Beating Seasonal Depression
In The Rocky Mountains

At approximately 8,000 feet above sea level, just west of the North American Continental Divide, a group of women and girls is riding through a snowstorm.

Some of the group is skiing and some are snowboarding; weaving in between trees and lift poles and deviations in the rolling slope. They ride up the chair in doubles—watching their cohort as they pass below—hooting and squealing and carrying on in a way that would be bizarrely over enthusiastic anywhere else. They high-five and fist bump and build each other up in a unique and powerful way.

Depression is among the most commonly diagnosed psychological phenomenon in America, and impacts an estimated 16.1 million adults.

The reduction in sunlight in the winter months can reduce the levels of serotonin and melatonin in the brain, deregulating mood and sleep cycles. Seasonal depression is accompanied by feelings of hopelessness, a lack of energy, difficulty concentrating, changes in appetite, a general loss of pleasure in treasured activities, and powerful, morbid thoughts.

Isolation, depression, and madness are synonymous with tales of cabin fever—the sensation of being immobilized in snow covered mountains.

But winter doesn’t have to feel this way.

Girls-on-Shred is a community that encourages women in Montana and Idaho to spend time with each other during the bitterly cold months of the Rocky Mountain winter—doing something that feels scary and new.

The group hosts snowboard and ski clinics for women and girls and tries to explore every corner of the small mountains where they convene. The organization works with resort leadership to provide discounted lift tickets to women and girls who may otherwise find enjoying the mountains to be cost-prohibitive.

A paradigm for female solidarity and confidence emerges from the storm, where silliness and danger intermingle in pure, driven snow. With flakes blotting out the sun and wind-chill values hovering around 0°F, a group of women in rural Montana are sharing joy, exercise, and a rare kind of camaraderie.

The competition is friendly while also being physically rigorous. They huddle together near a terrain park feature or a glade of trees, talking about techniques and tumbles and overcoming fear. When someone in the group goes down, the rest wait; when someone executes a new maneuver, cheers go up.

These are the months where seasonal depression and cabin fever have their opportunity to pounce: a difficult time of the year to spend more than a few hours outdoors.

Group support has limitless permutations—and while this is not a traditional way for rural American women to fortify their self-confidence—it seems to be working in Montana. 

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