I applaud Ann Travers and Bubba Jones Patton for recommending different strategies people can use to ward off the infamous winter blues (Issue 269, Dec. 11). However, while I think their intentions are sincere and well meaning, I am disappointed with the simplistic nature of their column. It seems that they inadvertently conflate two very different phenomenon: simple winter blahs and more serious, longstanding depression.
On the one hand, the writers talk about the winter doldrums; on the other hand, they talk about pursuing short-term, but nonetheless "serious" relationships, to help offset these doldrums. The problem with this idea is that annual doldrums are not caused by an absence of interpersonal relationships. For many people, the Christmas season isn't a sad time because the days are shorter and there's nobody to cuddle with. Rather, the Christmas season is a potent reminder of longer-standing issues that have gone unresolved for the better part of the year.
These longer-standing issues are often related to something much more serious—and much less season-specific—than the simple winter blues. They are related to clinical depression and as such, the suggestion that serious, short-term relationships can elevate one's mood actually diminishes—if not belittles—the deep, dark dread that some people experience over the holidays. I speak from experience on three fronts: I am a gay psychology student who has suffered clinical depression for many years.
Instead of encouraging romps in the hay with other lonely, miserable people, Travers and Patton might do better to suggest that people who feel really down during the holidays take the year-end as an opportunity to explore why they are feeling so dejected.
Eddy Elmer,
Vancouver, BC
Copyright © 2004, by Eddy M. Elmer
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