Does anyone here use a SAD lamp?
Hello! Hopefully this is the right place to ask this, but I was wondering if anyone here was using a SAD lamp, and if you have any recommendations.
Tangent:
I currently live in a fairly dark apartment, and have a cheapish SAD lamp that is pulling double duty to not only brighten the room, but also keep me from going crazy in the darker winter months. It seems in an age of smart-everything, I've struggled to find something to replace mine with.
I currently have a Verilux HappyLight, but it kind of sucks ass. The power cord always falls out, pressing the power button might be enough to loosen the power cord. The settings have to be set every time you turn it on. It's just total garbo in my opinion. I looked at smart bulbs, but they don't seem to hit the lumens I'm looking for.
I think part of the issue with my current setup is that I have to actually turn the light on, which you would think would be fairly easy, but with the issues above, and my sheer laziness it's basically an impossible task.
What I'm looking for is something that can be automated, I think one of my major issues I've had in the last year is that I haven't been able to wake up to the morning sun as I had previously. It takes hours before I actually feel awake. I've gone from a morning person to some sort of bizarre afternoon person.
Anyway, I'm looking for others experiences and recommendations.
it needs to be a minimum of 10,000 lux, or at least that's what I've read.
I have a big happy light and its great for photos and is okay for the SAD stuff. It isn't popular, but I found that fake tanning really helped with the SAD last year. I might do it every year, but I won't go nearly as dark as I did by accident.
I thought it would be nice to have a massive fixture over my bed that is super bright and diffused for this --- have it fade on to a level that simulates the face of God. Sort of something like this but on the ceiling.
You are correct --every study I have read that actually looks into conditions like SAD, or delayed sleep phase disorder, or anything of the sort is studying 10,000+ lux, above the eyeline, for a variable number of minutes (30 to 90). These devices are prohibitively expensive, and I'd honestly be concerned about the UV output of anything that's really cheap.
Personally, it got to the point that it made more sense to go read outside for 15 minutes when I wake up. It's really easy to do in the summer months, but come winter I am an abject failure at it.
That said, I doubt many people are clinically diagnosed with these disorders. I doubt many PCPs are looking for them or referring their patients for them. They'd probably just get diagnosed with depression and tossed on antidepressants instead.
[edit] looks like there are some options that are too expensive these days.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00PCN4UVU
It's pretty simple and cheap actually, just get a high bay light: https://www.superbrightleds.com/industrial-led-lighting/led-warehouse-and-led-warehouse-vehicle-lighting/led-high-bay-lighting/led-linear-high-bay-lights/165w-led-linear-high-bay-23-100-lumens-400w-mh-equivalent-5000k
Warning: this will be painfully bright. Looking directly at the lamp will be a lux of 100k or so, so you will need to bounce it off a wall.
That's funny, because my PCP says she diagnoses and prescribes SSRIs for SAD all the time. It came up because this summer, I asked to reduce my (years-long) antidepressant dosage thanks to a major health improvement. She told me not to hesitate to bump it back up again if winter blues showed up.
OTOH, I live in a place that's infamous for a six-month long stretch of cloud cover and less than 12 hours of daylight (as little as 7 hours at the winter solstice). SAD is a way of life here.
My local YMCA has daylight-spectrum LED panels everywhere, so working out is my best medicine during the dark days. I have a Varilux HappyLight set up next to my computer monitor, and just run it for hours at a time.
reading outside is such a simple solution, too. I really want a green house to read in.... a 2026 goal maybe :)
Wow, this is amazing, and would be amazing to set up. Looks like I'll have to go down this rabbit hole tonight and see how I could build one sometime in the future.
so cool, right? So many places would benefit from fake windows like this (prisons, hospitals etc.)
If you do go down this path, I'm excited to see the result.
They exist!
The main caveat is the price, which is "contact us" and rumored to be about $40k. But if you're outfitting an MRI machine room for example, it may be worth it.
if people are buying those, I'm in the wrong business. That's unreal. They look decent, though.
Can this sort of thing work? https://www.skroutz.eu/c/2179/timer-sockets/f/691643/Weekly.html
Yeah, any kind of "smart plug" could work assuming the light retains its on-off state on power loss. (I have one with a "touch" button instead of a manual switch/brightness wheel so not sure if it would work).
And even the old fashioned timer plugs are home automation- if you want to run something at a set time they're great! Could even rig together a daylight sensor one if you want to get fancy.
You just reminded me of the time that I ordered a big, meter-wide, rice paper pendant lamp because it was $4 several years ago. It's probably a fire hazard but I put a halogen bulb inside that and it was like having a big ball of sun hanging in the middle of the room.
I think a DIY solution here might be a cheaper and more reliable option. Combine a smart plug with something bright. But it's also nice to have color temperatures change throughout the day. I have something along the lines of 2-in-1 Smart LED Flush Mount Ceiling Light + Backlight, WiFi, Works with Alexa,Google Home,12 Inch 2000 LM and it is bright enough for me but I probably don't have SAD
Oh, I hadn't considered looking into a 'holiday light timer'. I'll deffo dig into this a bit deeper, even for other projects.
You actually have alarm clocks that integrate a bright light. I think Phillips was first with it years ago with the "wakeup light" series, but quickly checking Amazon, there are plenty of options available from other brands these days as well.
Yep, and I also have Verilux Happylights too (I have 3 of them). I don't find them to be crap though, just the opposite. I use the newest one for actual light therapy sessions during the low sunlight months, which I do while meditating. And related to your second question, I actually used to use one of my old ones as a wakeup lamp using an Alexa smart plug. From an old comment of mine:
So if you decide to do similar, let me know if you need any help setting it up for yourself.
It may just be my unit that is the issue, a slight breeze will knock the power cord out for me, and it's really annoying. Especially since the orientation of the port is such that you have to plug it in against gravity.
This setup sounds awesome though. I'm going to try a few different things this weekend and see what I can recreate.
What model is it, if you don't mind my asking? None of the models I own have that issue. They are the Verilux HappyLight VT10 Compact (which is what I used as a wake-up light), HappyLight Liberty (which is the original one I bought about 10 years ago that they don't make anymore), and the HappyLight Luxe (which is the newest and I use for light therapy now).
Thanks for the heads up. I deleted my comment.
I had the same issue as you with the dark apartment and tried to fix it, but it’s very difficult. Even with LEDs, the amount of power needed to simulate sunlight is very high. This is why SAD lamps require you to sit very close to them. They can use less power if more of the light is directed directly at you.
I found this forum post was very useful in my search for artificial sunlight. Yuji LED has the best LEDs on the market for reproducing the full light spectrum of the sun, but some other manufacturers get pretty close for much less money. I purchased my LEDs from this website. It took a long time for them to ship from China, but the LEDs were high quality. They add in 400nm-420nm violet LEDs to their strips to add in the part of the spectrum that most high CRI lights are missing.
I never got my lighting setup to a place where I was happy, but I ended up moving somewhere with more natural light since the sun is free. You can definitely make a much better light than you could buy off the shelf, but it’s still a lot of work. To automate it, just get a smart outlet and have that set to a timer.