Cold Plunge Enthusiast Now Unable to Experience Joy at Temperatures Above Freezing

Daily cold plunge practitioner Derek Frostholm has reported that after 18 months of immersing himself in water at temperatures between 1 and 3 degrees Celsius, he has lost the ability to experience positive emotions at ambient temperatures above freezing. 'I used to feel things,' Frostholm said, sitting in his living room with a visible expression of what a casual observer might describe as 'nothing.' 'Happiness. Contentment. The warm satisfaction of a summer evening. Now I feel those things exclusively in ice water. Room temperature is emotional flatline. A warm shower is existential void.' Frostholm's cold plunge journey began in 2024, when he purchased a commercial ice bath after watching a podcast in which a neuroscientist described the dopamine-boosting effects of cold exposure. The initial sessions produced 'euphoria, mental clarity, and a feeling of being profoundly alive.' Over time, however, the threshold for those feelings shifted. By month six, Frostholm needed water below 5 degrees to achieve the dopamine response. By month twelve, he was adding bags of ice to already-cold water. By month eighteen, he had installed a commercial glycol chiller that maintains his plunge at 1 degree Celsius — one degree above the freezing point of water. 'A warm day used to make me happy,' Frostholm said. 'Now a warm day is just a day when I can't plunge. My brain has been rewired. The only temperature that produces joy is the one that also produces hypothermia.' Frostholm's physician, Dr. Sarah Levin, confirmed that 'repeated cold exposure does upregulate dopamine receptors, but there is a point at which the body recalibrates its baseline, and normal temperatures feel subjectively less rewarding. Derek appears to have crossed that point roughly eleven months ago.' Frostholm's wife has adjusted the household thermostat to 15 degrees Celsius as a compromise. 'It's the only temperature at which he'll smile indoors,' she said. 'I wear a coat in my own living room. But at least he's present.'