Sure, we’re not living somewhere warm like we did in the past with Panama, but that doesn’t mean we can’t get out of here a couple of times during the dreary times.

Fortunately, we have the ability to break up the winter season by throwing in at least a couple of vacations to warmer climates… take that seasonal depression!

Right now, we have a Caribbean cruise planned for a week at the beginning of December. That was a steal, too – under $1,800 out-the-door for the three of us for a week on a newer MSC Cruises ship that we’ve been on before in a balcony room with the drink package and WiFi. We’re going with some friends and it should be a lot of fun.

We also were able to use our credit card points to book a complete vacation, including airfare, for the three of us at an all-inclusive resort in Cancún, Mexico. We’ll be staying there for 6 nights in late January/early February.

Guys, if you pay your credit card balances off in full every month and you’re not taking advantage of credit card rewards, you’re truly missing out. I’ll talk more about this trip and how we got it in a later post, but do yourself a favor and read a few of my credit card posts on credit card travel rewards:

• A Month-Long Panama Trip for 3 for an Unbeatable Price of Less than $1,500!
• We Got the Chase United Explorer Card… Again. Boom! Easy Free Travel!
• Is It Worth It to Open a Credit Card With a Huge Annual Fee?
• The #1 Best Way To Track Credit Card Rewards
• The #1 Easy Way We’re Getting the Southwest Companion Pass
• Our Travel Perks Are Drying Up and That’s Big $$$!
• Free Nights – We’ve Had 5 at Hilton Hotels Recently
• We Got Turned Down for a Credit Card… Ok, Four!
• Travel Rewards – 12 Free Flights Earned in 9 Months!

And, please, sign up for the 100% free site Travel Freely. It’s the best way to keep track of your credit cards, know when the right time is for you to apply for a card, figure out the next card to go after with a nice welcome bonus, and be notified of upcoming annual fees, bonus deadlines, etc. This is what we use to help us get free travel and we’ve easily earned thousands and thousands of dollars of that without changing our spending habits at all.

Also, we’re still on track to start getting free cruises. Our trip to Atlantic City is coming up (we moved it back until mid-October). Once that’s done, we should be able to complete the process and the cruises will hopefully start rolling in shortly thereafter.

The reason I’m mentioning this is because we’ll likely have another cruise or maybe even two that we line up for the winter as well.

So not only do we plan to get out of the cold of Ohio a few times during the winter, but these trips provide additional benefits in the meantime. They keep us busy thinking about, planning, and anticipating each vacation. Then there’s the packing and getting ready for the trip. Plus, after the trip, we’ll be busy getting back on track with our regular daily chores in life and starting to think about the next trip. Essentially, these trips also add to the busyness that I talked about in #3.

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I’d love to still be living in Boquete, Panama where seasonal depression wasn’t even on my radar, but that’s not the way it is. So it’s on me to try to figure things out as best I can (I have no interest in going down any meds route).

These are the four strategies I’m going to use to try to dodge the winter blues and we’ll just have to see how it goes. I’m sure it won’t be perfect, but fingers crossed I don’t head down the depression tunnel I did a couple of years ago (yikes!).

I hope to only need to worry about this for a few more years. Once Faith’s a little older and heads off to college, it’ll be time for Lisa and I to decide where life’s next adventure might take us to live. You can bet it’ll be someplace without cold winters!

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Plan well, take action, and live your best life!

Thanks for reading!!

— Jim