The Beach Heals
Xinalani Retreat
June 24-July 1, 2023
“The sea cures all ailments of man.” Plato
…quite possibly even autoimmunity.
Reno and I spent our honeymoon in Kauai, HI and celebrated Reno’s 50th in the Bahamas. The palpable and positive transformation in my body, while immersed in the sun, sand and sea of these beautiful islands, made me analyze the variables beyond these most obvious three influencers.
Curious as to my thoughts on why the beach environment helps heal the body? Keep Reading.
Want to feel blissful in your body surrounded by the healing properties of the sun, sand and sea - ON A SECLUDED MOUNTAIN SIDE BEACH RESORT OFF THE PACIFIC COAST OF MEXICO?
A Little Backstory:
Four years ago, while on our honeymoon in Hawaii, the ability to push a few of my food intolerances like coffee, nightshades and alcohol were definitely present. My body just felt good – pain free and less stiff to name a few. We had just gotten married and the thought did cross my mind the hormones flooding my body were quite possibly druglike. Whatever the cause, I soaked it up and ran with it.
For Reno’s midcentury celebration on Cape Santa Maria last year in the Bahamas, only a day in to our trip, I noticed the exact same thing.
What really made me put pen to paper, and not just think ‘this is so interesting’, is the husband of a couple we befriended while there suffered from vitiligo – a visible autoimmune condition that attacks the melanin of the skin causing discoloration.
His autoimmunity is very objective, meaning it is visible and measurable. My autoimmunity is subjective, meaning it is my own opinion (aside from measuring antibodies in my bloodwork) of how my body is reacting to certain things, visible or not.
He told me of his childhood visiting his grandparents at the Outer Banks of North Carolina. During these trips every summer, the vitiligo would clear up significantly. Although still visible, he said it was clearing up on this trip to the Bahamas.
Our conversations validated my own subjective experience that being at the beach does, in fact, change the physiology of the body. But why the potential for such potent healing?
My Theories:
1) Sun/Vitamin D
At 70 degrees or higher your body synthesizes vitamin D from the sun. Vitamin D acts like a hormone in the body and is responsible for myriad functions including quelling inflammation. People who have autoimmunity are usually very low in this and it is theorized why AI is more prevalent in northern states where they don’t get as much sun. Is it a cause, or outcome, of autoimmunity? In my particular case, I was diagnosed three years ago, suffering for almost 10 years. My vitamin D wasn’t low until 6 months ago. Completely anecdotal but lends towards the latter theory.
2) Ocean/Magnesium
The ocean is like one big Epsom salt bath. Healing in so many ways, the salt in the ocean acts like a calming agent and a detoxifier in the body. Magnesium is a mineral in which 80% of Americans are depleted, regardless of autoimmunity. Those with cardiovascular disease also show extremely low levels. Soaking for hours every day, well...
3) Air Quality
So much less pollution as there are very few cars, open air on most sides of you instead of buildings, no corporations and just the salty breeze. Much like the gut and other immune barriers, our lungs also have a mucosal lining that protects our body from outside material that shouldn’t be in our blood. When this barrier is calmed, or not inflamed with material it’s trying to clean up, the body as a whole also becomes less inflamed.
4) Sand
Much like the ocean and magnesium, the sand is full of minerals that are absorbed transdermally as you walk barefoot or dig your feet into a groove sitting on the beach.
A quick Wikipedia read explained that the sand where we were in the Bahamas is Oolitic Aragonite sand which is a phosphate free, calcium carbonite that stabilizes the body’s PH.
The source also stated that this type of sand is found in “high energy” environments. This statement could be a post all on its own, however, the gist, according to the various types of esoteric healing I’ve studied, is that the body can heal only when your field of energy has been addressed. When surrounded by high energy environments like undisturbed nature, your personal energy level rises enabling greater ability to heal.
5) The View
Healing happens when in, or simply viewing, natural environments. This research has become so adopted into present day approaches to health that many hospitals now include nature scenes on their walls, open spaces for both patients and employees and even include into their architecture more flowing curves emulating hills, water or natural spaces.
6) Sleep/Nap
Every day I took a nap on the beach and at night slept 8-9 hours in complete darkness. Each hour of sleep before midnight is like 2 hours of sleep after midnight in terms of what your body is healing and detoxing. We were in bed by 9:30 most nights and woke to the sun rising. In other words, we were in rhythm with the earth which helps set your own circadian rhythm balancing hormones and setting in place a balance in the body. More than anything, when it comes to health, sleep is THE number 1 thing that needs to be in check.
