The SAD Episode

Summary

Stuff You Should Know — “The SAD Episode” (Jan 8, 2026)

Hosts: Josh Clark & Chuck Bryant
Producer: iHeartPodcasts
Main Theme: Understanding Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD)—history, science, symptoms, causes, and treatments—with Josh and Chuck’s trademark warmth, humor, and relatable tangents.

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Episode Overview

This episode dives deep into Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD), exploring what it is, how it differs from the “winter blues,” its biological underpinnings, diagnosis, treatments, and some surprising geographical findings. Along the way, Josh and Chuck sprinkle the discussion with personal stories, banter, and their classic blend of humor and empathy.

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1. Defining SAD: It’s More Than the Winter Blues

[07:00]

• Josh starts by clarifying that neither he nor Chuck have SAD but understand it’s debilitating.
• Chuck notes: SAD is not just feeling a bit down in winter—it’s a major depressive disorder with a seasonal pattern, officially recognized in the DSM.
  • Quote:

    “Just right off the bat, we should point out... This is legitimate depression and comorbid with stuff like bipolar disorder... It’s not just, you know, ‘Oh, I get a little blue in the winter.’” [(07:04–07:23) – Chuck]

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2. Prevalence, Subtypes, and Demographics

[07:51]

• Prevalence: About 5% of Americans experience true SAD; about 10% experience “sub-syndromal” SAD (not full depression but worse than winter blues).
• Demographics:

  • SAD typically begins in young adulthood (18–30).

  • Women are four times more likely to have SAD.

  • Existing mood disorders (especially bipolar) increase susceptibility.

  • Higher prevalence further from the equator; e.g., Seattle is #9 in the U.S. for SAD rates.

  • There’s a rare “reverse SAD” (0.5%) where depression occurs in spring/summer.

  • Quote:

    “Women are four times likelier than men to have it... If you have an existing mood disorder, you’re much likelier to suffer from seasonal affective disorder.” [(11:33–11:55) – Josh]

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3. Symptoms of SAD (Winter and Summer Types)

[14:01]

• Common depressive symptoms: Listlessness, loss of interest in activities, trouble concentrating, hopelessness, and physical heaviness/lethargy.

• Winter SAD add-ons: Oversleeping, carb cravings, overeating/weight gain, pronounced fatigue.

• Summer SAD symptoms: Opposite—insomnia, low appetite/weight loss, anxiety/agitation, headaches, increased irritability.

  • Quote:

    “With winter SAD, you go inward... With summer SAD, you go outward—but it’s not like you’re just more sociable. You’re... more aggro, potentially.” [(16:30–16:45) – Josh]

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4. When to Seek Help and Diagnosis

[17:28]

• Warning signs:
  1. Symptoms last for days on end (not just a bad few days)
  2. Major changes in sleep/appetite
  3. Coping with drugs/alcohol
  4. Hopelessness or suicidal thoughts
• Diagnosis: Two consecutive years of seasonal symptoms, no lab test—clinicians may rule out other causes (e.g., thyroid issues).

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5. The Evolutionary (and Neanderthal) Roots of SAD

[22:36]

• Evolutionary perspective:

  • Humans, and possibly Neanderthals, evolved to slow down in winter to conserve energy when food is scarce and it’s cold.

  • Modern life fights this biological inclination, but some people’s brains go haywire—resulting in SAD.

  • Quote:

    “Your body just changes... without conscious thought... you slow down in the wintertime and you speed up in the summertime. That’s just what our bodies do.” [(24:00–25:10) – Josh]

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6. Biological Mechanisms: The Science of SAD

a. Serotonin
[32:01]

• Sunlight triggers serotonin production in the retina, impacting mood, sleep, cognition.

• In winter, less sunlight means less serotonin. In SAD patients, the transporter that clears serotonin from the synapse does not decrease as it should, so they get a double-hit: less serotonin, more “clearing,” leading to more depression.

  • Quote:

    “So like everybody else, they have lower serotonin during the winter, but they have the same amount of serotonin transporters. So there's less serotonin... more transporters removing the serotonin, keeping it from working, which pushes them from non-depressed to depressive symptoms.” [(33:59–34:25) – Josh]

• Genetics: A “short allele” in the serotonin transporter gene makes people more vulnerable to SAD and depression in general.

b. Melatonin and Circadian Rhythms
[36:00]

• Melatonin (the body’s sleep hormone) increases in winter; less sunlight = more melatonin = more sleepiness/lethargy.

• Circadian rhythm, regulated by the suprachiasmatic nucleus (SCN), is disrupted by light changes.

• Women’s estrogen interacts with these systems, potentially making symptoms more intense.

  • Chuck (38:57): “Your retinas actually react less to light in the winter compared to the summer.”

c. Social and Environmental Factors
[39:45]

• Anticipatory dread of winter, and living in darker/more overcast locales, can trigger or worsen symptoms.

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7. Treatments: What Really Works?

a. Antidepressants (SSRIs) and Wellbutrin
[40:25]

• SSRIs are effective and often used only during the dark months (start before symptoms, wean off in spring).
• Risks exist with improper use—should be medically supervised.

b. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT)
[41:35]

• Aimed at breaking the negative feedback loop by adjusting thoughts and behaviors related to the seasonal change (e.g., proactively scheduling enjoyable activities, reframing winter).

c. Bright Light Therapy (BLT)
[42:43]

• Sitting near an intense white light box (15–45 minutes every morning) effectively treats winter SAD.
• Works by stimulating retinal sensors, boosting serotonin and suppressing excess melatonin; light boxes are available for checkout in some public libraries.
• Personal anecdote: Josh shares that light boxes significantly helped his wife with sub-syndromal SAD.

d. Dawn Simulation
[45:31]

• Alarm clocks that slowly brighten a room to imitate sunrise can help align circadian rhythms with a healthier mood/wake cycle.

e. Vitamin D
[47:10]

• Correlation exists between vitamin D deficiency and SAD, but supplementation hasn’t shown consistently strong benefits.

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8. Surprising Research and Geographic Exceptions

Tromsø, Norway
[47:25]

• Despite two months of polar night, rates of SAD in Tromsø are lower than expected.

• Explanations: Cultural adaptation and positive attitudes toward winter activity (“I love the coziness of the winter months”), community traditions, reframing winter as special.

  • Chuck:

    “They get into their skiing, they get into their winter hiking, they get into their cozy drinks and their warm blankets and their fireplaces... it seems to work.” [(48:24–49:26)]

Contrary Opinions
[49:26]

• Some researchers contest whether SAD exists as a distinct disorder. One 2016 study found no seasonal variation in depression across a large American sample; however, major medical institutions still support SAD’s clinical reality.

