Hey, deserving listeners. It's just me today. I thought I would answer patron emails. I got a lot of emails about seasonal

effective disorder or SAD or sad.

There is a lot of BS on the internet and so let me clear up some of that. I actually spent

a portion of my early career specializing in this. I gave talks on it. I don't know why, maybe because Seattle, not sure.

First off, there's a huge difference between having a disorder like major depressive disorder or bipolar.

There's a huge difference between having a disorder in the DSM and feeling a little down during the winter months.

A lot of people online will say, oh my god, I have seasonal effective disorder and it's possible that you do,

but it's also possible that you're just feeling a little down or you just don't like the winter months

because you can't spend time outside or something. That is a far cry from actually suffering from a

disorder. People who suffer from actual diagnosable major depressive disorder that has a seasonal

aspect to it. These people are often suicidal on a daily basis. They can't get out of bed.

They hate themselves. They think they're a burden on society. They don't take pleasure in anything

for months and months of months. They might cry all the time. They might have no emotion.

It's a pretty severe thing. Major depression is a very severe thing. Unless you've actually

experienced it or known someone that's gone through it or had a client that has gone through it,

you really, it's hard to know exactly what it's like because people talk about depression

in common language as this mild thing. It can be mild, but for those who are diagnosed with it,

it's a very severe thing. The other thing is that regarding seasonal affective disorder,

what we use in the language of the DSM is we will say a mood disorder like major depressive disorder

with a seasonal pattern. That's what we will say. It's important to note that this clarifier

doesn't designate winter. We have people who suffer from major depressive disorder and it will

cycle into a more severe form in the summer. Sometimes it's a winter, sometimes it's not,

...