By Aimee Raupp, MS LAc
This article was reviewed AimeeRaupp.com's editorial team & is in compliance with our editorial policy.
It is officially SUMMER!
For us that means lots of time at Compo Beach with the little guy (he is OBSESSED with the water right now).
More time outdoors can be SO good for you, and good for your soul, but sometimes it isn't great for you skin.
So that's what we're talking about today- how much sun is good for you, how to care for your skin in the sun, and what to do if you get too much.
Here is the full transcript
How are you guys? Hi. What is going on? Happy Thursday. It's that time again where I'm coming to you live and we're talking about really important health topics, things that I feel are important for you guys to know about, to learn about, to hear about, and things that I enjoy talking to you about. Let me first apply some of my Aimee Raupp Beauty lip balm. Oh my God. It's so good. Our new packaging. Have you guys checked it out? Isn't it so beautiful? It wraps around. Oh, I just love it. Oh, I just love it.
So, hello, hello. Thanks so much for joining me. I know we constantly have new people coming on and following me and letting me be a part of their health journey. So, I just want to say thank you for that. Thank you for allowing me to be a part of your life. Yeah, it's pretty awesome.
It is summertime here. In the US continent and … Well, whatever. You know what I mean. It's summertime here. It's not summertime everywhere in the world, but it's summertime here. I wanted to talk to you about safe sun exposure and being safe in the sun, and what that looks like, what I do to manage my skin and my child's skin, and why sun is good for us, and the importance of staying hydrated, protecting our skin, and how to recover if we got a sunburn.
If you guys follow me on Instagram or on social media, you saw it was a couple of weeks ago that my family and I, we all about sunburned. We were at the beach. It was a pretty windy day. We applied, I think … I think my organic sunblock was expired. I think it was from two summers ago, and so we all got a little bit of sunburn. But, we recovered quickly and easily, got some aloe, stay hydrated, put some ghee and coconut oil on our skin, and we were okay. Not the ideal situation. I felt terrible that my little guy got sunburned. So, I knew I wanted to talk to you guys about safe sun exposure and what that means.
I know we've been told that sun exposure is bad for us and can lead to skin cancer. However, more recent scientific studies, so some longitudinal studies, have shown otherwise, that sun exposure is not causing skin cancer. Sunburn, of course, is bad for us. But, we now are a society that wears a lot of sunscreen and spends less and less time outdoors, and yet the incidents of skin cancers like melanoma or basal cell carcinoma have continued to increase. It's like increasing by about 4% a year. That's very curious.
What could be causing that? The current argument is that it's actually vitamin D deficiency that is causing the increased rise in skin cancers. Plus, also, interestingly enough, our higher exposures to omega-6 fatty acids like vegetable oils, like soy oil, or corn oil, or sunflower oil, that these are such … What's the word? They're such synthetic ingredients that are causing a lot of inflammation in our body and causing our body to oxidize and age more quickly, and they seem to be playing a role in the increased incidents of all cancers, but also in melanoma and basal cell carcinoma. So, it's twofold. It's vitamin D deficiency and then processed crappy foods, and then not spending enough time outdoors.
So, we're losing touch with nature. We're not getting healthy sun exposure, which I'll talk about in a second, and we're eating a shitty diet. These three things can be detrimental to our body, our health, and potentially be playing a role in the incidences, the increase of skin cancer. Now, of course, that's not to say that you should be getting some burns. I was not proud of ourselves when we got some burned. But as far as … Look at all the hearts. I love that you guys are excited.
What's your impression? I guess I should ask that? What's your impression? Do you guys think that sun exposure is causing skin cancer? And do you think that sunscreen prevents skin cancer? Because that's a big no-no as well. In fact, the FDA is making all sunscreens now put on their label that they do not prevent skin cancer because sunscreens are not proven to prevent skin cancer at all. They are proven to prevent sunburn, but not skin cancer. Just so we're all very clear on that, does everybody know that or did you guys think that sunscreen prevented skin cancer? Raise a hand if you can. Or if you're don't feel like raising your hand and admitting that maybe you didn't know that, that's okay, too.
But, I was under the impression that sunscreen prevented skin cancer years ago. I wonder, is sunscreen toxic? Very good question, [Kuikamo 00:05:34]. I knew that but … What is Elizabeth Gavin saying? Let's see. Everybody's joining now. Thank you, guys. But yeah, so this idea, should we wear it, though? So, right. I'm going to get into it. I do think we should wear some sunscreen. Here's what I do. And I highly recommend this for women. I only knew that about sunscreen, but not preventing skin cancer because of you. Thank you, Beth.
