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Monterey and Carmel are probably the last places I want to be at, crowd-wise... I knew 2 people from Monterey, both hated it--one run off to France, another one moved to Portland and is very happy there. Monterrey is full of wealth and fakeness, and boring to death, expensive as hell too. Los Padres national forest is beautiful and the weather is really nice, but that's about all that's there... one can't live in a vaccuum... Santa Cruz is near by and I met the rudest people there... violent panhandlers... the drivers are the worst there--they try to run a pedestrian over just like Brookyn drivers..! Not like some Seattle drivers who do back off often when they see a pedestrian about to cross.
I think you might want to check out the small cities in S. Oregon.....like Medford or Eugene. There is more sun and they are closer to the mts than either Portland or Seattle. I think you might get the best of both worlds......OR and CA.
I think you might want to check out the small cities in S. Oregon.....like Medford or Eugene. There is more sun and they are closer to the mts than either Portland or Seattle. I think you might get the best of both worlds......OR and CA.
I've been around these cities: the problem is... no jobs, not in my profession.
You know, SAD is a very real thing and when it gets really bad a person can become suicidal. Good if you're immune to SAD--I am not.
Life is so short, it's such a waste to have miserable SAD months.
Since I can't spend extensive periods of time in Seattle right now I have to rely on what people say. I can't afford to make mistakes like trying and failing and can't be "too cautious". If something happens to me, I don't have a wife, or parents, or siblings to take care of me. It make take a person long time before they're ready to move to wherever they end up moving and even buying a house there--it may take many years, actually. These decisions mature over long time.
As to eye contact--there's way too much of that in CA and this bothers me. I don't like eye contact and never make one. I usually keep to myself and not outgoing or social at all, and it's fine with me if everyone else is the same way, or even cranky as soon as they don't take out rainy day on me being rude.
Wow. I think you have more than just SAD going on. I was diagnosed with PTSD and you sound just like me when I first got to Seattle. I have had to work my butt off to get over it. I don't know if you experienced something traumatic in your life but you might want to talk about PSTD with your therapist.
Wait, if you already suffer from SAD, why would you even consider Seattle?! Seems like a disaster waiting to happen to me.
Seattle is one of the only two places on the West Coast that have good amount of jobs in my field, that's one reason why. Just looking at real estate prices in Bay area, one can get really bad case of SAD
Wow. I think you have more than just SAD going on. I was diagnosed with PTSD and you sound just like me when I first got to Seattle. I have had to work my butt off to get over it. I don't know if you experienced something traumatic in your life but you might want to talk about PSTD with your therapist.
Yes, I grew up witnessing military operations. But I do have SAD, aside from anything else. It's like something that kicks-in at the same time every year, at the end of October and get extremely bad in Nov-Dec, goes away in March--the less sun, the worse it is.
Yes, I grew up witnessing military operations. But I do have SAD, aside from anything else. It's like something that kicks-in at the same time every year, at the end of October and get extremely bad in Nov-Dec, goes away in March--the less sun, the worse it is.
Look........you have a great deal of fear in you. The lack of eye contact, the worries about being alone, the concern about having no support; the fear of the rain; can't afford to make a mistake; the feeling of uncertainty; your huge fear of the unknown, etc. I understand what you are experiencing........I was there. It mostly comes from fight or flight, a physiological response to fear and usually triggered chronically by PSTD.
It may get worse for you in the winter because of SAD but I bet its with you all the time. I was in F or F for several years until I started doing some breathing exercises similar to certain types of yoga. It slowed my breathing enough so I came out of F or F and experienced the difference. I was shocked.
Do some reading on F or F.....its a chemical reaction....and very real. If you ever get to Seattle, I recommend a course of yoga or learn the Buteyko Method. I did the latter and its what has improved my life significantly.
Again, I can't tell you how similar I was to you.........the symptoms you describe are identical to those I experienced..........and I don't suffer from SAD.
Seattle is one of the only two places on the West Coast that have good amount of jobs in my field, that's one reason why. Just looking at real estate prices in Bay area, one can get really bad case of SAD
Well, that's good there are jobs, but if you know you are going to miserable for at least half the year it doesn't seem worth it to me. See, I'm in Houston - lot's of jobs here in my field, but I'm miserable from April to October. Just getting another job here wouldn't solve my problem as it's a locational thing. Seattle has a decent amount of jobs in my field, but it also has a lot more of my interests there and is better suited to me as a whole. I think when it comes down to it, you need to move somewhere you think you will be HAPPY. So if you suffer from SAD already, then you are not going to be HAPPY in Seattle - even if you have a job in your field.
I may be able to add something that may help with the SAD concern. I grew up in the subtropics where it is extremely rainy and cloudy, year 'round. Warm, but still, overcast. Day after day. Month after month. Shoes were never really dry, paper was not crisp, clotheslines could not be used much and were strung under porches. When one got up, it was cloudy, when one returned home, it was cloudy, usually.
A few days a year it was dry and sunny, and I recall being delighted with dust - we would walk back and forth on what was usually packed wet clay paths, puffing up the dust, having the times of our lives.
We had not heard of SAD back then. Yet, out of my family, I was the child who would "droop" and be despondent on the cloudy days, and happy on the sunny ones. My mother called me her "sunflower." We did not understand it or have a name for it, but it was real, very real for me.
And when I moved to the desert Southwest, despite not caring for the high temps and the lack of beautiful plants in abundance, my spirits were higher, lighter. But after a few years of the triple digits and NO CLOUDS, never a cloud about 340 days of the year, the SUNNINESS caused something akin to SAD - can you believe, too much sun, too much unchanging? Yes, it was so. It was a trapped feeling.