7) No wifi/Blue light or screens of any kind
There was only wifi in one building where we stayed. So, once every other day we would take our phones there and check in to see if anything needed attention. In our present way of life this seems unrealistic, but if you are trying to heal the body, boundaries must be set around use of these things and more specifically times of day. Circadian rhythm, mentioned above, has been in our DNA evolution for millions of years. Our pineal gland (responsible in part for melatonin production-the major hormone the body needs for sleep) responds to light taken in through our eyes. Light tells our pineal gland it’s daytime and inhibits melatonin production which then inhibits healthy sleep patterns.
8) Routine
Highly beneficial for your neuroendocrine (brain/nerves/hormones) system, we did the same thing every day! The body loves balance and the same schedule maintained daily stabilizes the circadian rhythm and soothsays overall. If you think of routine as a pattern, and then think of this in its opposite, as sporadic or chaotic, you can see how maintaining the same schedule every day decreases stress allowing more opportunity for healing.
9) Quality time
Something else our systems have evolved to need is a sense of community. Spending time with people you love releases oxytocin (a feel-good hormone) and allows for the body to feel safe. This in turn begins to heal the adrenal glands, putting the body into rest and digest with a cascade affect ensuing. If the body is in constant survival mode, also known as fight or flight, then it is not worried about healing. ONLY when the body is in rest and digest, can it begin to heal. Being around those you love feeds your soul in a way that chemically nourishes the body.
10) Coconut Milk
And this one is a little iffy as recent research has shown a connection between coconut milk and LPS, or lipopolysaccharides (things that can hinder healing).
In general, though, both coconut milk and coconut meat are full of good, healthy fat for the body. To contextualize, most of your vitamins, A, D, E and K, are fat soluble, meaning you need to be eating good fat in order for those vitamins to even be absorbed by the body.
11) Music/Sounds
The pineal gland, mentioned above with regard to sleep and circadian rhythm, is stimulated by cadence and very specific rhythms. For this and other reasons, EFT (Emotional Freedom Technique), also known as tapping, has become a way to heal and calm the body. In my personal opinion, I felt I had some form of cadence influencing my system with the island music played in both Hawaii and the Bahamas.
The lapping waves of the ocean, the birds chirping, the breeze rustling the trees and bushes…, these sounds qualify as “brain tingles”, an experience also known as ASMR (Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response) which calms the brain and heart even if just listening to them through headphones and not in actuality.
Binaural beats, which you can find by doing a quick internet search, also restore the nervous system and can be used to lull the body to sleep. This is human produced but still a profound way sound influences our system and worth mentioning if you too are looking for calm.
The natural sounds of the environment, as well as the music within these island communities, together produce a cool and tranquil soundtrack.
Other Theories:
When I posted a version of this on Facebook upon our return from the Bahamas, I asked if others with autoimmunity had experienced the same healing properties. I also asked if anyone had other theories as to why this was happening. This is what they offered:
1) Altitude
While on an island or at the beach, you are at sea level. If you don’t live at the beach, this means that you are most likely living at a higher altitude. At higher altitudes your body makes more red blood cells to deliver oxygen to help you breathe. Maybe you have heard of athletes training at higher altitudes for this reason. When the athletes come back down to lower altitudes, they perform better because they have a surplus of red blood cells. We live at approximately 965 feet elevation, so quite possibly my body was reacting to this immediate 1000-foot decrease in elevation.
2) Stress of everyday life is less
Stress definitely plays a tremendous role in inflammation. The physiological response to stress impacts your stress hormones, which impacts sex hormones, blood sugar, minerals that affect digestion and stomach acid. Stress drastically decreases your immune response, and the chemicals released while under stress exacerbate any symptom. As mentioned earlier, stress puts the body into fight or flight, or survival mode, the sympathetic branch of the nervous system. When the body is in this state, it isn’t concerned with things like procreation, digestion, sleep/rest or healing. It is trying to survive. In our present culture, traffic can constitute enough stress to throw the body out of rest and digest. When these elements are removed, yes, the body has less to deal with and can more readily migrate to a state of rest and digest or the parasympathetic nervous system.
3) “My blood sugar is better at the beach”
This was an anecdotal comment from someone who checks their blood sugar every morning upon waking. It validates the above that every day stress is usually less.
My interpretation of why this is: When we are under stress, or in fight or flight, our bodies produce an influx of cortisol, the body’s main stress hormone. Cortisol is a glucocorticoid-meaning it is sugar steroid, influenced by and influencing blood sugar. When we are under stress, therefore in survival mode, the body increases cortisol, which increases blood sugar so that our brain and body are hyper alert and ready to fight or run for our lives. When we are less stressed, we produce less cortisol, which means our blood sugar would be more stable, or lower.
Want to experience all the benefits of being at the beach?
Join me this June 24- July 1, 2023
private beach, secluded mountainside Cabana & gourmet meals
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