New York State of Mindfulness | Seasonal Affective Disorder and Midwood

Listen to “Episode 1: Seasonal Affective Disorder and Midwood” on Spreaker.

Host Mila Myles is joined by Carmela Fridman, Chief Medical Officer at The Jewish Board, and Michelle Latimer, Director of Psychiatric Practice at The Jewish Board, to discuss what seasonal affective disorder (SAD) is and how it affects New Yorkers in the Midwood area of Brooklyn.

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Transcript

Carmela Fridman:
So, seasonal affective disorder is a disorder in which the individual will have depressive symptoms, such as just feeling a lack of pleasure in things, feeling unmotivated, having low energy, maybe not sleeping well or oversleeping, changes in their appetite. It can last for many months. That affects their ability to function.

Mila Myles:
I’m Mila Myles, and welcome to New York State of Mindfulness, a podcast about mental health, wellness, and the communities we live in throughout New York City, sponsored by The Jewish Board. The Jewish Board is one of New York state’s largest social services organizations, helping people of all backgrounds with mental health challenges. Today, myself and my two guests will be discussing SAD, otherwise known as Seasonal Affective Disorder or seasonal depression.

Mila Myles:
I know my first time hearing about SAD was, I feel bad knowing that it’s an actual diagnosis as I’ve gotten older, because I’m from Michigan from Detroit. I think with a lot of people there, we’re really conditioned around the time that most people kind of come down with their diagnosis to SAD or displaying some of that possible diagnosis. Michigan, as you know, half the year is winter, but the thing is in Michigan, for me, it’s actually really bright often times in the winter because of the snow reflecting whatever light is around it.

Mila Myles:
When I was in college, I didn’t know that seasonal affective disorder was a real thing. I had friends who were from LA, Colorado, and the West Coast, who during that time of year as the sun started to go down a lot sooner, they would get really, really depressed. Of course, being a kid and being in college, at the time, I thought it was something that was just funny and they needed to buck up. I just thought, “Oh. They’re being really spoiled about having sunlight.” I don’t know if you guys watch Game of Thrones, but I was like, “I’m the king of the north.” I’m from a place where it’s just blue, white, cold, and just grayish. What’s crazy is, for me, I didn’t take it so seriously when other people would talk about their therapy lamps and everything. A lot of people, when they think about SAD, they only think about themselves personally. They don’t consider it to be within the wheelhouse of depression. I think most people see it as kind of a luxury, like people who are used to living in luxury kind of would complain about being supposedly depressed, because they’re getting a little bit of sunlight or not enough sunlight.

Mila Myles:
Those are my personal experiences, but as I got older and left college, I started to realize that I lived in closer quarters with people who are truly affected by the lack of sunlight, especially when I moved to New York. In New York, even in the summer we don’t get as much sunlight as most people because of the tall buildings and the close quarters that we share with everyone. That’s why everyone flocks to the parks, right? I just talked to a friend the other day, and she told me she’s becoming agoraphobic, and this is something that I actually tried to talk to a few friends about at the midway point, like June/July of quarantine, because when the sun came out, that’s when everybody was like, “Okay. It’s time for me to leave the house.”

Mila Myles:
I just wanted to list off a few things that we found in our research. Approximately 5% of Americans experience SAD or Seasonal Affective Disorder, for on average 40% of the year. That’s a national study, so I can only imagine in a place like New York, in a place like Midwood, that those numbers could possibly be higher from your experience. A lot of people might not know this who are listening, but both of our guests today work within the Midwood area at our Midwood hub, where they offer a lot of social services and a lot of therapeutic services to the community, where they both worked for a few years, which we’ll get into later.