First of all, I want to just start with I deal with a lot of women's health and hormones. Whether you're trying to get pregnant or not, your hormones, if you're a woman, hormones are important to be balanced. And if you're a woman, whether you call yourself a woman or not, you still have female hormones and they need to be balanced. One of the best ways to balance hormones is sun exposure. For a couple hours between the hours of 11 … I'm sorry. For 10. My God. Between the hours of 11 to 1 or 10 to 1 for 10 minutes of unprotected sunlight every day, super-duper important.
Today, I went out for a walk/run from 9:30 till 10:05 and did not wear any sunscreen. I have on my anti … my rejuvenating facial oil, which has in it ghee, which has some sun protection, coconut oil, some sun protection, rose hip seed oil, so sweet almond, so they all have some sun protection in there. I probably had about the equivalent of like a six, maybe an eight on my face. I do that intentionally, and I do that as often as possible. I do not wear a sunscreen moisturizer, never have, never will.
If I'm going to spend a long day at the beach, I typically wear a hat to protect my skin and I will apply some sunscreen. We have a list for you of my recommended best nontoxic sunscreens, and I'll give you guys that link in just a second. We've made it easy for you. It's just a PDF you get to go download. But, that's how I do it.
Another thing that I'm really anal about … So, the sun exposure, super healthy for us. 10 minutes of unprotected sunlight will help reset our circadian rhythms. It really directly affects the pituitary gland, which is a master hormone controller. It's just so warming and nourishing to us, too. Even for me today, for instance, if you follow me on Instagram, you saw my stories, I'm out walking in nature. I'm taking it in. I'm not blocking it. We've become so immersed in technology and avoidance in our world today that we're literally blocking nature because someone somewhere told us that too much sun exposure was a bad thing. That's not the case.
If you're going to be in the sun all day, if you're going to go to the beach for four hours and it's a high sun, a hot day, you should probably wear sunblock because you do not want to get some burned. But still, when I'm there at the beach, I keep the hat on as much as I can and I'm wearing sunblock in the expose parts of my body. But then, there are times when I take the hat off and I just soak in the rays because the D is so good for us. Vitamin D deficiency is at epidemic levels. Vitamin D deficiency is considered the primary reasons for these increases in cancer, increases in autoimmune diseases, cancer, hormonal issues, fertility challenges. You have to think about all these other things. When we're not getting that healthy sun exposure, we're deficient in Vitamin D. It's the best way to get our vitamin D in. Then, we're getting all these other conditions.
But just to say it again, sunscreen does not prevent skin cancer. It has been proven across the board. Sunscreen has no impact on skin cancer. Sunscreen prevents sunburn, which could cause skin cancer, so it's like leading, but sunscreen does not prevent skin cancer. Vitamin D deficiency lends itself to skin cancer and other cancers. You need some unprotected sun exposure every single day, ideally between the hours of 10 to 1, 10 minutes a day to really help balance hormones regulate the immune system, boost your immunity so you're not getting the colds that are going around the office.
Vitamin D helps with so many things. It's a hormone precursor in the body, so it's having a major impact on your system. And when we're avoiding the sun or overprotecting ourselves with sunscreens, not even … I didn't even get into the sunscreen topic about how most sunscreens are toxic. But if we're just overprotecting, we're then inherently vitamin D deficient and we're going to be sicker.
Then, add to that, if you are overprotecting with sunscreen, is it a toxic sunscreen? You guys hear me talk a lot about skincare. And I'm a huge proponent of if it's not edible, it shouldn't go on your skin because it gets into your bloodstream and it impacts things. Sunscreen is no different. There are a lot of very toxic sunscreens on the market which are lending themselves to autoimmune conditions, hormonal imbalances, and cancers. Here you are trying to prevent cancer by using sunscreen, yet you're using a toxic sunscreen with ingredients that have been shown to cause cancer. I'm not trying to be overly fearmongering at all, but for you to really think about that.
So when we do use sunscreen … Again, I have a list for you guys. If you go over to aimeeraupp.com/sunscreen, you can download the PDF that we created for you. When you're going to use sunscreen, I tend to use Badger or California Baby. I even got the, for James right now, the Peter Thomas Roth. It's actually a powder. Looks like a blush brush, and you brush it on, because he actually will let me put it on him or he puts it on himself. It just has two ingredients, titanium dioxide and zinc dioxide. That's it. It's literally just a powder. That's not on the list, but you guys can write it down, Peter Thomas Roth. You can get on Amazon. It's like inexpensive, too, and it's great. It's just a brush. You just brush it on. My sitter was using it.
But, you want to think about what are you putting on your skin. A, is it working? And then B, that the … Yeah, so Instagram, the link is in my bio. Facebook, we just posted the link. B is the sunscreen … Is it causing vitamin D deficiency, which is going to make me sicker? Then also, is it filled with toxic ingredients that are going to make me sicker? Really good questions.