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9. Notable Quotes & Highlights

• On the “feedback loop” of SAD:

  “The behavior they produce feeds back into becoming more and more depressed.” [(36:00) – Josh]

• On evolutionary roots:

  “They think it’s possible that Neanderthals had like a real type of hibernation period in the winter. Not, you know, like a bear necessarily, but something more pronounced than humans.” [(22:36) – Josh]

• On treatment timing:

  “Depending on where you live, when fall starts rolling around, maybe you start some of these therapies to see if you can head it off at the pass, like in the old West.” [(41:35) – Chuck]

• Classic banter:

  Josh: “You don’t want to overdo it for sure. And I think it’s different for each person how much you actually need. But it does work. I know firsthand it works....” [(44:39)]
  Chuck: “That’s cool. I have friends that use these things just for not even seasonal, just for regular depression. And they say it helps them out.” [(45:05)]

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10. Personal Stories & Tangents

• [03:01–07:00]: Chuck’s Broadway & NYC trip; thanks to Natasha Hodgson, the Rockettes, Bar Centrale, Santa, and more.
• [06:09]: Josh’s sick holiday: his cat Momo learned to open presents.
• [27:39]: Holiday weight gain and Christmas cookies.
• [46:46]: Josh now wakes up at 6am instead of 5, to Chuck’s surprise.

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11. Listener Mail: Childhood Play & Emotional Health

[51:57]

• Megan from Michigan thanks Josh & Chuck, shares a charming story of her children enacting playful rituals with their dolls ("made gravestones... because their twin baby dolls had died"), and reflects on normal, healthy processing of heavy emotions through play.

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12. Final Thoughts

Josh and Chuck deliver an accessible, nuanced, and science-backed exploration of SAD, peppered with empathy, lived experience, and their signature humor. By the end, listeners understand that SAD is a real, treatable condition with deep roots in our biology, but also that mindset, community, and proactive strategies can make a significant difference.

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Key Timestamps

• 07:00 – Introducing SAD: Not “just winter blues”
• 11:33 – Demographics: Who gets SAD?
• 14:01 – Symptoms of SAD, winter/summer types
• 22:36 – Evolutionary roots, Neanderthals
• 32:01 – The serotonin pathway
• 36:00 – Melatonin/circadian rhythm
• 40:25 – Treatments overview
• 42:43 – Bright light therapy
• 47:25 – Tromsø, Norway: Why SAD rates are low
• 51:57 – Listener mail

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If You Only Remember Three Things:

1. SAD is a real, clinical form of depression—much more severe than typical “winter blues.”
2. Light—both natural and artificial—plays a critical role in regulating mood through serotonin and melatonin.
3. Attitudes and lifestyle adaptation matter: cultural approaches in far-northern locales show that embracing winter traditions and positive reframing can combat the effects of SAD.

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End of summary.

Transcript

[Podcast Announcer]

This is an iHeart podcast. Guaranteed Human.

[Josh Clark]

Hey, everybody. We're hitting the road again starting in January 2026, picking up again in April 2026. And eventually Canada will tell you year dates, too.

[Chuck Bryant]

That's right. We're gonna do at least three legs. And the first leg is starting out in Denver, Colorado, at the paramount theater on January 27th. We're gonna go back to our beloved Seattle at the Fairmount Theater there on the 28th. And then finally back at SketchFest on the 29th at the Sidney Goldstein Theater.

[Josh Clark]

Yep. And then April 16th, 17th and 18th, we're going to be in Madison, Wisconsin, Chicago, Illinois, and Akron, Ohio. And if you're not keeping up with all this or taking notes, don't worry, you can get all the info you need and buy tickets atstuffyou should know.com, click on the tour button and thank us later.

[Chuck Bryant]

That's right. We can't wait to see everybody again out there on the road.

[Podcast Announcer]

Welcome to Stuff youf Should Know, a production of iHeartradio.

[Josh Clark]

Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh, and there's Chuck. And Jerry's here, too. And it's a Stuff youf Should Know hoedown to start the new year. Chuck's still wearing his novelty 2026 glasses that he got spotted. Sponsored by Nivea. That I believe what you're saying was Ryan Seacrest himself handed them to you while you were at Times Square, right?

[Chuck Bryant]

No, not handed. He put them on my face with his hands.

[Josh Clark]

Whoa. Is it because you guys are coworkers? Yeah.

[Chuck Bryant]

He's with iheart, isn't he?

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, but I think like half of the US is a co worker of his. He's got so many jobs.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, you're probably right. Well, if you haven't guessed, listening audience, this is our first recording of the new year.

[Josh Clark]

Yes.

[Chuck Bryant]

I'm probably gonna be a little rusty. And can I just give a quick shout out to a couple of things?

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, please do. Great.

[Chuck Bryant]

Well, Josh knows all this stuff. Cause we communicate outside of work, believe it or not. Cause we're fwans. But I went to New York City. Emily and I do our little Broadway weekend in New York over Christmas every year. And this year, I just want to say thanks to a couple of people, most notably Natasha Hodgson of Operation Mincemeat fame, because she is in the show and put together the show and stuff you should know. And she's been in magazines as people alerted us as giving Stuff youf Should Know credit as our episode inspiring that show and was kind Enough to give us a couple of tickets to go see it. And it was fantastic. I highly recommend it.

[Josh Clark]

I know. I was loath to miss it. That sucked.

[Chuck Bryant]

I wish you could have been there. But it's still playing, so maybe you can check it out.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. I was especially upset when you said that she gave you. She came out into the audience in the middle of the show and gave you, like, a bouquet of roses.

[Chuck Bryant]

No, no, no.

[Josh Clark]

Those were all. And the audience lifted you up on their shoulders.

[Chuck Bryant]

No, that didn't happen. Also went to Bar Centrali, as I like to do before Broadway.

[Josh Clark]

What is that?

[Chuck Bryant]

Bar Centrale is where I go before Broadway shows.

[Josh Clark]

Well, what is it?

[Chuck Bryant]

It's a bar, but it's sort of a. I mean, you can just make reservations a week out. I think I've mentioned this before. It's sort of a secret place in that it doesn't have a sign or it's not widely.

[Josh Clark]

Oh, those are cool.

[Chuck Bryant]

Publicized, but, you know, seven days out from when you want to go, you can call them up. They specialize in getting people in and out of there pre and post Broadway. And, you know, sometimes you can see Broadway performers there on the down low.

[Josh Clark]

Nice. I would have no idea. That one could be sitting next to me, and I wouldn't even know.

[Chuck Bryant]

Well, you might if it's a famous. You know, like, Bryan Cranston was sitting there.

[Josh Clark]

He was?

[Chuck Bryant]

No, but he could be. Years ago, I saw Dexter in there. What's his name?