Mila Myles:
Our first guest is Carmela Fridman. She is the acting Chief Medical Officer at The Jewish Board and a board certified psychiatrist providing direct patient care at the Brooklyn REAL PROS and Seymour Askin Counseling Center, both located at the Brooklyn Hub. Our second guest is Michelle Latimer. She is a psychiatric nurse practitioner and the director of psychiatric practice at The Jewish Board. She has worked in every Jewish Board clinic and is currently seeing clients in the Bronx, Borough Park, and in Bay Ridge. Welcome to New York State of Mindfulness, you two. Thank you for taking some time from your busy schedules, and I’m sure exhaustive schedules, to come and talk with us today and tell us a little bit more about what you two do.

Carmela Fridman:
Thank you for having us.

Mila Myles:
Of course. My first question I have is first, how long have you been with The Jewish Board, and what’s your relationship to the Midwood area?

Carmela Fridman:
I’ll start. I pretty much grew up, was raised in or near the Midwood area, and had spent most of my life there. I went to Midwood High School. I came back as an adult, after my education, to the Midwood area because it’s near and dear to my heart, which is how I ended up at the Brooklyn Hub. I’ve been with The Jewish Board for nearly 10 years now and have worked at the Brooklyn Hub for pretty much the entire time. It wasn’t called the Brooklyn Hub at that time, but I’ve been at those particular programs from pretty much the very beginning.

Mila Myles:
Oh, and you, Michelle? 10 years.

Michelle Latimer:
So, I was just thinking, in February will make eight years that I’m here. When I first came to The Jewish Board, that was my clinic site for the first two years that I was here. I’m from Arizona, so the sunlight contrast between New York and Arizona is always of interest. And I end up talking about these things a lot with my own little cohort of people that are here, and how everyone’s dealing, because we think you just get your batteries charged in a totally different way living in such a sunny place for so long. Then, you come here, and you’re like, “It’s such a difference.”

Carmela Fridman:
And the snow is definitely not helping in the winters, because it just turns to sludge so quickly after it falls.

Michelle Latimer:
Absolutely.

Mila Myles:
Oh. That’s my favorite part, just getting it all stuck in your boots. That’s the worst. Okay, combined 18 years basically. I mean, overlapping years, but combined. That’s a lot of experience, especially throughout most of The Jewish Board’s clinics. I was looking at a little bit more information about the area that you work in, in Midwood, and I saw that there are a lot of parks and green spaces. I remember when I visited that area a few times, when friends lived in the area, it seemed a lot more spaced out. With quarantine and this time of year, I can only imagine that even in the spaces that you guys work in, a lot of people are still coming in with possibly even double diagnosis, right? Like, SAD compounded with something that they already were suffering from or quarantine fatigue, which I think a lot of people are getting.

Mila Myles:
I’m wondering, between the two of you and all the work that you’ve done, you’ve worked in this field long enough to almost have your own journal publications of just things that you’ve found that, sometimes, might oppose some of the things that your own education has taught you, right? Basically, being in the field. I’m wondering, and I think a lot of people, like I said earlier, kind of seeing the question ‘the diagnosis for seasonal affective disorder,’ but really I want to know: how is it different from just being actually sad, or how could someone tell? I feel like a lot of people feel sad around the wintertime, and sometimes it could be exasperated from the holiday season and natural feelings of being lonely, and how can someone tell the difference from just feeling under the weather during the holidays versus actually having seasonal affective disorder?

Mila Myles:
Wow, and you said it’s about two years, right? Because you have to be sure that it’s an actual diagnosis and not, I don’t want to say a fluke, but just a one-time experience that someone’s figured out how to remedy?

Carmela Fridman:
Yeah. It has to be cyclical, right? It comes back during that season. I think you had mentioned that it tends to be more common in the winter months, but there are people that have seasonal affective disorder in the summer time. It’s less common, but it happens.

