Depression From Wildfires: The New Norm?
Wildfires are sweeping across the Western United States. Last month, my family's camping trip to Oregon was rerouted to Montana because of poor air quality from wildfire smoke.
When we arrived in Montana, we found that winds had pushed smoke from a fire in northern Glacier National Park to southern Montana where we were staying! We literally couldn’t escape the smoke.
It messed with the beauty of our surroundings. Instead of the Big Sky of Montana, it was the Big Smoke. Some days you couldn't see the mountains in the distance. The Health Department issued warnings to limit exercise outside. People with pre-existing conditions were told to stay indoors. I felt bummed. What the heck is going on?
People living with wildfires are experiencing Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD). Now, the peculiar thing is that SAD usually only happens in the winter. When gray clouds blanket the sky, snow comes down for more days than you can count, and you haven’t seen the sun in weeks. You stay in your house, you aren’t around your friends, and you start to feel “blah”.
Some cities in British Columbia are keeping their street lights on during the day because of how thick the smoke it. Compound the dark skies with being told to stay indoors, and you create a recipe for depression. Indeed, SAD is a type of Major Depressive Disorder.
Depression is an overwhelming feeling that you just can’t shake. It’s the pits. It’s like you just can’t feel better no matter how hard you try. Sometimes you don’t even feel like getting out of bed. When you’re feeling that down, you feel hopeless, like you’ll never get out of it. You don’t even feel like doing the fun things you usually enjoy. There can be changes in your weight. It might mess with your sleep, and you often can’t even concentrate. When it’s really bad, you start to question what the point of living is.
If you are able to, it’s wise to try different things at home to improve your mood. I know these aren’t always possible, so start slow. Don’t set yourself up for failure. It seems that whenever we try too many things at once, we can get overwhelmed and not do any of them. Don’t go too big with implementing changes in your life. Pick 1 or 2 and just do what you can.
Eat good nutritious whole foods. Think things that are unprocessed and grow naturally. Things that humans have been eating for thousands of years. Not cheese whiz or Pop-tarts. But more vegetables and meats.
Get 5 minutes of exercise, even walking up and down the stairs or back and forth across your living room if you can’t go outside. Play a game with a friend. Take a dip in the pool.
Improve your sleep by installing a blue light-blocking App like F.Lux onto your computer and cell phone. Blue light in your eyes stops all melatonin production in your brain. Melatonin is a natural hormone that is produced to help you fall asleep. Exposure to blue light after 6 PM makes it more difficult to fall asleep.
There are lots of things you can do to help feel better when you’re stuck indoors from wildfire smoke. Keep up your normal routines, make an effort to socialize with friends, exercise and eat good nourishing foods, practice mindfulness exercises.
If those things aren’t doing enough, it’s a sign that something biochemical is going on. Sometimes we just need a bit of a push to get us better. There’s no shame in seeking out a provider to find a medicine that can help your brain.
Your brain is a lot of circuits. Based off of your own individual experience of depression, it helps me to essentially determine what is firing and what isn't. It's a simple matter of anatomy. Over time, we get into ruts. Less desirable circuits become stronger, and our thoughts become repetitive. You're stuck in a rut and you can't get out.
But it probably wasn't always like that. You didn't always have those repetitive thoughts. You weren't always in "the pits". That's because there are other connections in your brain that used to be stronger, but they got weak over time. Once we map everything out, we can find a medicine that will match your unique experience, and reroute those connections. And get you out of your rut!
In my practice, I’ve found that natural medicines are gentler and more effective than drugs. Unlike anti-depressant drugs, you can discontinue the natural medicines and you don’t go back to square one. The medicines I use in my practice influence the brain to heal on its own. It’s not something that you need to continue indefinitely. It’s not a crutch, or a band-aid. It’s something that grows, and continues to grow, until you no longer need the medicine to feel normal. Nature has provided us with incredibly profound medicines that will get us to where we need to be.