Then we moved to the Seattle area, north of Seattle, in the supposed "banana belt" area that locals believe get "so much more" sun. Perhaps it is so. It seemed very much like the Seattle weather, however, on a day-to-day comparison. Chill and gray.
I find this about SAD (speaking from my experience, of course, and my observations of others) - if you work fulltime, it is less affecting. But if you are at home AND you very much enjoy the outdoors, in that you enjoy unfettered movement and the warmth upon your skin, you will likely not fare too well.
It is difficult, if you are used to unfettered movement, to get used to the wearing of the clothing, the silk underwear, the wind-blocking vests or jackets, and the things on your head. I think this adds a layer of psychic distress to the SAD itself. It is not a matter of being "spoiled," it is a matter of what is in your bones, in your very blood.
But, one thing, it may help the OP. I found living near the oceanfront, on the Sound, was very helpful. The expanse of the sea, even in the gray days, was freeing, uplifting. I did not get the terrible despondency when I would look out on the ocean and walk along the beach each day. But inland, again the sadness.
Yet some people who grow up in a distinctive climate can do well when going to a very different climate!
I hope this may somewhat help someone, in that it points that extremes, either sun or clouds, might cause distress, and that the sea, at least, can help with the cloud-caused sadness. Best wishes to the OP, and may I add, don't fear not having relatives or spouses, they are often rotten in a pinch, and a big city like Seattle will be comforting in that there is much infrastructure there to help one.
I have to agree that the OP sounds like he/she has more than just SAD ... may want to reconsider your life plans if you are so afraid of living on your own. Look, we all live with uncertainty in our lives. That is a constant throughout the whole world. Financial uncertainty, career uncertainty, loneliness, fear of random acts of violence, accidents, etc.
If you do have SAD then there is a 100% chance you will hate it in Seattle for 7 months out of the year, but it is what you make of it (in addition to any medication or vitamin supplements that might help). For example, yes, it is overcast a lot of the time in Seattle in the winter, but that allows for vibrant green foliage the spring and much of the summer. It also feeds the streams for fish and nature. That allows you go to on hikes and enjoy it and in the winter you can enjoy snow and skiing in the mountains while only having to worry about an annoying mist in the lowlands.
It does sound like you need to work on looking on the silver lining and good nature of stuff.
I may be able to add something that may help with the SAD concern. I grew up in the subtropics where it is extremely rainy and cloudy, year 'round. Warm, but still, overcast. Day after day. Month after month. Shoes were never really dry, paper was not crisp, clotheslines could not be used much and were strung under porches. When one got up, it was cloudy, when one returned home, it was cloudy, usually.
A few days a year it was dry and sunny, and I recall being delighted with dust - we would walk back and forth on what was usually packed wet clay paths, puffing up the dust, having the times of our lives.
We had not heard of SAD back then. Yet, out of my family, I was the child who would "droop" and be despondent on the cloudy days, and happy on the sunny ones. My mother called me her "sunflower." We did not understand it or have a name for it, but it was real, very real for me.
And when I moved to the desert Southwest, despite not caring for the high temps and the lack of beautiful plants in abundance, my spirits were higher, lighter. But after a few years of the triple digits and NO CLOUDS, never a cloud about 340 days of the year, the SUNNINESS caused something akin to SAD - can you believe, too much sun, too much unchanging? Yes, it was so. It was a trapped feeling.
Then we moved to the Seattle area, north of Seattle, in the supposed "banana belt" area that locals believe get "so much more" sun. Perhaps it is so. It seemed very much like the Seattle weather, however, on a day-to-day comparison. Chill and gray.
I find this about SAD (speaking from my experience, of course, and my observations of others) - if you work fulltime, it is less affecting. But if you are at home AND you very much enjoy the outdoors, in that you enjoy unfettered movement and the warmth upon your skin, you will likely not fare too well.
It is difficult, if you are used to unfettered movement, to get used to the wearing of the clothing, the silk underwear, the wind-blocking vests or jackets, and the things on your head. I think this adds a layer of psychic distress to the SAD itself. It is not a matter of being "spoiled," it is a matter of what is in your bones, in your very blood.
But, one thing, it may help the OP. I found living near the oceanfront, on the Sound, was very helpful. The expanse of the sea, even in the gray days, was freeing, uplifting. I did not get the terrible despondency when I would look out on the ocean and walk along the beach each day. But inland, again the sadness.
Yet some people who grow up in a distinctive climate can do well when going to a very different climate!
I hope this may somewhat help someone, in that it points that extremes, either sun or clouds, might cause distress, and that the sea, at least, can help with the cloud-caused sadness. Best wishes to the OP, and may I add, don't fear not having relatives or spouses, they are often rotten in a pinch, and a big city like Seattle will be comforting in that there is much infrastructure there to help one.
Yes, you pretty much nailed it... the unfettered movement is what's hard to give up. I like to exercise outside a lot, do some gymnastics stuff, and have body move freely when you work out like that is important. Indoor exercise just doesn't beat the outdoor.... I grew up where I had to wear something like a dawn coat, fur hat and double mittens to stay warm for the most part of the year---now it's VERY hard to make yourself wear warm gloves and jacket every day, as I got used to light clothing, feels like you're a horse being put in the harness. You see, I don't like to live on the ocean/bay/really close to it (with a view), expanse of ocean is too much for me.. I'm more of a mountain and tree person-- like mountains, rocks and trees around, don't like open spaces whether it's prairie, desert or ocean. I thought of places like Granite Falls or Gold Bar around Seattle, that have mountain rivers.
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