Mila Myles:
Yeah. Wow. I am actually a person who’s a fan of gloomy weather, so when the summer comes around, actually I found myself having depressive weeks, because I felt that there was so much pressure on me to go out and enjoy the sunlight. I’m a very extroverted person, but for some reason in the summer, there feels to be so much more pressure on that, that I prefer to not be bothered and not be in the house, and that’s actually some of the time when I actually disappear from a lot of social gatherings or have a lot of Irish exits, so to speak. Or I take my bike to the party so no one else can leave with me, just so I can have more time to myself. That’s why I miss growing up in Michigan. The summer feels like a time where there’s a lot of pressure to socialize and be around a lot of people, so I’m happy that you said that.

Michelle Latimer:
Right, and for it to be like this particular idyllic thing, right? You’ve got to bring the picnic, get the blanket, and it has to look like this. Yeah, it’s a lot of pressure.

Mila Myles:
There’s so much pressure to be punctual too. My birthday is this weekend. I’m a December baby, so I actually thrive in the wintertime. I love it. It’s a new thing to even be around the sun so much and warmth in the winter for me, so I’m happy that you said that. I think, again, a lot of people only think that SAD takes place in the deadest of winter. I wonder, a lot of people who might suffer from other forms of depression before that season shift, that can also exacerbate the possibility of then, again like I said, compounded depression because of the season.

Mila Myles:
I really did see that happen and take place a lot during quarantine. It’s almost been like a year-long depression for some people, because they were coming out of the winter depressed. Then, when their season shifts, and it’s usually the kind of rhythm that they have like, “Okay. Spring is here. I can be outside and be around more people—“ but then that changed. I could only imagine that your offices and phone lines might be, I’m surprised that you even have time to talk to me today honestly. I would only imagine that even during the summery months, that this year you can kind of see a different type of seasonal depression that’s taking place in the summer, because people feel like they should be able to at least be outside, and then a lot of them can’t. How does seasonal depression affect the communities you serve at Midwood?

Carmela Fridman:
I think that we spoke, we touched a little bit about that already. I think that because the winters are not super bright, it’s going to have a double depression effect. I have clients that already had been coming to me for depression or bipolar disorder, and then when the season comes around, it’s a big shift. They don’t always have a luxury of going to Israel, Florida, or somewhere nice and warm. A lot of the folks in the neighborhood are families. They have kids that are supposed to be in school, even if it’s a modified blended model these days for them because of COVID, but they don’t have the luxury to just get up and go somewhere else. They’re here taking care of their kids and trying to kind of do their thing, so that’s extra challenging.

Mila Myles:
I guess I would have possibly even been one of those people, since when the summer hit, a lot of peoples’ leases were up. It was time for new lease signing, and the idea of having to try to live with another set of people, roommates, or commit to another lease, for me, and I think for a lot of other people, was a lot more daunting than going and getting the sublet Airbnb somewhere sunnier. I didn’t even realize until this moment that I had committed to not being in New York for the entire winter just so I would not trick myself if I could afford to avoid suffering from seasonal depression. Have you ever had to recommend that to any of your clients if they could, or have some of your clients actually taken a mini quarantine vacation to somewhere brighter and sunnier for this reason?

Carmela Fridman:
I mean, I think that we can make those recommendations, but a lot of our folks, as I mentioned, don’t have the luxury to be doing that. And so, even light therapy, which would probably be more affordable than taking a trip somewhere, would be nice. But even light therapy, to get a good piece of equipment, can be expensive to get the right kind of light box. It can be expensive, so even that isn’t always easy. What we do try to encourage are much more simple self care techniques. It’s still to go out, and it’s still to go to public spaces, parks, even during COVID. They obviously can’t go indoors anywhere at this time, but they need to have a change of scenery, so that sometimes just looks like going out, even if it’s taking the stroller on Ocean Parkway. That would be the best recommendation we can make that would be helpful to the most amount of people.

Mila Myles:
Right. Just some open air. If you can’t get a lot of sunlight, even just being under the sky can help a lot, right?

Michelle Latimer:
It’s really important.

Carmela Fridman:
Absolutely.