[Josh Clark]

Dexter's good enough.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. This year I saw the lady from Lost, Although I don't think she's on Broadway. She was in there, but all this to say big thanks to Jason, who helps take care of Bar Centrale. And Joe's on Broadway. He came over on his night off just to say hi and was just a total sweetheart of a guy.

[Josh Clark]

What a trip.

[Chuck Bryant]

And then finally, I want to thank Santa. Santa Claus in the Radio City Music hall show. I surprised Emily by going to the Christmas show this year for the first time.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, I remember. Santa rode in.

[Chuck Bryant]

Santa rode in. And although he was not in the performance we went to. Santa Adam was very kind to send a Christmas video to Ruby. Have you been to the show?

[Josh Clark]

No, I'm just some bumpkin who stays at home all the time, apparently.

[Chuck Bryant]

Dude, you and Yumi have to go to the Radio City Music or Christmas Spectacular. It is one of the delights of my life. The Rockets was one of the most impressive, most amazing live shows of any kind I've ever seen. They were incredible.

[Josh Clark]

Wow. Okay. I'LL go.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. And it's. You know, you guys love your Christmas cheer and it really. You can't. Even the biggest grinchy curmudgeon wouldn't help but get in the mood, even at the 10am show. But the Rockettes were amazing. And Santa said that he turned them onto our listener mail and the Rockettes episode. And some of the now current Rockettes are listening.

[Josh Clark]

Oh, cool.

[Chuck Bryant]

So a shout out to you, Rockettes. Keep on kicking.

[Josh Clark]

Hello, Rockettes. We did a whole show on the Rockettes, didn't we? We did, yeah.

[Chuck Bryant]

All right.

[Josh Clark]

That was amazing.

[Chuck Bryant]

Chuck, you were sick over the holidays.

[Josh Clark]

And it felt terrible. It really stunk. I got this cold that apparently there's like a two week cold going around.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh, no. That long.

[Josh Clark]

And it was just like every day I would add a new symptom and it was. I could do stuff during the day, but I was just sick the whole time.

[Chuck Bryant]

I'm so sorry.

[Josh Clark]

It was rough. Yeah. So thanks for that. I appreciate it. But we still had a great Christmas. Momo knows how to open presents, so. She opened presents on Christmas morning. She was so happy.

[Chuck Bryant]

Paws or teeth?

[Josh Clark]

Quite a. Both.

[Chuck Bryant]

Okay.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, she's a pro. She knows what she's doing. She got some new rabbit treats, so she laid on on her back and rolled on those and she had a great Christmas morning. So that's wonderful. It was a good Christmas. After all, we hung out with friends on Christmas Eve and our friends Laurel and Braden and their kids, Elliot and Bear. So we got to hang out with. Yeah, you do. You've met them plenty of times. So we got to hang out with little kids on Christmas Eve. And man, that will put you in the Christmas spirit when you don't have kids of your own.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. How old are those kids?

[Josh Clark]

They're like 8 and 6, I think. So like, prime age.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. Right in the zone.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. So thank you, though, for your sympathy over my sicknesses.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, I felt bad.

[Josh Clark]

One thing I don't have, Chuck, which I am really happy I don't have, because it's awful, is sad.

[Chuck Bryant]

No sads for you.

[Josh Clark]

I don't have sad. Do you have sad?

[Chuck Bryant]

No, I don't have sad. You know, we're talking about seasonal affective disorder. And just right off the bat, we should point out, because I was about to say, occasionally I get the winter blues. This is not that. This is a real. It's legitimate depression and comorbid with stuff like bipolar disorder. And we're gonna talk all about it, but it's not just, you know, Oh, I get a little blue in the winter sometimes when it's, you know, gloomy.

[Josh Clark]

No, but it's tied to that. Yes. It's just. It seems to be an extreme version of that. But you're right, it's not. It's nothing light. It's classified, I believe, in the DSM as a major depressive disorder with a seasonal pattern. I think that's the clinical name for seasonal seasonal affective disorder. And there are people out there, I think something like 5% of people.

[Chuck Bryant]

I don't.

[Josh Clark]

I believe that's an American statistic.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, that's America.

[Josh Clark]

Get the, like, real deal seasonal affective disorder where they have major depressive symptoms during the winter months, but something like 10% or maybe even higher than that. In the United States, people get what's called sub syndromal seasonal affective disorder. So where you don't have it, where it could be considered major depression, but it's definitely worse than the holiday blues. And the weird thing about this, although it's not so weird once we explain it, it is seasonal. It's tied to winter. And it seems that summer. Or summer, which. That one's just mind blowing to me.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, we'll get into that.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, it seems like they have it figured out. They have this. They have it explained. So this is one of my fav episodes where it's like, here's how the human body works. Here's what's messed up with this when we're talking about this. Ta da. I love episodes like that.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. Not a lot of mystery. Big thanks to Livia for getting the new year off to a great start with another banger.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. Hear, hear.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. We should say that this is something that hasn't been officially. I mean, it's obviously been around since time began, because as we'll see, it's tied to seasons and especially light and how much light you're getting. So that's always been a thing, but it hasn't been officially diagnosed as a thing for that long. It was in 1984 when there was a paper by researchers at the National Institutes of Health, particularly a guy named Norman Rosenthal, got together and they discussed these. Almost 30. I have a feeling one dropped out. Cause there were 29 patients. Most of them had bipolar disorder. And they all had. What we now know is as Sad.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, that 30th one, when they, like one week in, they're like, how do you feel? And they were like, fine. And they're like, you're cut.

[Chuck Bryant]

You can go.

[Josh Clark]

Get out of here. Yeah. So, yeah, bipolar disorders, we'll see, like, really kind of ties into this. It seems to be, like, also seasonal in some weird way, too. But pretty quickly after that 1984 paper, the DSM went all in. 3. Three years later, the DSM 3R, as we all know. R stands for revised or rockin. That came out in 1987. And it was like, now it was a diagnosis, but it was used as a modifier, as we saw major depressive disorder with a seasonal pattern. So it wasn't its own thing. It was just a subtype, essentially of an existing depressive disorder. That's kind of how they first had it.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. And, you know, because it's seasonal, the most common kind of sad that we think about, and like we mentioned, it is very serious thing. And it starts off in the fall, maybe early winter. And it kind of depends on where you are, as we'll see, although not always intuitively, there's a third act reveal that might surprise some people. It generally subsides in the spring. But I did mention that odd spring and summer variety that hasn't been studied much. It's very, very Limited. About 0.5% of the population has this opposite pattern. But it is a diagnosable mood disruption. It just happens in the spring and summer. And it's tied more to sort of like oppressive heat. And maybe, unsurprisingly, some of the things they recommend for that, which again, we're gonna cover a little more later, is stuff like maybe stay inside, dim the lights, that kind of thing.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. And the thing that gets me about the summer version, that much rarer one, is that the symptoms are almost in some cases, opposite the symptoms of winter. So usually when it's when you first start getting sad, it's around young adulthood, ages 18 to 30, I think. And most people who get it, get it most years, but you don't necessarily have it every year. Women are four times likelier than men to have it. And if you have an existing mood disorder, you're much likelier to suffer from seasonal affective disorder because it's almost like it takes your existing mood disorder, say, bipolar 2, and just builds on it. There's an extra, like, environmental punch to it that really kind of kicks it into high gear.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. And that. That four times more common in women. That's. That's really substantial. And we'll get into that. It seems to be tied to estrogen, but we'll dig into that a little bit more in a bit. But having family members, they think there's some Genetic component to it. If you have relatives that have depression or any kind of mental health disorder, it's, you know, obviously it doesn't mean you will, but that could mean you, you might. I guess that's the way doctors say it.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, you might. Got it.

