Sunscreen, Is It Good Or Bad For You?The Reasons We Personally Avoid It.

Sunscreen. The multi-billion dollar industry is becoming a hot topic for debate, if it's doing more harm than good?

Our road to choosing to not use sunscreen began with me personally suffering with eczema and allergies. Throughout my journey of trying to uncover potential irritants I underwent patch testing through my dermatologist. It uncovered a number of chemicals I was reacting too, one of them being benzophenone-4, something that is used in many cosmetics, one being sunscreen.

This opened up a bit of rabbit hole of investigating what all these chemicals were and where I would find them. I became even more aware of always reading labels to make sure I wasn't using something with these ingredients.

I hadn't always been mindful of using to many chemicals, working as a hairdresser for 20 years I have been exposed to gosh knows what and I have no doubt that working with these chemicals has impacted my health in a negative way. While it was a rewarding career, it's come at a cost to my health and I wish I knew then what I know now. I have now given up hairdressing as my health was deteriorating from constant exposure to the chemicals and water.

I started reading, a lot, listening to many podcasts, and doing much of my own research online as unfortunately the only answer from the medical profession that I was given to deal with my eczema was steroids. To which I now suffer with steroid withdrawal, not a nice thing to deal with. That's just a little back story to my interest in chemicals and how they affect the body.

We travelled Australia as a family back in 2020, and while we did use sunblock then, we didn't use it all the time. But the one thing I noticed from being in the sunshine was how much better we all felt, we had come from a cold climate where it was almost always cloudy and cold. And we were always sick with something. But when we got to the sunshine, we were never sick, I tell you no lies, not even a sniffle. Which made me even more curious, what is it that is stopping us from getting sick? I had to put it partly down to the sunlight.

When we arrived home to Victoria, we spent the next 10 months with colds on and off all the time, we struggled to get up of a morning, we started to lose motivation to do anything, and it was rather depressing. Our kids were spending so much more time inside, exposed to barely any sunlight at all. All these factors really made me start thinking.

We have since left Victoria and are now travelling up north again in a caravan, but this time, no sunblock on board. At first it was because I just hadn't brought any, but as time went on, I was really starting to think, is sunblock really necessary? And is it actually good for us? I myself barely wore it because of this fear of having a reaction to something, but I was forever pestering my husband and the kids to lather up.

But we left for our trip without sunscreen and while the kids did get burnt on their first exposure to the sunshine, (that pale Victorian skin got a bit of a shock), after that there were barely any incidences of sunburn. And I have just recently discovered why that is.

To dive into the bodies mechanisms in a way that is easy to understand this is how I believe it works. The UVB rays in the sunshine cause our skin to create melanin and vitamin D. And what does sunscreen block, UVB. When we allow UVB exposure to our skin we develop that beautiful brown glow, it is the melanin that is in fact our skins natural defence against sun damage. But, wearing sunscreen stops our bodies from producing not only melanin but also enough vitamin D, and what is vitamin D a star in? Fighting off cancer! Vitamin D is anti-cancer. Among many other things it does for us. And here we are hindering our body's ability to make it.

We have become a society so obsessed with sunblock, don't forget either, it is a multi-billion-dollar industry, and lines can be blurred when there is a lot of money involved. Kindergartens now insist our kids lather up every morning, even if they only have 15 minutes of sun exposure, we are loading our kids up in chemicals, often unnecessarily and we have no idea how these chemicals are reacting within the body, what issues they may be causing long term, and the what the problems could be from actually not having enough sun exposure.

Interestingly, sunscreen is not only damaging for humans but it is detrimental to our ocean life. The build-up of sunscreen in the ocean not only causes a film to form over the ocean, preventing sunlight reaching below the surface, so now we see dying coral, but our sea life is being affected too. One of the main ingredients in sunscreen benzophenone 3 and it is hormonally active, it's anti-testosterone. The fish are absorbing these chemicals and are becoming intersex, meaning it can cause female characteristics in males, and you only have to look around at what are we seeing running wild in our society these days, young kids who don't know what sex they are! I'm not saying that sunscreen could be the one and only cause of this, because we are being exposed to chemicals in every aspect of our lives, effecting so many ways the body is supposed to function. But it is definitely a factor that we need to consider.

And one might argue that "oh it's just a little bit of sunblock, it's only a little chemical exposure", but think about how many times we re-apply it during the summer months. (On a side note, did you know that chlorine in pools can react badly to the chemicals in sunscreen, making pools basically a nasty blend of chemical cocktails). We apply it every day in our skin care regime, it's in our make-up, so the exposure is not limited, it's daily. Zinc has been advertised to us as a safer option, however for zinc to be clear the particles have to be reduced, to micro particles, to trick the eye into thinking it's clear, but these micro particles enter the body through the skin and are being found in the kidneys, liver, brain and reproductive organs. The idea of chemicals ending up in our organs is not really something I'm excited about.

Sunblock is also giving us a false sense of security. What I mean by that is we put on our sunblock, on repeat, and we go out in the sun, for hours, thinking that we are being protected, but we are simply not meant to be exposing our skin to that hot sun all day long. Not only is it damaging to the skin, but by using the sunscreen it is preventing the melanin and vitamin D from forming, so we have no natural protective mechanisms happening within the body. We are not made to be exposed to the sun all day long like a lizard. And what are we seeing increasing? The diagnosis of melanomas. One can argue it's from not wearing enough sunblock, some argue it's the sunblock itself. I would argue it's because we are exposing ourselves to too much hot damaging sun, resulting in the skin being damaged and not enough exposure to the gentler sunlight that helps us to build our bodies natural defences.

So, what do we do personally instead of sunblock?

Incidentally, before I had done too much research these are the things we did, that must have just been gut instinct.

If we will be in the sun for long periods of time we will wear long sleeves, we wear hats, or the kids wear wetsuits when they are swimming. (We choose to wear Anchorline fishing tops as we have found these to be the best, and they are Aussie made and owned.)

We sit in shade or provide ourselves shade to sit in and try to stay out of the extreme heat of the day.

We also eat a high antioxidant diet, because that is what protects our skin from damage, not only damage from the sun but from all oxidative stressors we are now exposed to. Lots of colourful fruits and veggies.

Something I hadn't done before but will now is exposing ourselves slowly to the sun in spring, giving our body time to build up that natural defence mechanism before the hot summer sun sets in,

If you want something to layer on the skin, coconut oil is supposed to be a great preventative measure to avoid burning, however I have not personally tried this, so it is only on based on what I have read, (please do your own research).

Now I will mention that while we cover the kids up when they will be in the hot sun all day, we don't worry if they are just going to out and about and will have some sun exposure. Because we strongly believe it's good for them, it's healthy for all of us to get sunlight on our skin, we evolved in the sun, and for some reason we are being made fearful of it. That's not to say go out and sunbake with no protection all day, that would be plain silly. This is about saying sunscreen and zinc should be used as a last resort and to use common sense.

There are many other details I have uncovered regarding the negative effects of sunscreen, but we could be here all day, so I would advise you go and do your own research to make your own informed choice.

Bottom line is, that we were never meant to be exposed to all of these chemicals, chemicals are not part of our evolution. They are for the most part detrimental to our health and that of the planet. I really hope that the way we view chemicals will change for the better in the future. If we don't at least become a little curious and aware, there is potential for a world of hurt for future generations to come

Emily

Disclaimer: While we have personally made these changes to our lives, this is not medical advice, it is purely the opinion of one family who have been impacted by the use of chemicals and are choosing to opt out when possible. If it is something you are curious about, please do your own research before making any changes.