Michelle Latimer:
Yeah, and I think we just try to think to talk to people about practical things, like pre-COVID I’m always talking to clients when summer is coming up of like, “Do you have air conditioners? Do you have access to get them?”, because it’s not something that’s easily affordable for a lot of our folks. I think a lot of the conversations I’ve had these days are, “Do you have warm winter things? Do you have things so that the kids could go out and play, and you can be there with them without freezing?”

Mila Myles:
Wow.

Michelle Latimer:
We can’t do indoor play dates right now, right? Just talking to people about that kind of planning, saying, “Look. Of course, you want to go outside, so let’s figure out how we can help get you there.” I think, and just normalizing it like, “This winter, we’re all going to need to be out a little bit more, because we can’t count on the other in person pick-me-ups that we might use otherwise.” Obviously, holidays may be really lacking for some people who are trying to socially distance, and that’s going to be very difficult and painful, so people are especially going to be reliant on the ability to just, as you say, get out, get some air, get some light even if it’s not southern, ocean-side quality light.

Mila Myles:
Don’t worry. I had to give up my lease for it.

Michelle Latimer:
Worth every penny.

Mila Myles:
Exactly, and also crash with different family members for a month at a time, which has been nice, but I do miss having my own quarters.

Michelle Latimer:
If it was ever a year to couch surf, I think this is the one, if it gets you in front of the ocean.

Mila Myles:
Yeah. Definitely. What’s crazy is that I have thalassophobia. I am deeply afraid of open water. I can look at it, but even then my heart races. I ran from the ocean one night for no reason whatsoever, because I thought that a tidal wave was coming in, so there’s a catch to it. There’s a catch to it. But I really actually came here so I can get some air. That’s actually what I really wanted to come for, was for more than sunlight. I don’t really mind the sunlight, and I think that’s why I was talking about being in Michigan. In Michigan, like you said earlier, what’s really important is if people can’t afford some of the other things that might alleviate some of their symptoms in depression, the least that they can do is go outside and get some fresh air.

Mila Myles:
In Michigan, what a lot of people do is they just throw winter clothes on their children, about three layers, slap Vaseline on their faces, and push them out the door while the hot cocoa is on the stove until they decide to come in. I didn’t realize that was something that possibly, because my mother suffered from manic depressive bipolar disorder, and I didn’t realize a lot of the different self care techniques that my stepfather would do and that my mother would do for herself, especially in the winter months. I think that’s actually amazing, and I didn’t consider that when thinking about SAD, even within my community from my neighbors, that even donating winter clothes for the sake of actually alleviating depression for people who can’t afford to even afford the lamps or ring lights. Wow, I’m kind of blown away that’s something that’s so simple that I did not consider at all.

Michelle Latimer:
I mean, just thinking about, because like you said: I’ve covered it, [in] all the clinics that we have. We have one in Coney Island that is half a block off the beach. It was interesting to me always how in tune with the rhythms of the ocean that a lot of the clients were, and how many of the clients were like, “Well, I go on the beach or I go on the boardwalk all winter long, like all year round.” They got it. Living so close and being that close to the weather, right off the ocean.

Michelle Latimer:
But Midwood is really close to Coney Island too, right? We’re talking I think maybe six stops on the subway from Coney, so they’re really close, but it’s just far enough that it wouldn’t necessarily naturally occur to our clients. I think often it’s reminding folks, “Listen, you might think of Coney as a place that you go in the summer, but we need to think a little differently this year,” and there’s nothing like that ocean quality of life. I think in Michigan, it’s not an option to not go out six months of the year, so that problem is already solved, whereas in New York we kind of don’t go out in the winter sometimes.

Mila Myles:
Exactly.

Michelle Latimer:
Getting people in that mindset of like, “This year, what can we do to try to get ourselves out there?”