[Chuck Bryant]

And not surprisingly, you're more likely to develop sad if you live in places in the far, you know, away from the equator, far north or south, where there's going to be less sunlight. Or maybe, you know, in places like Seattle where there's just more gray days than others.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, I was surprised. I couldn't find the other eight. The first eight. But Seattle was the ninth most affected city with seasonal affective disorder. I would have thought it'd be higher than that. I could not find the first eight. So I'm like, does this list really exist or was this just like a post intelligence or made up article?

[Chuck Bryant]

And do they, do they tie in things like. Or do they list things like Tacoma, like neighboring, neighboring towns? Does that count as a different place? I wonder?

[Josh Clark]

That's a great question. What about Tacoma?

[Chuck Bryant]

Well, I just wondered. Tacoma's very lovely, but maybe Seattle might be a little more lively.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, no, I'm sure. No, no, everybody knows about Tacoma.

[Chuck Bryant]

Okay. Okay.

[Josh Clark]

It's been a long time since we picked down a particular city.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh, I don't want to put Tacoma in our sights.

[Josh Clark]

Okay, we won't.

[Chuck Bryant]

Because, you know, you can't spell. You can't spell seatac without tac.

[Josh Clark]

That's right. So what happens when you experience sad? Seasonal affective disorder. I mean, most people can kind of come up with this idea of like what depression symptoms seem like, but there's specific ones that emerge with seasonal affective disorder.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. I think, you know, generally what you'll see like with most depression, listlessness, obviously, sadness, interest in activities that you might normally like, you don't like as much. You may have a hard time concentrating. Suicidal thoughts if it gets really bad. Hopelessness, maybe guilt sometimes. And then some physical symptoms. Like just a weight. Like in your limbs sometimes.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, like a lethargy, a fatigue and those. Yeah, that's kind of common among depression in general. But winter sad has some extra symptoms like oversleeping or just sleeping too much or more than you normally would, craving carbs, overeating, weight gain. And then that, that fatigue, the low energy and tiredness and all of those things too create like a feedback loop where you know, if you're depressed and you start gaining weight and that kind of thing bothers you, you're going to be Even more depressed because you just started gaining weight. In which case, if you're an emotional eater, you might go eat more carbs and gain more weight, and it just kind of goes on. So that's one of the difficult things about it, is it's not just like, I'm depressed, I'm depressed, and now everything is set up because of this winter season for me to just keep getting more and more depressed while winter's going on.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. And if you're sitting there thinking, like, oh, man, in the wintertime, I tend to sleep later and I tend to eat and maybe drink a little more and gain some weight, and I'm a little more tired. Those are also. That's why sad is such a sort of a unique thing, because that also just describes a lot of people in the winter. But there is a difference. And you know, we're gonna be pointing out those differences. You mentioned summer was unusual because the summer sads because it's very much opposite. And that goes for the symptoms as well, because instead of sleeping in, you might have trouble sleeping. Instead of eating too much, you might have a low appetite, you might lose weight, you might be anxious and agitated and irritable. Headaches is another one for Somerset.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, it's like winter sad, you go inward and are kind of closed off. And with Somerset, you go outward. But it's not in any like. That doesn't mean you're just more sociable. It means, like, you're more aggro, potentially than you would be with, like, winter sad. So, yeah, it is. They're just kind of opposites. And yet they tie into, like, you were saying, how people already are. Like, you go out more in the summertime, you stay in more in the wintertime. So what seems to be the case with seasonal affective disorder is that it is a hyper or hypo version of a normal human biological imperative that we have learned as a society to try to ignore. And. And for some people, ignoring it is not really an option because it's so pronounced.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. And inescapable.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah.

[Chuck Bryant]

So there are basically four things. And like I said, if you feel like, oh, man, I kind of feel those things in the winter too. Listen to these four things, because this is when you should see a medical professional. As if one. If these feelings persist for days and days in a row, it's not like, oh, I just had a couple of rough days when it was like, really rainy and cold. If your sleep and appetite patterns really change, is the second one. If you're coping with drugs and alcohol, that's a big red flag. And then the fourth one, if you feel hopeless or suicidal, for sure. And I think as far as diagnosis goes, you have to. I think it has to be for at least two years in a row. Even though you did say you don't necessarily have it all years, you at least have to have it two years in a row at some point.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. And because it is essentially, if you look at the winter sad and summer sad, they're basically two ends of a spectrum. Mania and depression. Like, people with bipolar, too, are definitely more susceptible to sad. And they might experience both types of seasonal. Although, again, just statistically speaking, they're much more likely to just experience the winter sad.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, for sure. And if you do see a professional, they're probably gonna ask you a lot of questions. You might even fill out an official questionnaire. There's no blood test or brain scan or anything. Like other types of depression, that's the case as well. But they might rule things out. They might do, like, a thyroid screening or some other things just to make sure it's not something physical going on.

[Josh Clark]

Right. So. So that's sad, everybody. And I think we should talk about where this whole thing comes from. They think after a break. Chuck, our first break of 2026. Let's make it a big one.

[Chuck Bryant]

You still got it. You still got it.

[Josh Clark]

All right.

[Podcast Jingle/Interlude Voice]

Lately, I've been learning some stuff about insomnia or aluminia. How about the one on borderline disorder Order? Better yet, reporter. Heard that one before, but it was so nice, I learned it twice. Everybody, listen up. Oh, it's Charles and Joshua. It stops. It, stop.

[Josh Clark]

It.

[Podcast Jingle/Interlude Voice]

Stop. You should know.

[Josh Clark]

Hey, everybody, we're hitting the road again, starting in January 2026, picking up again in April 2026. And eventually Canada will tell you year dates, too.

[Chuck Bryant]

That's right. We're going to do at least three legs. And the first leg is starting out in Denver, Colorado, at the paramount theater on January 27th. We're going to go back to our beloved Seattle at the Paramount Theater there on the 28th, and then finally back at SketchFest on the 29th at the Sidney Goldstein Theater.