There's a recent study that came out that I wanted to read. Sunscreens protect against some burn, but there is no evidence that they protect against basal cell carcinoma or melanoma. Problems lie in the behavior of individuals who use sunscreens to stay out longer in the sun than otherwise would. Vitamin D inhibition is at this stage unlikely due to insufficient use by individuals. Safety of sunscreen is a concern, and sunscreen companies have emotionally and inaccurately promoted the use of sunscreens. Interesting, right?
Vitamin D deficiency has been strongly linked to a variety of cancers. It can be estimated that increased sun exposure … Oh, so this is just interesting, too. Sun exposure might lead to a few hundred more melanoma deaths but will potentially stop 3,000 other deaths. Basically, avoiding the sun is helping minusculy to prevent cancers. Avoiding the sun, though, is exacerbating a lot of other health conditions because of the repercussions of vitamin D deficiency. The pros do not outweigh the cons.
The key is get your sun exposure. Wear good quality sunscreen when you do it. To me, 10, 15 minutes of unprotected sunlight every day, super-duper important to your immune system, to your hormones, to preventing cancers. I see it across the board. I deal with a lot of women trying to get pregnant and stay pregnant. Vitamin D deficiency is rampant. It's very common for me to see a vitamin D level in the 30s. Healthy vitamin D levels are between 50 and 70. I know for certain if I don't get her vitamin D levels up to a 50, she is not going to get pregnant. She is not going to get pregnant. Is that clear to everyone? If your vitamin D is deficient, it's going to severely impact your hormones and your ability to get and stay pregnant. You need the unprotected sunlight. You need the vitamin D. And then when you are going for a beach day, what you need to do is wear a healthy nontoxic sunscreen and limit your exposure in the sense of don't get sunburn.
Vitamin D is super important for your kiddos, too. I mean, we went to a birthday party yesterday at the beach, and it started at 4:30. I did not put any sunblock on James, and he was outside in the sun from 4:30 until 7:00 PM. And you know what? He's fighting a little bit of a cold, and I looked at it as medicine. The sun is medicine for him. It is medicine. The vitamin D is so important. I gave him a thousand IUs of vitamin D every day as well. Thorn is the brand, and I put it in his water to keep his immune system strong. But, I oversunblock my kid, and I still don't. I mean, I sunblocked him today because he's going to camp and he's outside all day, so sure. And he has a hat on. We do the best we can do.
The review also found sunbathing without burning reduced the risk of melanoma. Sun exposure itself is associated with less risk of melanoma. Long-term exposure may also protect the skin. Vitamin D reduces cancer risk. Lack of sun exposure may be driving the rising melanoma rates.
Then, there is this whole thing about diet. Omega-6 oils like canola, cottonseed, vegetables, soybean, corn, they're all brand new in our diets. They're all highly refined vegetable oils that are synthetic and toxic. Evidence shows that when these oils are consumed they can be used in place of saturated fats. These saturated fats that we're replacing are vitally important to healthy skin and skin function.
People always compliment me on my skin. I'm not bragging, but maybe a little. I say, “Sure, I use my skincare line. I use Aimee Raupp Beauty every day.” But you know what else I do? I take cod liver oil every single day, and I eat a ton of fat, coconut oil, ghee, olive oil, avocado, nuts, seeds. That's why my skin looks so good. It's not just what I'm putting on my skin, it's what I'm putting into my body, and I don't freaking touch these omega-6 vegetable oils. I don't touch them. And when I do, my stomach is a freaking disaster, so that's another reason I don't touch them.
The amount of linoleic acid in the diet, as well as the balance between omega-6 and omega-3, determine the susceptibility of the skin to damage from UV rays. This is a very straightforward explanation for the beautiful skin of people eating traditional fats like butter and coconut oil. It's also a straightforward explanation for the poor skin and sharply rising melanoma incidents of the Western nation. Melanoma is the most deadly form of skin cancer.
So, bottom line, I think you want to just rethink your sun exposure. It's perfectly safe and healthy to have. And in fact, I've seen some of the cancer docs from Sloan Kettering who specialize in melanoma and basal cell. Because I have a handful of girls that have had melanoma or basal cell. What those doctors are recommending now is 10 minutes of unprotected sunlight to these cancer patients to help them heal. Skin cancer patients are being told to have unprotected sunlight between the hours of 10 and 1 for 10 minutes every single day because the vitamin D is so healing because we need the sun exposure. You have to have the sun exposure.
Is this blowing anybody's minds or have you guys heard me talk about this before? Let's see. I'm looking on Facebook here. So again, the sunscreen lists aimeeraup.com/sunscreen. Instagram, it's the link in the bio. Facebook, we have it linked here.