Mila Myles:
Wow. Wow. I’m happy we’re talking about this. Again, I think because we know what SAD is, we don’t realize that just getting out, whether the sun is out or not can still offer a little bit of something to help you with that. Wow. I’m so happy. Now you’re going to have me calling my best homegirls from college like, “Girl, I’ve got something for you.”

Michelle Latimer:
And it’s the thing that you say to people in reverse about sun screen in the summer, right? That even on a cloudy day, a good 70% of the UV rays still come through. Even though psychologically it might not have the same quality, it’s still very activating in that way.

Mila Myles:
Wow. Now I see. It’s right there, written plainly when you look it up, but we think about just direct sunlight so often that we don’t think about the UV actual rays that are actually hitting us regardless of if the sun is beaming down. I think when we think of SAD, we think about, again, seasonal affective disorder and which season that comes in. I really do think that people often times immediately correlate it with tanning, you know what I mean? I think they immediately correlate it with tanning, and I think you guys have heard this from your clients saying things like, “Oh. Because I don’t have a tan, I’m depressed,” but I really didn’t realize that, “Oh yeah. I’m outside, and I’m still getting air.”

Mila Myles:
Like you said, in Michigan the sun in the winter is not always directly beaming down on us, but through the clouds, and it’s gray days but, again like I told you, it’s still very bright. So, there is some light, but I really didn’t realize that I was still being taken care of. My melanin was being treated, and that’s another thing I wanted to get into. You kind of already answered my next question a little bit, which is kind of how does it affect clients differently based on their class, race, religious affiliation, or even location within Brooklyn? I think we talked on that a little bit when it comes to living close to a lot of buildings, and whether some people can afford to go somewhere where there is more sun or wear warmer clothes, still go outside, and get some sunlight.

Mila Myles:
But another topic I want to talk you about, I guess especially comes along with religious affiliation and race, because a lot of Black and brown people, we’ve grown up not even thinking that we need to wear any SPF, no sun block, because our skin protects us. I knew about our Vitamin D being, like we grew up and my mom would always tell me like, “Our Vitamin D is special. I don’t really need that much sunlight, because I have Vitamin D,” but to find out that it’s actually the opposite, and I’m probably at higher risk for SAD with not actually having any UV or any sunlight. Have you been seeing that a lot more, and also with religious affiliation? Have you seen any different proportion or disproportionate amount of people depending on their religious affiliation, and I guess that must come down to cultural practices and how SAD affects them more, if it affects them at all?

Carmela Fridman:
I mean, you certainly pointed out that persons of color definitely, they’re not absorbing the Vitamin D in the same way that white/Caucasian individuals be absorbing it. That in itself puts them at risk. They can definitely supplement with Vitamin D. In fact, so many New Yorkers, no matter what their religion, cultural background, race, so many New Yorkers have a deficiency in Vitamin D anyway, so that’s always important to address, and it would certainly help with seasonal affective disorder.

Mila Myles:
Wow. I’m really looking forward to this conversation reaching so many other peoples’ ears who need to hear this, and also know that they’re not alone. Even if they’re people who don’t take their SAD seriously, that it’s actually a serious thing that they can also remedy themselves a little bit, while also seeking help. I mean, even myself, while I’m getting sunlight, I think that some of the other things that might, again, exasperate a possibility or put me at higher risk for SAD, even when I’m around a lot more sun and air, being indoors is the thing that is really getting to me and a lot of other people. To get the permission from two very highly trained psychiatrists to tell us that we can go outside, and we will be fine as long as we take our precautions, is really affirming to hear.

Michelle Latimer:
I mean, it makes me think of, I almost did midwifery, so I had lots of mom and little tiny baby conversations: “How we always give the advice to take the baby outside? Go outside with the baby. Expose the baby to whatever the season is. Walk with the baby during the day. Get the baby in the proper circadian rhythms,” so I think it’s even bigger. It’s not just sunlight exposure, but it’s nature exposure, we think goes a long way. It doesn’t have to be in the middle of the woods, right? We never want to suggest things that aren’t achievable to our clients who are living all over the place, who are living in the south Bronx, or east side of Harlem, where there’s not a lot of parkland. You can still be outside, and there are still indicators to you of what is the season, and being connected in that larger sense, we think, makes a huge difference. It’s great if it’s a sunny day, but even if not, these other pieces are really critical and important.