[Josh Clark]

Yep. And then April 16th, 17th and 18th, we're going to be in Madison, Wisconsin, Chicago, Illinois, and Akron, Ohio. And if you're not keeping up with all this or taking notes, don't worry, you can get all the info you need and buy tickets atstuffyou should know.com, click on the tour button and thank us later.

[Chuck Bryant]

That's right. We can't Wait to see everybody again out there on the road.

[Evan Ratliff]

Hi, Kyle. Could you draw up a quick document with the basic business plan? Just one page as a Google Doc and send me the link. Thanks.

[Josh Clark]

Hey, just finished drawing up that quick one page business plan for you. Here's the link.

[Evan Ratliff]

But there was no link. There was no business plan. It's not his fault. I hadn't programmed Kyle to be able.

[Chuck Bryant]

To do that yet.

[Evan Ratliff]

My name is Evan Ratliff. I decided to create Kyle, my AI co founder, after hearing a lot of stuff like this from OpenAI CEO Sam Altman.

[Chuck Bryant]

There's this betting pool for the first year that there's a one person billion dollar company which would have been like unimaginable without AI. And now will happen.

[Evan Ratliff]

I got to thinking, could I be that one person? I'd made AI agents before for my award winning podcast, Shell Game. This season on Shell Game, I'm trying to build a real company with a real product run by fake people.

[Podcast Announcer]

Oh, hey, Evan, good to have you join us. I found some really interesting data on adoption rates for AI agents and small to medium businesses.

[Evan Ratliff]

Listen to Shell game on the iHeartRadio app or wherever you get your podcasts.

[Chuck Bryant]

This is syskis. All right. So kind of like we were talking, it's. It's kind of hard to diagnose this as far as when you should go to a doctor because a lot of people are just like this in the winter and you're also sort of fighting. I think you kind of hinted at it like a natural human intuition in a lot of ways. Because if you go back in time to the time where Tuk Tuk was roaming the earth in the winter, they slowed down and they conserved energy because food wasn't around and it was cold. So they bunkered down. And there are some interesting theories around that, right?

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. They think it's possible that Neanderthals had like a real type of hibernation period in the winter. Not, you know, like a bear necessarily, but something more pronounced than humans. And that interbreeding with Neanderthals may have produced seasonal affective disorder in some people.

[Chuck Bryant]

It's pretty cool when Homo sapiens started hugging and kissing Neanderthals.

[Josh Clark]

That's right. Like in, what was it? Quest for Fire.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh, man. There was some real realizations in that movie.

[Josh Clark]

It was a. I mean, what an interesting movie though, you know? Yeah.

[Chuck Bryant]

Ron Perlman.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, he really. He's. He's a good caveman.

[Chuck Bryant]

By the way, did a minute ago. Did I say bunkered down?

[Josh Clark]

Mm.

[Chuck Bryant]

I meant to say hunkered down. Is bunker down even a thing?

[Josh Clark]

I feel like it should be more than hunkered down. It makes more sense.

[Podcast Announcer]

Okay.

[Josh Clark]

I didn't even know I heard you and made like I grasped that you said bunker down, but it's so natural that it didn't even seem wrong.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. And. And our Georgia Bulldogs, what they say for them is hunker down, you hairy dogs. I'm starting bunker down and everyone's just gonna think I'm like a CIA plant or something.

[Josh Clark]

Right? A narc. Yeah. Oh, I can't talk about the dogs right now.

[Chuck Bryant]

I know. Very disappointing.

[Josh Clark]

What a heartbreaker.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah.

[Josh Clark]

Okay, so you said something like that. People back in Tuk Tuk's age definitely slow down in the wintertime. Right. Your body just changes. And that's still the case with humans. We have not evolved out of that. And there's been studies. There was a 2015 study that found that the Simone in Bolivia and the San people in Namibia, who are in no way, shape or form related ones in South America, one's in Africa. They both sleep longer in the winter and less in the summer. And you might say, like, well, duh, we all do that. That's exactly the point. There's some sort of biological mechanism. There's some sort of, like I said, imperative where you, without conscious thought and kind of without, Without a choice, you slow down in the wintertime and you speed up more in the summertime. That's just what our bodies do. And because of this natural thing, it can go haywire just like any other natural thing in humans. And when it does, that produces seasonal affective disorder. And they think they've got the mechanism to the whole thing down.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. And that, you know, that's kind of evidence in this German study from 2023. They did a study and caveat all this was, it was a study already of people that had sleeping issues with disturbed sleeping patterns. So it was kind of, you know, it wasn't just the general population. And interestingly, they found that even if they were living in a place where it was mostly artificial light, even then by season their sleep cycles would vary. So it's not just like. Yeah, if you live out, away from all the, you know, out in the boonies, away from industrialization, and your circadian rhythms are really dictated by natural light, that would make sense. But they found that, that, that took place even when you were just living a regular, well lit life.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, even when you lived in a windowless brutalist apartment in Munich.

[Chuck Bryant]

That's Right.

[Josh Clark]

You wear a black turtleneck all year round.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh, man.

[Josh Clark]

And then another kind of thing, like you said, that was a small study and it was of people who already had a sleep disorder. Yet it backs up what everybody kind of anecdotally already knows. Right? You sleep more in the season or you're more tired in the winter season. Another thing that's anecdotal but is backed up by study is that your appetite changes. Right?

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah.

[Josh Clark]

Some of it's cultural where, like, you know, Christmas cookies are around. Sure you're going to eat them, and Christmas cookies aren't around in March. Say, maybe some maniac makes like St. Patrick's Day cookies. But way more people make Christmas cookies than St. Patrick's Day cookies. So there are reasons that your appetite does increase just because there's more delicious stuff around. But we've also found that just by being in colder temperatures, being exposed to colder temperatures over periods of time, hormone levels change in our bodies and we crave more calories because as we digest them, we produce more heat. And that keeps us warm. We don't need bare skins anymore.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, that's right. We need buckeye balls. And Emily's aunt comes to town every Christmas now. And all the. Her mom and her aunt and her sister and Ruby, they all have a night making Christmas cookies.

[Josh Clark]

Nice.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh, dude, I did better this year than usual. I somehow managed to only put on £5.

[Josh Clark]

Hey, that's not bad for Christmas season.

[Chuck Bryant]

From Thanksgiving to January 4th.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, that's great.

[Chuck Bryant]

That's not bad. Cause usually that number is more like 12, so. And I found that that temporary sort of gain goes off a little quicker too.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, it certainly.

[Chuck Bryant]

Once you get back to reason, you know.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, that's the key is getting back to reason faster than, you know, just not putting it off for the rest of the month of January. That's what I found.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, you got. And the buckeye balls are gone. And those old fashions really slow down after Christmas.

