Starlight Deprivation Syndrome

Winter is when my friends bemoan their struggles with Seasonal Affective Disorder. The days are too brief, the Sun is at a lower angle in the sky, and spirits are low. Every once in a while, I suspect I might have a touch of it, too, but in truth I’ve never really been bothered by the shorter days and longer nights of winter. Instead, I welcome them.

I’m in the minority, but summer is my least favorite season. While most human beings relish the long, hot days, I have the opposite reaction. Bright sunshine makes me tired. Heat zaps my stamina. I find myself enervated and longing for darker and cooler seasons — and especially their longer nights.

But here in the winter, there have been long weeks when I found myself crankier and more irritable. My fatigue was heavier, and I was more likely to give into frustration. I worried I was succumbing to SAD at last.

Then I looked at the long gaps between entries in my astronomy logs, and I realized my grumbly mood isn’t exclusive to autumn and winter. So, not SAD. These cantankerous spells crop up in warmer months, too, when we’ve had weeks of rain and overcast skies. What I suffer from is a lack of starlight.

Starlight Deprivation Syndrome (SDS) is decidedly different from stargazing-induced sleep deprivation, which can also occur at any time of year but is the result of good nights of observations. I’m familiar with that phenomenon as well, but I won’t complain about astronomy-related insomnia when the central activity sparks so much joy! In contrast, SDS is the glum consequence of too many overcast nights and other complications that prevent nights under the stars.

With a sample size of one, I have noted these and other symptoms of Starlight Deprivation Syndrome:

• Fatigue
• Irritability
• Crankiness
• Frustration (yes, these are synonyms, but the struggle is real, y’all)
• Popping my head out the back door every 15 minutes after the Sun goes down, just in case the skies have miraculously cleared

While my friends use full-spectrum sun lamps to combat SAD, I curse the clouds for other reasons. They’re craving sunlight, but I’m not looking to produce vitamin D. I’m after starlit joy instead.

Of course, there’s only one cure: a clear night. A whole string of clear nights is even better.

Under the stars, my breaths deepen. My blood pressure lowers. As I look up, I feel the stress of the day and the burdens of the world draining away through the soles of my feet. There’s a mental clarity that comes from standing beneath a clear, starry sky, and it carries over into the next day. My thinking is not only more optimistic but more fluid. And there’s the lingering, buzzy buoyancy I call starglow.

This is the prescription that promotes ease in mind and body. Stargazing brings me back to myself.

So in the tiresome days of SDS, I awake every morning and check the coming night’s forecast for cloud cover, seeing, and transparency. When it’s been too long since our last clear night, I don’t even mind lunar light pollution — plus, Moongazing is a delight of its own.

In late January, we finally had a run of decent nights here in Portland, and I felt the weight of SDS fall away like thick icicles dropping from frozen tree limbs. My fleece onesie kept me cozy in the frigid winter air as I looked up and laughed at the familiar sights of Orion, Taurus, Auriga, and Gemini dominating the sky. 

Because I wasn’t sure when we’d have good observing conditions again, I de-prioritized sleep as much as possible. I continued virtual stargazing with Dad when he had decent skies on the East Coast, then stayed up way past any reasonable bedtime to see and photograph as much as I could. Low-power binoculars and my Dwarf 3 smart telescope were constant companions.

Stargazing insomnia came into play, but did I mind? Not so much.

I was happily outlasted by the stars. When exhaustion finally won, I wrote a message to future Jen: “Gazing through binoculars at the celestial disco ball that is Sirius, and then coming inside to watch an old BBC documentary about the Huygens probe on Titan? Always a good idea.”

But this is the Pacific Northwest, and the clouds and rain soon returned. The splendor of the stars is again a memory. Before too long, SDS will come creeping back in, and I will reach for astronomy books and YouTube videos to fill the void. But I am not forlorn. The skies will clear, and once more I will stand in awe beneath the stars.