Carmela Fridman:
And also trying to maintain some sort of structure and routine to your days, which is super hard during COVID times, because people are more isolating. They’re maybe sleeping in, because they don’t need to be somewhere at a certain time. Their entire structure is completely off, and it’s so important to stick to a certain routine: to wake up in the morning when the sun is out and to go to sleep when the sun comes down so that you can get that circadian rhythm going properly, have the melatonin peak it’s supposed to and dip when it’s supposed to, so it’s really helpful to have that kind of routine in place as well.

Mila Myles:
Yeah. I guess I wanted to add, especially when it comes to SAD, quarantine, and peoples’ circadian rhythm, like you said, it’s important to establish a routine, which— have you seen a pattern, or a pattern starts to develop, with the way that peoples’ quarantine or their routine has been along with the spike in COVID cases, like, the result of those COVID cases’ spikes being another wave of lockdown? Have you noticed that, or do you think that people have gotten the hang of it, and it’s kind of really leveled out to them already doing the same kind of self care and keeping to their routine, because this has been the norm?

Carmela Fridman:
[crosstalk 00:29:22] I think they were doing. Oh. Go ahead, Michelle. Do you want to go?

Michelle Latimer:
No. Go ahead. Go ahead.

Carmela Fridman:
I was going to say that I think that in March, when the lockdowns happened in New York City, and when it gotten summer I think people started to get more into the routine in the summer months, but now with the second and third wave, whatever they’re calling it, that second or third wave at this point, I think that it’s getting people to kind of get back into their shells a little bit more. People are moving away from the routines that they were starting to establish. I think this season and COVID happening, the second wave happening in Midwood areas specifically … We were in a red zone not that long ago, and we’re currently in a yellow zone, but I wouldn’t be surprised if we go back into an orange or red zone really shortly. But it’s really made people kind of move away from some of those routines again.

Mila Myles:
Yeah.

Michelle Latimer:
And I was thinking too, both at the beginning, especially people with kids had these aspirational structures that they put in place, but they also did indulgent things that were maybe not great, right? If you saw all of these comfort foods that were practically going off the market, all of a sudden people were buying them by the truck like, “I need to feel better.” So, I think we see both the structure has dropped, but it can be really hard for people to get in a place of new habits.

Michelle Latimer:
It already feels like there’s very little that brings them pleasure right now, so to suggest more structure and more things that feel not fun to them, like say to people, “Great. Exercise would be good,” just sounds like crazy talk to people, even though it’s exactly what most people need. I think with people in general with season affective disorder, but just all kinds of depression, I do think there’s that pull towards having what I would call vampire hours. They want to stay up until 4:00 AM, and they want to sleep. You’re like, “You know me. You’ve seen me at my house.” And you want to sleep until 4:00 PM, and then you’re a mess, and you wonder why. So, don’t do that. Cut it out.

Mila Myles:
That was the rhythm at one point at the beginning of quarantine, because it was just like, “Oh. It’s the end of the world. It’s fine. Everything around me is a flame.” Then, I did start to get into a routine, where now I wake up at 7:30 every day almost. Then, no matter when I was visiting family in LA, and now in the south, and I’m hoping that when I get back to New York, because I’m going to be back in a few weeks, I’m hoping that stays in the same place. I wake up early, and it kind of helped that I was in LA for a little bit, because then I got used to waking up very early to stay on New York time, because I still am doing my day job online.

