Winter Blues

I just read the following in an email:

It’s hard to believe, but Americans are the unhappiest people on earth. That is the conclusion of a new study by the World Health Organization and the Harvard Medical School, which found that 9.6 percent of Americans suffer from depression or bipolar disorder – the highest rate of the 14 nations surveyed. Our "Prozac nation" has a greater percentage of depressed people than war-torn Lebanon (6.6 percent); job-starved Mexico (4.8 percent); carefree, hedonistic Italy (3.8 percent); and overworked, socially rigid Japan (3.1 percent). And how’s this for a paradox: Nigeria, a land of desperate poverty, rampant corruption and violent tribal conflict, had the lowest depression rate of all – just 0.8 percent.

How can this be? One possibility is that when your life is a struggle for clean water and adequate food, you don’t have time to indulge in existential despair. In New York, on the other hand, a lawyer making $200,000 a year may find himself “depressed” if he doesn’t make partner in his mid-30s. It may also be that in less modern societies, people find comfort and meaning in their families, their religion, and their cultural traditions. (Vince Siciliano, Wall Street Journal’s The Week Magazine, 3/23/07; cited in Church Leaders Intelligence Report, 10/31/07)

Every year, I talk with someone that is in depression or contemplating suicide at this time of year. So here are some things I suggest to those struggling:

1. Read the Psalms. David and the other authors are often very honest about their emotions (or lack of them), and yet they still cling to God. Perhaps reading it for yourself will help you do the same thing. I suggest reading at least one Psalm per day, and spending a few minutes praying.
   
2. Get enough sleep.
3. Eat healthy.
4. Buy a sunlamp. A few years ago a friend admitted she needed a sunlamp to make it through the winters.
5. Get a bit of exercise. Walk the mall. Play Wii. Wrestle your kids. And if you don't have kids, borrow someone else's (but ask permission first!). Just do something active.
6. Take a vacation day or two if work is really stressful. Sure, it's the beginning of the year, so you may hesitate to give up a vacation day this early in the year, but your employer would prefer to have you mentally healthy than to have you breakdown and burnout in a few weeks.
7. Talk with someone. Or write your thoughts. Sometimes just getting our thoughts out helps.
8. Find someone to serve. Often serving someone in worse circumstances than us helps us appreciate what we do have and snaps our perspective back in place.
9. If things persist, visit your doctor. Sometimes depression is chemical and needs treats. I usually suggest this as a last resort because I don't want people medicating depression if it is truly something spiritual that is going on inside of them. But I also don't want someone suffering endlessly when a short-term plan of medicine could help the person turn the corner.
   

Comments are open for anyone who has additional ideas that can help. The key is take care of yourself. Get right with God. Get right with your friends. Get right with yourself. You can and will get out of this funk you're in. I promise!