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Happy midsummer from Finland! 🌸🏵 We are celebrating Finnish-Swedish midsummer when the sun never sets. I know it sounds exotic for foreigners with midnight sun, but we are so used to it. It's the opposite in the winter, when the sun never rises for a couple of months above the Arctic circle. Where we live we see the pale sun for a few hours a day.

@tanjaostman my. sister in Bergen,Norway says she still can tan at 9 at night.

@sinbach tack detsamma! 😊 Har din familj nordiska midsommartraditioner?

@tanjaostman absolut! vi äter! och lite bastu och simma kanske .... när vi är trötta ....vi äter mer!

@tanjaostman
Wow! That's wild! How do you keep depression at bay in Winter? Just curious?

@tanjaostman
Just a clarification 'to keep something at bay' in English means to keep it away or at a distance. You may know that, I'm only clarifying in case, because I've noticed in the past, you saying that English is not your first language.

@OneofTen Thanks for asking! The question is valid, since depression and alcoholism is a huge problem here. I have heard that they have the same problem in Alaska, that is on the same latitude. I hate the darkness a lot and want to move south every winter (but there are few places on earth as beautiful as the Nordic countries in the summer and I enjoy the snow as the light comes back)… but I am aware of my own reactions, psychologically and physiologically. It helps me not to blame different circumstances for feeling low, because he darkness messes with the brain chemistry. When we can afford it and have time, we travel south a couple of weeks during the darkest time of the winter, preferably Nov-Feb. But 2 weeks are a minimum for any effect. We have a light therapy lamp on the kitchen table. I take vit. D supplements. I rest more. I am trying to be kind to myself and don’t blame myself for lack of energy and feeling low.

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