How to Beat Seasonal Affective Disorder with Infrared Sauna

What Is Seasonal Affective Disorder?
Seasonal Affective Disorder or SAD is a condition listed in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM). Symptoms include fatigue, depression, hopelessness, and social withdrawal.

Does that sound familiar? Probably does with the cold snap we’ve had recently.

SAD tends to affect people who live in areas with more pronounced seasons. For instance, about 1.4% of Floridians get diagnosed with SAD, whereas 9.9% Alaskans are diagnosed with SAD. 

But many more people don’t fit those diagnostic criteria but still get the “winter blues.” 

Here’s how to beat it.

How to Treat Seasonal Affective Disorder
Many people who experience SAD take antidepressant medications, like SSRIs. Some rely on Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, a form of talk therapy. 

One of the best treatments for SAD is physical exercise. But, some people who experience severe symptoms have trouble making it to the gym (and you can forget about exercising outside when it’s snowy, icy, and freezing cold).

Some light therapies, commonly called “SAD Lamps” can be effective in treating Seasonal Affective Disorder. But we think that Infrared Sauna is one of the best treatments for the winter blues out there. 

(Yes, we’re biased but we’ve had hundreds of customers tell us so).

How Infrared Saunas Work
The sunlight (that’s sorely lacking this time of year) is a combination of visible and invisible light. Infrared saunas use this invisible spectrum to heat your body directly without blinding you.
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An infrared sauna works just like other dry saunas but with a few key differences:

• First, it's not as hot as a conventional dry sauna. Dry saunas usually top out around 185 degrees Fahrenheit whereas our infrared sauna tops out around 158, with the effective range between 100-130 degrees Fahrenheit.​
• Infrared saunas have an electric heater to make it feel "sauna-ish" but what is really heating you is the non-visible infrared light spectrum emitting from the sauna panels. This heats the core and produces sweat even at lower temperatures.

Why Our Infrared Sauna Is the Best
Remember those invisible bands of light we talked about? Most low-end saunas only use one segment of that bandwidth, called “Far Infrared”. Far infrared is great! It penetrates the deepest into the body and it has a lot of benefits itself. But it’s only one of three segments of non-visible light.

The other types of non-visible light are “Mid Infrared” and “Near Infrared.” Each spectrum of non-visible light has a different wavelength, which correlates to how deep into your body tissues it penetrates. And each carries its own benefit.

To get all of those benefits, you really want what is called a “Full-Spectrum” Infrared Sauna. And that’s what we have here at Float Missoula - a full spectrum infrared sauna from the best manufacturer on the market - Sunlighten.

Check out our Infrared Sauna page to learn more about the benefits of Infrared Sauna (and book your appointment today).