Before traveling to Iceland, I made contact with a clinician there to discuss how mental health varies in their country to ours. I would be traveling to Iceland in August when the sun barely sets at all for only a few hours. While this is great for sightseeing and traveling, I couldn’t help but think of the trade off—winter days when the sun never really rises. I live in Michigan and I can tell that Seasonal Affective Disorder starts to creep up on me at times. It was worse when I first moved here, I feel like I have acclimated somewhat to the lack of sun. But I still get cabin fever at the end of March and can’t stand still having snow on the ground when they’re playing the Masters amid blooming azaleas in Georgia.
winter days when the sun never really rises
Shockingly, when I mentioned Seasonal Affective Disorder to Anna who lives in Reykjavik, she said they don’t see it much. And research corroborates this off the cuff comment by her. In a comparative study published by the Archives of General Psychiatry, Magnusson and Stefansson showed the Icelandic rates of SAD are far outstripped by the east coast of the US in prevalence. They offered the possible conclusion that SAD was not conducive to reproduction and natural selection has favored those with more tolerance for winter darkness in Iceland.
thermally warmed pools and playgrounds with your family….
I was glad that Anna had disabused me of my notion that Iceland would have a fair share of SAD before I visited. I looked at the people and country in a new way. With the way that I feel as a southerner having moved to Michigan, I couldn’t imagine that in a place as dark as Iceland in the winter, winter blues wouldn’t exist. In visiting the municipal pools and thermal baths in Iceland, I think I got a glimpse into how this can be happening. Sure, Icelandic people may have evolved the ability to cope with winter darkness, but if you get to spend your afterhours from school and work in thermally warmed pools and playgrounds with your family…..that’s going to go a long way to helping too.
