Can aromatherapy help with SAD symptoms?

Many essential oils have anti-depressant properties and these can be used to help lift the mood in winter. Those who suffer from seasonal affective disorder may be helped by aromatherapy in combination with other therapies.

If you have SAD and are feeling blue, it's important to do all you can to improve your well-being and mood. Several essential oils have anti-depressant properties helping to your lift your mood when you are down and also boost your energy when you are feeling lethargic and sleepy. They are probably not enough in themselves to dispel SAD symptoms but in combination with other ways of tackling your condition they can provide a welcome element.

Consult an aromatherapist about the best oils to select for your particular circumstances but a general guideline about the best aromatherapy oils to select when you lack energy and feel depressed is to choose from

• bergamot
• clary sage
• geranium
• jasmine
• lavender
• melissa
• orange
• sandalwood

As essential oils are too strong to use directly, you need to dilute them (add 8 drops of an oil you particularly like to 20ml of a carrier (neutral) oil to use as a massage oil) or simply add 5 drops of essential oil to your bath.

Psychiatrist Teodor Postolache from Washington U.S. has done some research into the links between seasonal affective disorder and the sense of smell. His studies have indicated that the sense of smell in SAD patients in the throes of winter depression was less accurate than those without SAD. Yet in summer their sense of smell recovered and become better than those without SAD.

As there is a direct link between your sense of smell and memory, emotion and mood and it is a key part of instinctive behaviour which plays a role in self-preservation in all animals, including awareness of the seasons, it may be that the sense of smell is tied up in some way to the development of SAD symptoms in some people.

Back to Questions about SAD