Mila Myles:
I get up early now, but the thing is, in keeping that healthier rhythm, the hard part is in keeping those healthier rhythm … I think you see some people, and some of your clients might have that rhythm, and then they’re reminded it’s a global pandemic. That happens to me. I get anxious all over again, and kind of worry that it’s going to slip me into depression. So, I can understand how it’s kind of hard to stick to that routine that sets up a different type of normal for you, because everything around you is not so stable. You feel a little guilty having and maintaining your own stability when that’s not the case around you. I’m still working at it, and I’m happy that I got ahead and took some of your tips.

Mila Myles:
Of course, I did read some of the research before this, so I think I probably kind of started doing it subconsciously to take care of myself, since I was already reading about the work that you two do. But in that, I guess another question I wanted to leave everybody with and you two with, and I think we already discussed that, but just in case people wanted a straight out list of recommendations from the two of you, what are some practical tips you would to listeners, people, and our followers on social media who might be coping with SAD, or have a loved one or friends who need support, and they don’t really know what to do? And the things that they have been doing that we find so easily online, like buying a lamp, what are some things that you would recommend for them to help themselves or help other people in their lives?

Carmela Fridman:
There’s definitely the things that you can Google, which is, as you said, the lamp, Vitamin D supplements, and you can come visit us at a clinic and maybe get an anti-depressant to help with some of those symptoms if it really feels like other techniques are not helping. We’ve talked about the Vitamin D supplementation, especially if there’s a deficiency. So, there’s some really solid things that can be done, and a lot of it is really behavioral and getting out there, like we said, and taking care of ourselves. Even hydrating. I saw that big bottle of yours of water. All of those things are really important, and trying to eat healthy. In season affective disorder, one of the common symptoms is that people tend to overeat, and that just leads to a whole set of other problems, so all of that self care is also very important.

Michelle Latimer:
I think exercise. When people imagine exercise, who don’t do it, I think it can sound exotic and unachievable. People can think, “Well, I don’t want to be in the gym.” Even people that used to go to gyms, they’re obviously, “You people are very right to have a lot of ambivalence about returning to the gym,” so how can you take care of yourself at home? Really, going for a walk counts as exercise. This would be really helpful. I think people can sometimes make it such a big goal in their head, and set the bar so high that they don’t do it at all. Getting people to just buy into just going for a walk for 20 minutes a day has real value on so many levels. It doesn’t have to cost anything, but it’s an amazing way to take care of yourself.

Mila Myles:
Yeah. When I started walking more in the mornings, because I had a slight injury on my leg, so on top of that, because of quarantine I couldn’t go and get the care that I needed to try and go workout more. But once I started just taking those walks, either at the very beginning of the day or the very end of my work day … Just before the sun would set in the summer, I would go outside. Me and my partner would take at least an hour walk in our neighborhood, and I can say that it also woke me up a little bit more. I depended less on the coffee. I depended less on other things, like at the end of your week, a little cocktail on a Zoom happy hour. My body just wanted more water and fresh vegetables just for taking those walks.

Mila Myles:
Also, I think that I would like to say that a lot of the tips that you guys have also mentioned, doing any one of them, just attempting to take care of yourself boosts your self esteem and self confidence in a way that even sitting in the sun all day could probably never do, to where you actually start to feel a little bit better about yourself; which is a huge symptom of depression, right? And a little bit more happiness and pride in doing something in an effort to take care of yourself. So, I’m really grateful for a lot of your recommendations, because I’m about to put the rest of it in my life. We were talking about kids in school earlier, but I feel like I just got an A- on my test today.

Michelle Latimer:
Your walks are so smart, the way you were doing them too, because they’re grounding and they connected you to your community, right?

Mila Myles:
Yeah. They did.

Michelle Latimer:
Like you saw. You knew what was going on, and it’s what we do with little kids, and we forget to do it with ourselves, but you used to nanny. It’s that a little kid will notice. They’re doing construction on this corner now. They’re building this building. This tree has yellow leaves now, and they’re falling on the ground. We do it with little kids, and then we forget to do it with ourselves.

