Rise With The Sun - The Good, The Bad, The Ugly
The sun is with us every day, whether you see it or not. The sun can affect a whole day. Making it bright, cheery, and warm, or cold and dark. It is the basis for plants to grow which provide us food and oxygen. Majority of people look forward to sunny days and make plans to get outside when its nice, some days a rainy, dark day is welcome too, and during the winter a snow day is usually desired by kids and adults.
The good: The sun benefits us in many ways, it helps to regulate our circadian rhythm (directing our sleep-wake and eating cycles), provides us with vitamin D - giving us energy, strong bones; boosts serotonin which improves mood and can fight depression, and boosts the immune system. It encourages us to get outside whether we eat outside, go for a walk, lay out by the pool, enjoy a drive, go to the beach, golf, whatever. It is recommended to expose yourself to sunlight first thing in the AM (if possible) which will help to wake you up - moreso than that cup of coffee, and this will help to regulate your circadian rhythm which promotes a healthy sleep pattern and it also regulates your cortisol, the stress hormone, so that your body is not over-producing cortisol (which still may happen due to life stressors that are unavoidable). Not to mention the great skin tan we get from repeated sun exposure.
The bad: While sunshine is great, you still need to protect yourself from the harmful ultraviolet rays which are UVA, UVB, UVC. These UV rays can cause sunburns and sometimes sun poisoning or blistering, freckles, dark or hyperpigmentation, dry/rough skin, wrinkles, redness, premature aging and skin cancers. I personally love being outdoors and enjoy a nice hot day (the less humid the better!) but I cannot lay out in the sun at all! If I attempt to lay out without a body of water near me like a pool or the ocean I get so hot and feel like I’m going to pass out and get nauseous.
The ugly: The aging process is severely accelerated with lots of sun exposure. What happens? The skin loses its elasticity and will sag, this is called solar elastoses and this person will have more wrinkles than the average person at that age. The skin can even get thicker, which sounds like you’d want thick skin and not thin, crepey skin but this thick skin is usually described as looking like leather by many people. What could be even worse than severe aging? Skin cancer. Skin cancers are normal cells that have mutated and this may be caused by lots of sun exposure. Skin cancers are easily treatable depending on the type (basal cell carcinoma, squamous cell carcinoma, and malignant melanoma) with topicals that cause a chemical burn, lasers, biopsying through shaving, scraping with a curette, or a punch-biopsy, or surgical excision or MOHs surgery. Skin cancers are easily treatable but you may be left with a scar, and depending on the size of the cancer the scar may be large. While we absolutely love our dermatologists and seeing them we do not want to see them for skin cancers, let’s keep it to the fun stuff like getting rid of skin tags, toxins, fillers, and our wellness checks.
Ways to enjoy the sun safe and protect yourself:
SPF - broad spectrum and MINIMUM of SPF 30 with re-application every 2 hours. Don’t forget your ears, toes, neck and hairline/parts. And you should apply one ounce with each application.
Protective clothing, any clothing will provide a barrier but if you can find UPF treated clothing or with UV protection you can opt for those for those beach days. Wide brimmed hats will provide shade; sunglasses protect your eyes, a lip balm with SPF will protect your lips.
Seek shade when appropriate, especially from 10:00A-4:00P when the sun is the strongest. If you must be out, use SPF 40+ and reapply every 2 hours.
Hydrate! Drink plenty of water if you are laying out or in a very strong sun area.
Water such as lakes, beaches and snow covered areas and sand like desert or beaches are at an even higher risk of sun damage even if the sun is not shining bright. This is because these surfaces act as a mirror and reflect the rays back up at you and your beautiful face. So you are not in the clear from sunburn on a cloudy day either.
Avoid the tanning bed at all costs and use self tanner if you want a year round tan. I hate when self-tanner is visible in the creases of your hands so I recommend washing your hands especially fingertips and where the wrist meets the arm gently immediately after application or use a good body brush to apply the product. Don’t forget to put some on the back of your hands too for harmony.
