Does anyone else get "Ramadan Depression"?

As salaamu alaykum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh

I've been experiencing this strange phenomenon for every Ramadan that I can remember since becoming Muslim.

I always look forward to Ramadan and I feel the initial wave of happiness when that first Maghrib adhan comes in, and I always hope and expect to feel a significant boost in Iman.

But that feeling never comes. I've had brief glimpses where I've tasted the sweetness of Iman so I know what it feels like, and I always hope and expect that that feeling will come easy and often during Ramadan, but it never does. Instead I just feel nothing.

Usually during regular Salah I'm able to retain a small amount of khushu, but in Ramadan it's just completely gone. I don't feel any aversion or negative feelings towards Salah or ibadah, but I also don't feel any increase in Iman or khushu either. It just feels like nothingness.

And then that bums me out and make me think that perhaps I'm a munaafiq or Allah is angry with me or something and then it just sends me down the rabbit hole of sadness and hopelessness and apathy. I try to maintain focus in Taraweeh but inevitably my mind starts drifting because I don't understand most of the Arabic, and then I feel like I'm just going with the motions but I'm not really praying or accomplish anything, just going through the bodily movements but I don't feel anything in my heart.

I still go to Taraweeh as often as I can, and this year I made it my goal to memorize a particular surah which I've pretty much done, and I try to make extra Du'a, Sunnah prayers, all that. But I just feel nothing in my heart. Whereas outside of Ramadan, when I pray and am able to maintain some khushu, I get a bit of that feeling in my heart ya know. But in Ramadan it's just nothing.

I've talked to my wife and some close brothers about it but I seem to be the only one I know that experiences this. Maybe it's just from sins? Maybe I'm taking it too easy in Ramadan and I need to try harder (I did waste a lot of time this year and previous years). For me the difficult part of Ramadan isn't refraining from food and drink but refraining from the sins I still struggle with. So I fear my Ramadan and past Ramadans are probably not going to be accepted because of the hadith of "Allah is not in need of his leaving his food and drink". Then it kinda ruins Eid because I know I didn't do anything to deserve to celebrate.

Does anyone else experience this? Am I alone? It's making me start to almost dread the coming of Ramadan and look forward to its ending because I know it's just going to be this weird empty feeling depression cycle over and over, and I doubt that my Ramadan will be accepted from me.

And I'm not trying to be all "woe is me" and have anyone feel sorry for me or try to comfort me, I'm just wondering if anyone else experiences this and if anyone knows a practical solution to this problem.

JazakumAllah Khair wa BaarakAllahu Feekum

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