3 Ways Cold Showers Can Improve Your Health, According To Science
Shivering can affect your energy, stress, and body composition
Close your eyes and relax. Deep breath in, deep breath out. I coach myself, mentally preparing for this.
I open my eyes, take a final breath out, and step in. The cold water hits me like a wave, shocking my body. I try to keep calm and remember why I’m doing this. But why am I doing this? Are cold showers even worth it?
Cold showers are less popular than their warm counterparts, but they have their place. How you perform your cold showers will influence what physiological effect you will experience. Let’s go over them.
Shift your circadian rhythm
Circadian rhythm is the clock your body naturally has that tells you when it’s time to wake up and go to sleep. Most people are awake during the day and sleep at night. Someone who works night shifts would have the opposite clock as they work at night and snooze during daylight.
However, we do have the ability to shift our circadian rhythm. If you want to stay awake longer or wake up earlier, you can speed up your body’s adjustment process based on your body temperature.
Your body temperature is typically lowest in the early morning, around 3 to 4 AM, then peaks in the late afternoon to early evening around 4 to 6 PM. This is one way your body knows when it’s time to wake up and go to sleep.
Gain energy later in the day
If you need a little boost to stay up later, take a cold shower in the evening. The shower cools your body down, which causes the body to rebound and warm up when you’re done. Remember, at this point, your body is usually cooling down for sleep.
By causing a rebound warm-up, you’re telling your body the day is still going and feel more energized. This will cause you to fall asleep later in the night and wake up later the next morning.
Get up earlier
To wake up sooner, try a cold shower first thing in the morning. The rebound effect mentioned above will raise your body temperature quicker than what it naturally does without the cold shower.
This will make you want to go to bed sooner and wake up earlier the next day. People usually notice 30 to 60 minutes of a difference.
Improve your stress tolerance
Why are Navy Seals forced to lie in cold ocean water for hours at a time? They are training to control their stress response.
If you calm yourself when getting into the cold shower, by deep breathing or meditating, you are doing the same. Trying to resist the shiver is suppressing activation of the sympathetic nervous system, which can help build your tolerance for real life stressors. When something shocking happens, like the physical shock of freezing cold water, you’ll be better prepared to handle it calmly.
Increase fat loss
To increase fat loss you to embrace the shiver in a cold shower. Shivering is your body’s way of trying to warm you up. It uses a process called thermogenesis, which uses calories to burn energy. Our bodies have areas of brown fat primarily along the neck and shoulder blades. Brown fat is unique from other fat. When we begin to shiver the brown fat begins to burn calories to produce heat and warm the body up. This can ultimately lead to increased calorie burn.
We have all heard of how Michael Phelps used to burn 12,000 calories in a day. While part of this was due to his training, another aspect was the he was always in cold water leading to increased caloric burn.
To increase the amount of time spent shivering, take a cold shower for 5 minutes and then stand for 5 minutes before toweling off allowing yourself to shiver. This can be repeated if desired.
Conclusion
Cold showers can be a great addition to your routine if you’re looking for a change or added health benefits. You can include them every once in a while or make them your new normal.
Time your cold shower intentionally. Plan it for the morning if you want to head to bed sooner and wake up earlier the next day, or schedule it in the evening if you need a late night energy boost.
Resist the initial shiver of getting into the cold shower to help build your stress response. Channel your inner Navy Seal and try meditation or deep breathing to calm your body and mind.
Then allow some shiver once you’re submerged in the shower to help temporarily boost thermogenesis.
Credit goes to Andrew Huberman and the Huberman Lab Podcast, which is where I first hear of all of this. This piqued my interest and led me to look into the research myself. He goes into the physiological side of all this in much more detail. I’ve learned a lot from his podcast and he always covers interesting topics, so check it out if you haven’t!