Mila Myles:
You’re right.

Michelle Latimer:
But it makes us feel like, “I’m here, and here is not on fire, literally. I’m okay, and I’m walking. My feet are on the ground. We’re okay here.” It lets you be connected into what’s going on. “There’s that lady again with that fancy dog.”

Mila Myles:
Oh my gosh. You guys are truly observant psychiatrists, because you’re right. I was in a new neighborhood visiting family, and it was really shocking to me and my walking partner to see that the people who we were living with, because they drive everywhere, didn’t even know the community that they had just bought a house in. But we walked around, and neighbors let us at a distance pick limes from their trees.

Carmela Fridman:
Nice.

Mila Myles:
[We’d] discover fruit we had never seen before and eat it. We were picking figs all summer. We would come home with whole fruit bowls and notice how community-oriented the rest of our neighborhood was, but living on a busy street and never leaving the house in a neighborhood, you would never know that. We walked into gardens under those power lines that they have in LA, and to meet so many elderly neighbors, who loved that we were respecting social distancing, that they would invite us into their gardens and give us fruit. There was a huge language barrier between us and them, and still we did feel more grounded and a lot less lonely.

Michelle Latimer:
Right. A thing that you probably were not doing on your walks is being on your phone. I think it’s so easy to get into news cycle overload in 2020. We all know it’s not healthy, and we continue to do it, and I think it’s sort of the opposite piece, right? If you’re out and walking, you want to get off your phone, don’t be having conversations, don’t be scrolling, don’t be texting, and really be present, right?

Mila Myles:
Yeah.

Carmela Fridman:
Present.

Michelle Latimer:
It’s its own form of meditation in some ways.

Mila Myles:
Truly.

Michelle Latimer:
If meditation is not your thing, but people probably are on their phones more than they need to be, and it doesn’t probably help your mood. If people kind of track and see what their mood is like, probably less phone equals better mood most of the time.

Mila Myles:
Yeah. I think the best thing that we would do for ourselves is we would just not care to make sure our phones were charged, so even if the compulsory behavior that all of us have developed to still have our phone on us for safety, once we’re out, and I told you our walks would be almost an hour long, within 20 minutes of our walk our phones would die. So, we couldn’t do anything really about it, and I love having a dead phone if no one’s worried about my safety. The thing that I miss the most, and I never mentioned this, but I talked about how I didn’t really have that much seasonal depression even living in New York, but I skateboard. I would go outside.

Mila Myles:
In New York, I ride my bike and skateboard all year round. As long as there’s not any snow or ice on the ground, I’m skating or I’m riding my bike. I don’t even know all of the names of the streets, and I’ve lived there 10 years. I just know where I’m going intuitively, because I skate and ride my bike so much. Of course, I can’t be on my phone then. That usually ends up in disaster. It does. You guys have kids, so you know. It’s definitely going to end in disaster. I have a lot of skinned knees, but yeah. I would do that a lot. Another thing that I do miss is, before having jobs that required that I have a smart phone, there would be times when my phone would break or get stolen, and I would just decide that it wasn’t worth spending another $150 for two or three months for another phone. I would go two to three months with solely using my computer, which allowed me to think more, meditate more, and just have more intimacy with my surroundings. So, I’m really happy that you said that, that people should just put their phone away. Also, again, that nowadays for 2020, that’s the source of a lot of our anxiety as well.

Mila Myles:
Thank you to our guests, Carmela and Michelle, for joining us today. To learn more about their work in Midwood, check out Jewishboard.org. Lastly, remember that you are not alone. If you or a loved one lives in NYC and needs mental health services and support, call our non-emergency intake line at 1-844-ONE-CALL. Again, that’s 1-844-ONE-CALL. Don’t forget to follow us on Instagram and Twitter, and like us on Facebook.

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