[Josh Clark]

Man, those buckeye balls.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh, God.

[Josh Clark]

I made my mom's Christmas cookies. My mom's recipe, the one that I grew up with as a kid that had confounded me for years because I couldn't get it quite right. It was always too floury. And in the last few years, I've learned enough about baking that I kind of figured it out on my own and I nailed it finally.

[Chuck Bryant]

Nice. Yeah, man, I gotta have some of those.

[Josh Clark]

I'll make you some next Christmas, though. Yes, for sure. Not. Or St. Patrick's Day, maybe. Don't do it. But Yumi got me these cookie cutters that are all like kind of. They're like sentimental between us, like different shapes. And one of them is broccoli. So I have broccoli shaped cookie cutters and I hate broccoli. So it's.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh, I love that. That's fun.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, I don't have any. Oh, yeah. We were talking about how appetite changes.

[Chuck Bryant]

That's right. Here is one thing, though. You might think you've probably heard that, like, suicides spike around the holidays because it can be such a tough time of the year for people. That is actually not true. In fact, they happen the least in December. They're more common in the summertime. Of course, in Australia, that's reversed because of where they are and how their seasons run. So we're talking about the, you know, our hemisphere's perspective, obviously.

[Josh Clark]

Right.

[Chuck Bryant]

But I found that interesting and it's good to correct the record because I think everyone always hears that it's probably good in a way because anytime you're raising awareness on something like that, that's a good thing. But that's not true that they spike over the holidays.

[Josh Clark]

No. I feel like we've talked about that before. And they think that maybe just by people reaching out more during the holidays, you have a greater social calendar. Typically just the holiday spirit can get to people. But then also there's some other explanations for why it might be more common in the spring or summer months. Like, you might just have more energy to actually complete suicide.

[Chuck Bryant]

Right.

[Josh Clark]

Another one that I thought was just horrible is that you. There are autoimmune conditions like lupus or rheumatoid arthritis that are linked to seasonal allergies. And that people who have those are just this overlooked population of people with a higher suicide risk. And that that would account for it because your lupus is probably flaring up way more in the spring and summer than it is in the winter months.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, for sure. And, you know, we've kind of hinted around about the length of day and we're going to talk a lot about that over the next little bit. But it is, you know, it's intuitive and it's correct that the more intense that seasonal change is, as far as that length of day goes, the more likely you're gonna have sad. I believe it was a meta analysis from South Korea just last year. In 2025, they studied 24 studies with 30,000 total participants. So pretty robust. And for each 1 degree of increase in latitude, SAD rose by 0.2%. And just the winter blues by 0.32%. So 1 degree increase in latitude is obviously a little less daylight.

[Josh Clark]

It's like Jimmy Buffett said, changes in latitude, changes in attitude.

[Chuck Bryant]

Never thought about that.

[Josh Clark]

That's what he was talking about with seasonal affective disorder in that song.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, he changed the title, though, because when you title things like Cheeseburger in Paradise, you can't title something Seasonal affective disorder.

[Josh Clark]

Well, it was originally the song was titled Major Depressive Disorder with a seasonal pattern. Right. So, yeah, I think he was wise to change it as well. So let's talk about it. You want to get into some of the causes. I've been teasing this basically the entire episode, and I'm really kind of jazzed about this part.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, I mean, here's where it gets sciency, because our old friends, obviously serotonin and melatonin show up, right?

[Josh Clark]

Yes. So just as a refresher, serotonin is responsible for things like mood, sleep, cognition, a bunch of other stuff. But as far as seasonal affective disorder goes, those are the important things that serotonin does, right?

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah.

[Josh Clark]

What's really cool, I didn't actually realize this sunlight hitting your retina actually triggers production of serotonin. It increases the production of serotonin. Right. So therefore, when we're exposed to less sunlight, there's a lower angle of the sun. You just don't get as much sun physically in the winter months. That means that your serotonin levels are actually less in winter than they are in the brighter spring and summer months. That's just a fact. It happens to everybody. But in most people, your serotonin transporter gene starts producing less serotonin transporter, the stuff that goes in and gets the serotonin out of the synapse, right?

[Chuck Bryant]

That's right.

[Josh Clark]

Which means that the. There's less serotonin, but there's also less transporters, removing this, the serotonin that's there. So you keep about the same level of, say, mood that you would have in the summer months because your body is adjusting. What they found, just amazingly, is that there are two things that are screwed up with the serotonin and the serotonin transporter that seem to be one of the major causes of seasonal affective disorder.

[Chuck Bryant]

So spill it. You're on a roll.

[Josh Clark]

Okay, so people with seasonal who get seasonal affective disorder, they have enough serotonin all year to keep them from being depressed, Right. But just like everybody else, when they are exposed to less light, their serotonin goes down. But the thing that seems to give them seasonal affective disorder is that their serotonin transporters don't also go down.

[Chuck Bryant]

Right.

[Josh Clark]

So like everybody else, they have lower serotonin during the winter, but they have the same amount of serotonin transporters. So there's less serotonin. And proportionately speaking, there's more serotonin transporters removing the serotonin, keeping it from working, which pushes them from non depressed to depressive symptoms. All because they're exposed to less light during the wintertime.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. And, you know, I mentioned women have it four times as often as men do, and it was tied to estrogen. And it looks like variations in estrogen levels can interact with those changes in serotonin and basically make it worse. And that probably is the explanation why women get it more. And you know, perimenopause and menopause affect all that as well, which are. That's an episode we need to. We need to do. For sure.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah.

[Chuck Bryant]

And also there, you know, we mentioned there's a genetic element. Right. So it looks like that people, generally speaking, who have at least one short allele in that serotonin transporter gene promoter region. I know that's a lot of words. Everybody. That the TLDL is too long didn't listen. Is that right?

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. Nice.

[Chuck Bryant]

Is that there's a genetic component. So if you have that short allele, you're gonna be more vulnerable to developing just regular depression to any kind of like life events or stresses like that, or just depression, period. But that short allele is also associated with. With those higher SIRT levels, the S E R T levels in the winter. And that's where your increased level of SAD is gonna come on.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. So that's serotonin. That's a big, big factor in producing seasonal affective disorder as well as just any kind of major depression. Right.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. So melatonin is next. And that just kind of broadly speaking, as far as we're concerned, is the one that, you know, kind of makes you sleepy.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. Which I mean, it can make you sleepy, it can make you lethargic, it can make you not want to go out and all of this stuff. Remember, there's a positive feedback loop here with the depressive symptoms that come on with seasonal affective disorder. The behavior they produce feeding back into becoming more and more depressed. Melatonin keeps you from wanting to do stuff because that's the way our bodies are set up to respond during the winter. And it all has to do with the circadian rhythm, which, as everybody knows, most people know governs your sleep and wake cycle. Right?

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah.

