Tag: cold showers

Cold Therapy Update – April

A University of Pennsylvania study of brain scans showed some striking differences between how men and women’s brains work. “In the study, women scored well on attention, word and face memory, and social cognition, while men performed better on spatial processing and sensori-motor speed.” Female brains worked back and forth across the hemispheres while male brains tended to work front to back.

Everyone cautions, brains are not hard-wired, a major tenet of philosophy, along with the premise that generalities are generalities.

I also think that discipline in one realm spills out in another spill. I think that, though, because this is how it works for me. It seems to be how I’m wired. I don’t know if that’s forward to back.

My last hot water shower was on March nineteenth. It’s been cold showers since, a challenge on my last two weeks as I traveled and visited families. One of the ways I’m wired is to take a hot shower to relax and prepare, especially when traveling. I love checking in, making plans and kicking it all off with a hot, relaxing shower to clean off travel grime.

Boy, rejecting hot showers were a tempting challenge in the hotels and homes I stayed in during the last two weeks. Be strong, I told myself, shivering until the cold blast. And I was.

I don’t know if it helps me rewire myself, if there is re-wiring involved in discipline and choices, or if I’m just smoking myself. But afterwards, I feel good. I feel strong and ready to go on.

Much as I do after a hot shower.

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Cold Therapy Update

My cold therapy continues. It’s been two weeks since my last hot shower. I believe I’m finally adjusting.

Mind you, the temperature outside has been dropping to the mid-thirties at night, so the water is wickedly cold when I shower in the morning.

I believe I’m adjusting. My scrotum no longer leaves, slamming the door behind it in protest. I used to turn on the water, count to three and then ease in, a body area at a time, starting with my head. Then I began counting to three and leaping in. Now I step up and turn the shower on.

Bracing, baby.

It is invigorating. I love toweling off now, mostly because I enjoy re-acquiring warmth and feeling in my body parts.

I do use hot water for my face afterwards, because I’m shaving. I did cold water shaving in the field in the military. It’s not something I’m going to do again, if I can avoid it.

 

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Cold Therapy Continues

March 20th marked the beginning of my cold therapy challenge for myself. Today’s cold shower was my ninth.

I’m very slowly acclimating. Washing my hair (twice) was the worst. I turn the water off after soaking my head to apply the shampoo and lather up. It seems like standing in the shower during that interlude feels bitter cold.

Still, it’s a choice and it’s inside, where it’s sixty-eight degrees. It’s better than many have. Yeah, I whine and rant about it because c’est moi.

On the bright side, I’m probably saving money on the water and gas bills.

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Cold Therapy

Aidan Reid had a post about cold therapy the other day. Part of his therapy is cold showers.

I used to do this. We had a sauna in our apartment building in Waldorf, Germany, along with pool. The pool was unheated but indoors. It was our habit to hit the sauna, the pool and then step outside into the wintry cold. It was supposed to be a heart healthy practice. We would do this three or four times in a session. We, being in our early thirties, had no problem with it.

But time and age presses on. With aging comes changes. The last time I attempted cold therapy, my body employed some nasty language to threaten me and convey its displeasure. Aidan’s post inspired me, though.

I will try this, I decided.

“No, you won’t,” my body retorted.

“I will,” I replied.

Today, I did.

I believe I did a fair imitation of Munch’s The Scream.

After that, my testicles climbed up into my body. My pecker shriveled up and disappeared like a turtle pulling in its head.

But, I persisted.

I didn’t last long. I wasn’t counting but it was long enough for fast scrubs of all required body parts. My shower requires about thirty-five seconds for it to become comfortably warm. I’d stepped in and turned it on. The water was beginning to warm when I stepped out, or I was imagining that I was growing warmer in a triumph of mind over cold water. Either way, my guesstimate is that I was in the shower for half a minute.

Afterward, I felt fantastic. It might have been the exhilaration of no longer standing in cold water.

Will I do it again? Absolutely. Aidan suggested a trail for over seven days. Did I mention that he lost weight without trying? He also cited other benefits he’s observed since becoming a cold shower man. One bennie we agreed upon in an exchange of comments is discipline. I also think this is one of those things you can use to build self-confidence and inner strength.

At least I hope so.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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