Again, can we look in awe at how our bodies were made? Our hair is placed to protect our scalp, a direct target from the sun, our eyebrows are there to provide some shade to our ever important eyes, our nose provides shade to our lips. These things aren’t placed on accident. Being in awe of all that our bodies without us even knowing is a recurring theme for me because I think it is severely underrated and doesn’t get enough recognition for keeping us alive and running smoothly to none of our concern for the most part.
SPF, what is it really?
SPF is sun protection factor. The number of SPF tells you the amount of time it takes for the UV rays to redden, or burn your skin with the product versus the amount of time without using the product. So, SPF 30 makes it 30 times longer to acquire a burn that it would without using sunscreen - so if it takes you one minute to burn, you will have 30min. Of protection with SPF 30 and 50 minutes of protection with SPF 50. It is not recommended to go outside and see how long it takes you to take you to burn to determine what strength sunscreen you need but rather reapply every 2 hours and after you go swimming or sweat it off. If you see your friend getting red or pink, tell them so they may reapply immediately and let’s hope they do the same for you.
SPF 15 blocks 93% of UVB rays
SPF 30 blocks 97% of UVB rays
SPF 50 blocks 98% of UVB rays
IMPORTANT: Using SPF products does not mean that you will not tan, this is a HUGE myth! It will take longer but you will still get a nice color. This is the point of sunscreen, that it takes longer to burn so you are able to be outside and not get skin cancer at the age of 25. SPF is blocking the bad UV rays, others rays make it through and you will get some color. Most of us want to lay out and come back from vacation the darkest we can possibly be and you can still do this with sunscreen and probably enjoy your vacation the slightest bit more since you don’t have the pain or itchiness of a sunburn or worse sun poisoning.
There are chemical and physical sunscreens. Chemical sunscreens absorb the UV light and take about 30 minutes to actually, so reapply about 30 minutes before you leave. Physical sunscreens are mineral (zinc or titanium) sunscreens and they reflect the light, they are considered “natural” since minerals are naturally occurring elements and work quickly so this is ideal when it's a last minute dash to the beach. Whichever you choose, remember you need to apply about an ounce every 2 hours and after swimming or sweating.
Personal story: When I worked in a dermatology office, a young man probably in his 30-40’s (this was 11 years ago so I don’t remember) came in. I think it was for a lesion. It probably needed to be biopsied and he argued that doctors just want to cut everything off and make problems where there isn’t one. He believed this because skin cancer is a new thing and nobody died of skin cancers in the 1800’s and early 1900’s. I had to tell him that’s because man didn’t live past 30 years at that point in time. You don’t walk outside, get one sunburn and then you have skin cancer. You are growing that skin cancer over years with every unprotected (and sometimes even protected) exposure to the sun. This is why it is important for children to wear SPF. Usually people want to be tan and rebel in their teens and early 20’s and believe they’re immortal so they don’t need sunscreen because they won’t age and they won’t burn. These people usually get skin cancers in their 40’s-50’s. The exception: TANNING BEDS! I have seen teens with melanoma from tanning beds and resulting in having a 1 inch or longer scar on their abdomen, chest, leg, anywhere.
Another personal story: I have had a basal cell carcinoma on my scalp, a few inches from the part in the middle of my head. Can you believe it? The point of the hair is to protect the scalp from this damage and here I am with a BCC right smack in the middle of it. Now if you’re thinking of the story above and how did she get that? I believe it is because when I was 7 I was diagnosed with leukemia, I underwent chemotherapy and subsequently lost my hair. I refused to wear wigs, I did wear hats, and we did use sunscreen but I’m sure there were times (evidently) of sun exposure. Which adds up to presenting as a skin cancer in my early 30’s.
Be on the lookout for a post on sunscreens that I like, use and recommend. This one is long enough and that is a totally different subject from this.