[Josh Clark]

It also has to do with digestion, it has to do with body temperature and all sorts of other hormones. I didn't know this, but apparently it has to do with the release of cortisol, which we think of cortisol typically as a stress hormone, full stop. And it is, but it also is a hormone that causes us to do more stuff to produce more energy. So when the circadian rhythm is not quite functioning correctly, it doesn't just make us sleepy, it actually makes us less energetic as well. And the whole thing, the whole circadian rhythm is controlled by a little part of the hypothalamus called the suprachiasmatic nucleus, or the scn.

[Chuck Bryant]

Nice work on that one.

[Josh Clark]

I've practiced a couple times.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, the scn. And this is where we can throw a little German in there. It relies on zeitgebers or time gebers. And these are just clues from the world around us telling you what's going on. And mainly what we're talking about here is light. Sunlight again, hitting those retinas, it travels to the SCN and then that signals the pineal gland to release or produce that melatonin. So the more light you have, the less melatonin you have. That's why you're not supposed to be looking at your cell phone or avoid really bright lights before you try and get some sleep. But the TLDL here is. It just means our bodies make more melatonin in the wintertime than the summertime. So you're going to be sleeping longer and probably a little more lethargic.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, exactly. So serotonin plus melatonin being messed with, it happens to everybody. But most people's bodies respond in a way, way that regulates it and keeps it from becoming depression. Some people do not have that same way to regulate it. And that's who has seasonal affective disorder.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, and I thought this was really interesting. So it's, you know, we just said that if you experience sad, then you're gonna have a greater than average increase in melatonin in the winter than, you know, your average person. But this is really interesting. You know, we talked about sunlight coming through your retinas, and that's the pathway that it initially travels maybe a little on your skin, but mainly through your retina. They found that your retinas actually react less to light in the winter compared to the summer.

[Josh Clark]

You're right, Chuck. That is really interesting. Thank you, Josh.

[Chuck Bryant]

And I guess before we break, we should talk about the third Little thing after serotonin and melatonin, which are social and environmental factors. If you have SAD when fall rolls around, you start to get that dread. You're going to have a negative emotional response to winner. It's not the cause of it, but that's part of that feedback loop that you were talking about. You're like, oh, man, the days are going to get shorter. If you live in the Pacific Northwest or other places where it rains a lot and it's just more gray days. That time of year, you start to have that dread. And that just feeds everything.

[Josh Clark]

Yep. Yeah, it just makes it worse. And then. Yeah, the whole thing is that feedback loop. Chuck, I'm going to do it again. I think we should take a message break.

[Chuck Bryant]

All right, we'll finish up with SAD right after this.

[Podcast Jingle/Interlude Voice]

Lately, I've been learning some stuff about insomnia or aluminia. How about the one on borderline disorder? Better yet, birth order. Heard that one before, but it was. Is so nice. I learned it twice. Everybody, listen up. Oh, it's Charles and Joshua. It. Stop it. Stop it. Stop. You should know.

[Chuck Bryant]

This is sys.

[Josh Clark]

Kiss. All right, so we talked several times about SAD being a form of major depression, which means that it is highly treatable, actually, thanks to our friend, the selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor, ssri or antidepressants. Apparently, Wellbutrin works really well to treat sad, but basically any SSRI is going to work. One thing that stuck out to me, I believe that if you have seasonal affective disorder, but you don't have bipolar, you don't have major depressive disorder. It's just seasonal, I guess. They suggest that you take SSRIs, you ramp up in, say, like, the fall before it becomes winter, and then you wean off as springtime comes around. So they would have you on SSRIs, but not year round because you wouldn't need them year round. I thought that was fascinating, because that can be. That can be risky if you don't do it right. It can be really risky.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. And one of the things that they suggest with all of these treatments is that you start before it hits. And depending on where you live, when fall starts rolling around, maybe you start some of these therapies to see if you can head it off at the pass, like in the old West. But CBT is another thing that they suggest. Like all cognitive behavioral therapy, it's basically trying to get you to change the way you're thinking about a thing. It might be a group therapy a couple of times a week, over a couple of months maybe. But specifically in this case, it's like, let's try and get those negative thoughts about the upcoming season or the season that is upon you with positive ones and maybe do things like, hey, I know this is a thing for me, so I'm going to plan some things specifically for this winter that I know that I will enjoy.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, like CBT seeks to break that feedback loop up so at least you're not getting worse and worse because of all the other. The cascading effects it has.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, for sure.

[Josh Clark]

One of the other ones, like as that 1984 study right off the bat came, identified a really great treatment for seasonal affective disorder that's non pharmaceutical that you can do at home. As a matter of fact, you can do it at the library. I saw that the libraries in Northern Ireland rent out light boxes. It's called bright light therapy, uses very intense white light. Don't worry, there's a protective UV cover so you're not blasting your face. You're not going to get a tan from it essentially, but your retinas are going to pick up on that white light and so serotonin is going to increase. Your melatonin is going to not be so high and it can actually treat especially moderate forms of seasonal affective disorder.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, for sure. The idea is you put this light on, you don't just sit there and stare at it. You just kind of maybe do it in the morning, 15 minutes to an hour, maybe 45 minutes or so, cast it upon your face. This goes. Is that funny? Yeah, this goes all the way back actually to the 1700s. There was an Italian physician named Vincenzo Chiararugi who way back then said, hey, if you're depressed, I think sunlight would help. So it's been a thing for a long time. But now obviously they still say get out in the sun if you can. But in a lot of places where there's limited light in the winter or just gray days like we were talking about, this is where the blt, that bright light therapy comes in play. I saw they also make little hats, little visors.

[Josh Clark]

Oh yeah.

[Chuck Bryant]

That just shine down on your face at all times.

[Josh Clark]

Nice. Like collective soul set.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. I don't think you're supposed to. I think it's supposed to be limited still though, you're not supposed to have that light on you at all times because it can disrupt your sleep and cause eye strain and fatigue and stuff like that.

[Josh Clark]

Right? Yeah. You don't want to overdo it for sure. And I think it's different for each person how much you actually need. But it does work. I know firsthand it works because you may used to get what I guess you would call sub syndromal seasonal affective disorder. She definitely didn't have major depression, but it was like she was impacted noticeably and she found out about light boxes and got one and it helped her a lot.

[Chuck Bryant]

That's cool. I have friends that use these things just for not even seasonal, just for regular depression. And they say it helps them out. Dawn stimulation is another thing and it's kind of the same idea, but it's like one of those alarm clocks that slowly starts brightening your room over the course of like 30 minutes or so as you're waking up. So again, tied into the circadian rhythm of rising with the sun's rise.

[Josh Clark]

Do you remember that alarm clock from the 70s and 80s that it would light up? It had a picture of like, I think like a fence out in the old West. And the sky would go like dark blue. It would like, it would change the color of the sky on the alarm clock picture depending on what time of day it was. You don't remember those?