My husband calls me crazy how much I bug the kids to wear their hats outside. Yeah, Alyssa, I think that's great. I mean, that's what I do with James. He's just got a hat on and a little bit of sunscreen. I don't oversunscreen him. I just don't. And obviously, the organic sunscreens are harder to get on, too, so I'm really loving this Peter Thomas Roth brush. It's a lot easier.
But, so I want you guys to really rethink this whole thing of like, yes, don't get sunburned. It's bad for you. If you get some burned, you got to really hydrate. Use aloe. Apply ghee and coconut oil to the sunburn. It'll help it calm down. Vitamin D is so important, and the best source of vitamin D is from the sunlight. So 10 minutes of unprotected sunlight every single day between the hours of 10 and 1, amazing for hormones, amazing for health, amazing for immunity, amazing to fight cancer. When you use sunscreen, use a nontoxic sunscreen. And when you're at the beach, let yourself just soak in some rays. Don't be so afraid, and don't stop spending time outside.
I'm not surprised people of color are getting more melanoma because we are not getting enough sun and likely getting vitamin D deficiency. Also, we are not eating the natural oils that are best for us. I totally agree. It's so true. I mean, people of color should not really be getting melanoma, if you think about it in that sense. It's like it is. It's just the lack of vitamin D and the sun exposure. You guys, really, you can get some sunburn, but it's we're just now afraid of the sun. Everybody's paranoid of the sun exposure, and it's ridiculous. We need the vitamin D. We need it. I can't tell you.
I mean, I deal with people autoimmunity, infertility. That's my main practice. I got like, I don't know, 40 clients a week I see in the clinic and about 10 or so that I coach weekly. Everybody has a vitamin D deficiency. Every single one of them is vitamin D deficient. Every one of them because we're not getting enough unprotected sun exposure. For me, it's my rejuvenating facial oil. If I get too much done, extra ghee, extra coconut oil.
How do you know if you're lacking in vitamin D? You have to get a blood test. I have friends who are as dark as milk chocolate getting some burned. Wow. Lina, that's insane. That's it. It's a vitamin D deficiency. So, that's the other argument is that if we don't have enough of the healthy fats and the vitamin D in our system, we're more likely to get sunburned.
Is argan oil good? Yes. Argan oil is good, too, for a facial oil. All of these nut oils tend to have a little bit of SPF naturally occurring, like carrot seed oil, coconut oil, argan. It's a quick Google search. Just google SPF of natural oils, and it'll come up, and then you can see.
They are vitamin D deficient and poor antioxidant intake. That's exactly it. They're eating a shitty diet, so full of these saturated vegetable oils, not enough good healthy fats, low vitamin D, and not enough sun exposure. Yeah, all right, guys. Go get your sunscreen lists from me, aimeeraupp.com/sunscreen, and enjoy some sunshine and stop feeling so guilty about it, okay? I'll see you guys next week.
Oh, let's see. Wait. I went to my doctor and did a vitamin D test. She said I'm fine. You got to ask the level because is fine is really vague. You want it between a 50 and a 70. Let me just make sure there's no other comments here on Facebook. Laura, so grateful to you. You helped me get my vitamin D up to a 67. Know your numbers. There you go. I agree. All right, guys. Love you. I'll see you next week. Bye, Instagram. Bye, Facebook.
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Aimee Raupp is a licensed herbalist, natural fertility expert and acupuncturist in NYC, offering natural health treatments, care & coaching solutions to anyone in need of health rejuvenation! Heal autoimmune diseases and feel better now with Aimee's online courses & coaching solutions. Aimee and her team are experts in Chinese Medicine, & Eastern Nutrition and they are excited to work with you at one of the Aimee Raupp Wellness Centers in NYC, Nyack, or CT. Achieve optimal health & vitality, and take control of your health!
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Aimee Raupp, MS, LAc, is a renowned women’s health & wellness expert and the author of the books Chill Out & Get Healthy, Yes, You Can Get Pregnant, and Body Belief. A licensed acupuncturist and herbalist in private practice in New York, she holds a Master of Science degree in Traditional Oriental Medicine from the Pacific College of Oriental Medicine and a Bachelor’s degree in biology from Rutgers University. Aimee is also the founder of the Aimee Raupp Beauty line of hand-crafted, organic skincare products. She has appeared on The View, and has been featured in Glamour, Allure, Well + Good, GOOP, Shape, and Redbook, and has received endorsements from Deepak Chopra, Dr. Christiane Northrup, Arianna Huffington, and Gabby Bernstein for her work in helping thousands of women to improve their vitality, celebrate their beauty, and reconnect to the presence of their optimal health. Aimee is also an active columnist for media outlets such as Thrive Global and MindBodyGreen and is a frequent speaker at women’s health & wellness conferences across the nation. She engages her large community worldwide through her online programs and with her website, www.aimeeraupp.com.
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