SAD connection with Major Depression and Bipolar Disorder

SAD is a disease that people can suffer from without suffering from major depression or bipolar. However, people who do suffer from those diseases definitely notice the changes in seasons.

“In the winter when it starts to get dark earlier is when I start to see him become depressed. The amount of sunlight really affects my dad. In the summer when the days are longer, he starts to get hypomanic,” Said Jillian Beld, a sophomore at Grand Rapids Community College whose father suffers from bipolar disorder  as well as SAD.

Ann Arbor therapist Lisa Puceu said that in her experience, she has seen the seasons have a big affect on her patients who suffer from major depression or bipolar.

“There’s a link between bipolar and major depression and how they respond to the season, and typically we will see a pattern of people becoming worse in the winter,” Puceu said.

Seasonal Affective Disorder

Every year, when the seasons change, roughly 10 million Americans suffer from a disease called Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD). The disease can affect you in many ways, including tiredness and loss of energy, an increased need for sleep, craving of carbohydrates, weight gain, a general disinterest in socializing, an overall sense of hopelessness, unhappiness, and irritability, said Kelle Sajdak, a counselor at Michigan State University Counseling Center.

People living in northern states like Michigan are affected by the disease much greater than somebody who is living in a warm weather state such as California or Florida, said Lisa Puceu, a therapist from Ann Arbor.

Sajdak said that it is important to take care of yourself, mainly by eating healthy, getting enough sleep, and participating in some form of stress relief.

MSU Student Section Fair Weather Fans

With Michigan State’s football team really struggling this season, many of the difficulties with getting and keeping Spartan Stadium full have been magnified.

Michigan State Associate Athletic Director Paul Schager said that a typical game will have a no show rate somewhere in the teens percentage wise.

With Michigan State's incredibly poor play this season, many of these numbers will grow even higher.

“People leave early because they have plans to go out that night, or they’re getting cold because it’s November and we know it’s freezing up here. So you’re always going to have that because the stadiums are so big, and the universities do try to make sure that the students who want tickets get them, it means you’re going to have these fair weather fans,” Said Dr. Heather Dichter, the Assistant Professor of Sports Management at Western Michigan University. 

Between the increasingly cooling weather for the later games in the season, as well as the Spartans lack of success, attendance expectations are lower than ever for the remaining games of the 2016 Spartan Football Season.

Michigan State Football Game Attendance

Michigan State Football's student section is one of the school's biggest points of pride. Despite this, many fans leave the football games early and the stadium atmosphere suffers as a result.

One of the biggest concerns is about game time. Some of the rules of college football have lead too much longer games than that of NFL or high school football. 

“The lengthening of games is impacting the retention of fans, not just students but all fans, with the game lasting well beyond three hours, which is contradictory to the history. We’ve got games that can go three and a half, four, four and a half hours long,” said Paul Schager, the Associate Athletic Director at Michigan State.

Schager said that athletic directors are concerned about game length.

On top of this, many students have also expressed concern over this issue “If the games were shorter, meaning there weren’t so many time outs or stoppages and media breaks, I think people would maybe stick around longer,” Said MSU Junior Erik Jacobsen.