[Chuck Bryant]

No, I don't think I've ever seen those.

[Josh Clark]

They were amazing. My oldest sister had one of those. I would love one. I don't know what happened to that. It probably broke.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. My brother had one of those clocks. The alarm clocks that had the like a Rolodex. It would flip the numbers around like mechanically.

[Josh Clark]

Oh, neat.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, those were fun.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. The one I always had was like the kind.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh man.

[Josh Clark]

No. Really? Yeah. When I was a teenager that's what I needed.

[Chuck Bryant]

Or the two bells with the hammer.

[Josh Clark]

I had one of those too.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh man.

[Josh Clark]

There was a period where I had the one that went wouldn't do it. So I had to switch over to the two bells one.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh God. Have you always had a hard time waking up like that?

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. Have I? I don't anymore. But yes, I used to when I was a teenager.

[Chuck Bryant]

Well, because I get emails from you at like 5:30 in the morning. Like what the hell are you doing? Are you farming?

[Josh Clark]

I've seen. I've milking the cows and email at the same time sometimes. I have decided that Getting up at 5 is way too early for me, so. Oh good. I'm doing six now.

[Chuck Bryant]

Hey, that's reasonable.

[Josh Clark]

It is seven sometimes if I'm feeling frisky.

[Chuck Bryant]

You had a really late night the night before.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, I went to bed at 10.

[Chuck Bryant]

We should mention vitamin D, speaking of cows, because vitamin D deficiency does correlate with more likelihood of having or developing sad. But they haven't found any good, hard, consistent evidence that vitamin D supplements can.

[Josh Clark]

Help a lot there. There's one place, remember you said that high latitudes, the higher the latitude, the more negative the attitude, the likelier you are to have seasonal affective disorder. That does not hold true, at least in some parts. Some of the most extremely northern parts of the world, in particular town called Troms, Norway. That is very northern. It might be the the most northernmost city in Norway. It's really high up there. Suffice to say that they are absent from sunlight, I think two full months out of the year.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh man.

[Josh Clark]

Nothing like the sun comes out. I mean, I think it might get as much as it would get before sunrise on a normal day. And they go like that for two months. And yet the rates of seasonal affective disorder are much less in Tromso than you would expect.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, it seems to be because they've done just sort of studies and questionnaires and people there agree with statements like I love the coziness of the winter months. Winter brings many wonderful seasonal changes. They don't agree with. Winter is boring, winter is limiting. So it seems to really be a lot about the attitude. And you know, I think if you live there, a lot of people probably don't just move there. It seems to be a place where you're usually from or maybe people do move to one of the most northernmost cities in the world. I'm sure it happens. But generally if you have grown up in a place, and that's the thing, everyone knows that's the thing. And so there are probably many, many events and traditions and activities that they do to thwart that. And it seems to work because they get into their skiing, they get into their winter hiking, they get into their cozy drinks and their warm blankets and their fireplaces. And it seems to be that they look forward to that stuff and it bears out by them not having a prevalence of SAD there. It's kind of interesting.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. And some people point to that as evidence. They say that there's no such thing as sad. That just does not make sense. If SAD is this response to biological imperative that happens every year among people who are maladjusted for that, that imperative, then that just should not be the way in Troms. And there was actually a study from 2016 from researchers at Auburn Montgomery, the University of Auburn in Montgomery, and they studied CDC data and they found no seasonal variations in depression symptoms. And it was a massive population that they studied. And I mean, if there is such a thing as seasonal affective disorder, then there should be an increase in the winter months and they didn't find it. That does not seem to be the consensus among the scientific community. As a matter of fact, I went to go click on the link in this Scientific American article that we were checking out and it exploded. It was gone. It couldn't find it.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh, wow.

[Josh Clark]

So it made me wonder if they quietly retracted it or wow, maybe it was just a broken link. You never can tell. But for the most part, if you look up seasonal affective disorder, every reliable website in America, like Johns Hopkins or Harvard Health or Cleveland Clinic, Mayo Clinic, I could keep going. They are all in on seasonal affective disorder.

[Chuck Bryant]

Now I'm picturing just like a couple of scientists in a ditch being shoveled over with lime. Right?

[Josh Clark]

So just one thing before we stop. It has nothing to do with Norway really, but it reminded me I saw a There's a good true crime. I don't know if it's a docudrama, but it's based on real life and it's Danish. It's called the Investigation. It's so mellow.

[Chuck Bryant]

The Investigation. I love those. I love stories set in those parts of the world. I love Danish filmmaking and Norwegian filmmaking.

[Josh Clark]

You'll love it. There's at least one episode where almost the entire time nothing happens and they just show nothing happening. But it's really good. It's really engrossing. So I would recommend it.

[Chuck Bryant]

Awesome.

[Josh Clark]

Chuck said awesome. That means he just triggered the first listener mail of 2026, everybody.

[Chuck Bryant]

That's right. This is from Megan in Michigan. Hey guys, thank you for the many years of engaging in and interesting content. I first started listening in 2012 when I moved out of my home state and would download episodes onto CDs.

[Josh Clark]

Nice.

[Chuck Bryant]

Wow.

[Josh Clark]

That is. Wow.

[Chuck Bryant]

Well, this will make you feel old too. To pass the time on the long drives in my old Cavalier.

[Josh Clark]

Oh, wow.

[Chuck Bryant]

They don't still make the Cavalier, do they?

[Josh Clark]

I don't believe so, no. I think they buried them with those Auburn Montgomery researchers.

[Chuck Bryant]

Well, 2012. I'm surprised she wasn't in a Camry. I just listened to your dolls episode, guys. I had to write in. I have three kids and they have at times acted out scenarios with dolls and toys that would have been very disturbing if I had not been prepared that it was very normal and healthy. Actually, the most recent example is when my five year old came into the house and told me that he and his three year old sister had made gravestones in the backyard because their twin baby dolls had died.

[Josh Clark]

Oh my.

[Chuck Bryant]

Even knowing it's normal, I do have to take a deep breath and remind myself that part of raising emotionally healthy kids is letting them process through play. Still, I was a bit relieved. The next day they threw a big party for the baby's first birthday, so she skips out the part where they dug them up out of they exhumed them from the grave. Thanks again for bringing so many topics and perspectives to light while somehow keeping things humorous and upbeat. Looking forward to learning more in 2026. That is Megan in Michigan.

[Josh Clark]

Nice Megan. Thank you for that. That was a great, great email. And God bless your kids for being awesome.

[Chuck Bryant]

For sure.

[Josh Clark]

If you want to be like Megan and tell us about your awesome kids, we love that kind of thing. You can send it off to Stuff podcastheartradio.com.

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