Oh, would you look at that?! I have returned to the blog I abandoned for three months because I went so far beyond angry about what has happened in said months that I couldn't even bring myself to write about it. Or anything, really. I just wallowed in my rage. Writing about it probably would have helped, but apparently, my brain needed the sun to fuck off entirely before it'd even consider letting me start tippy-tapping.

But I'm here now. Ready to unleash my fury about the absolute shitshow Summer '26 has been. Buckle up!

I have mentioned in previous posts that I suffer from spring-onset seasonal depression. I've never been a huge fan of summer, but it got a lot worse after I became chronically ill. Back in the day, my beef with summer was purely the seemingly never-ending break from school. The weather didn't bother me at all. I just wish I was enjoying it at school. But then it did become about the weather, and it got BAD.

Despite the title of this post, which I chose for the chuckle factor, I can't remember exactly which summer it was that it started to become an actual problem™️, but I imagine it was in the same year I started learning about climate change. In my third year of university, I finally decided to seek some help for what was becoming a very obvious pattern as soon as the "blues" (they were more like reds and oranges, tbh) hit.

Unfortunately, I was a patient of the Student Health Centre at the time, and because the problem existed outside of semester time, I didn't get much help other than the diagnosis and I eventually just... learnt to deal with it in my own way. Which is what I've been doing ever since, because even after I switched to regular GPs, none of them had any idea how to handle the weirdo form of seasonal depression.

When my now husband told me that we might be moving to the Netherlands just before the summer of 2016, I was ecstatic. I was well aware of the stereotype that the Netherlands is rainy and cold, and while New Zealand isn't exactly the tropical paradise some people seem to think it is, I was so excited to be moving somewhere with weather I thought was going to be more suitable for someone like me.

I was wrong. So, so wrong.

I do believe that the first couple of summers were "typical Dutch summers". Average highs of 22°C (71°F), with reasonable amounts of sunshine in amongst a little bit of rain here and there. One or two extra hot days, but mostly pleasant and less of a drag on my mental health. I think that if I was presented with what has now become Dutch summers in those first two years, I definitely would have made a bigger effort to leave before we'd firmly rooted ourselves here.

Because it's honestly worse than New Zealand ever was (and still is!) now, and it's just one of the many things I have grown to dislike about this country, but that's a whole 'nother blog entry, which I've actually been working on in the missing months but I just couldn't bring myself to finish it. Maybe it'll be the next thing I post here. Watch this space! But now, back to the point at hand:

The Netherlands is being royally fucked by climate change.

It started with one, maybe two heatwaves every summer. A week, tops, of 30+°C (86°F) heat, usually broken by an epic storm that brought us back to those "typical" 22°C temperatures I mentioned earlier for the rest of the summer. It definitely sucked for those few days, but it was really nothing compared to what is happening now. I'd actually give anything to return to the single heatwave summers where I'd only be out of any meaningful action for a week or two, rather than THREE ENTIRE FOOKIN' MONTHS!

That's exactly what happened this year. The first heatwave happened at the end of May. Even though we'd gotten aircon installed back in April, and we were able to keep our house at a quite reasonable 23°C (73°F), I still had dogs to walk, errands to run, and appointments to go to. I changed my schedule to accommodate the dog walking, but I couldn't do shit about the errands and appointments. Aircon is only all well and good if you don't have to leave your house.

From there, we had three more heatwaves. One a month, with both of the June and July ones lasting WEEKS. And to make matters even worse, with each one came all of the folk who willingly live in places that I can only classify as "Satan's butthole" refusing to understand the concept of abnormal heat and acclimatisation, asking why we don't all just get aircon. That pissed me off almost more than the actual weather, because it's the same brand of stupidity that has lead to these fuckass heatwaves.

I can't lie. The aircon did make a huge difference to my physical comfort, but the fact that we need aircon in the Netherlands absolutely obliterated my mental comfort. I was essentially paralysed by the experience. It sounds so fucking stupid as I type it out, but that's exactly what happened. It's why this blog didn't get an update for three months, despite me having plenty to whinge about. I was so far beyond angry with what was happening that I couldn't be bothered to be angry.

And that made me even angrier.

I'm glad I have this blog.