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As a Florida native, my world was rocked (and not in a good way) when I encountered my first real Winter after moving to New York City. The temperatures dipped far below 40 degrees (which is about as frigid as it gets in the Sunshine State), piles of snow remained on the streets for weeks on end without melting, the sun was already set by the time I left my office to commute home, and I basically morphed into the Michelin Man because of how many clothing layers I wore every day.
To top things off, my mood drastically changed during the darker Winter months, transforming me from my usual happy-go-lucky self to a lethargic slug who rushed home after work to burrito in the sheets, calculate how many days were left until Spring, and maybe even shed a few tears.
I talk to my mom on the phone pretty much every day, so naturally, she noticed the steady shift in my overall mood as I struggled to deal with the Winter blues. As a doctor, she diagnosed me with Seasonal Affective Disorder — or SAD, for short, somewhat ironically — and ordered me the Verilux HappyLight Touch Therapy Tablet on Amazon as the potential solution to my woes. It's been about a year and a half since my lamp was delivered, and rarely a day has gone by since then without excitedly mashing that "on" button to reap its healing benefits (more on those ahead).