The Sun: Friend or Foe?

Hey everybody, I have a question for you? Do you think the sun is your friend or your foe? The first thing that probably pops into your head while trying to answer this question is Ultraviolet radiation. The majority of us, myself including, have been spoon fed by the media, magazines, and even doctors, that Ultraviolet radiation is ultra-bad for you. (Sorry for the horrible joke) Anyway there is a problem with this, they all look at this one sided. Ultraviolet radiation does indeed cause cells to mutate, possibly to cancer cells, but the UV rays are also important for the bodies production of Vitamin D.

For of you that don't know, Vitamin D is one of the most important vitamins out there. It's benefits stretch a wide variety of types. For one it helps maintain bones and helps them grow strong, just like the Milk companies advertise but this way avoids all those nasty Caseins, milk's equivalent of Gluten. It also increases the bodies production of natural killer white blood cells. The fancy name aside, these are the white blood cells that quite literally kill any mutated or stray cells that mutated from your normal cells. And the great thing is that they kill cancer cells too.

Oh and for all you Psoriasis suffers, ever heard how the over production of skin cells is caused by the activation of T-cells for no apparent reason, which leads to your plaques. Well Vitamin D also blocks the activation of these T-cells, preventing Psoriasis at the source. Some of you may also know that UV radiation is medically one of the methods used to treat Psoriasis. Well now you why, because UV radiation D produces Vitamin D which helps prevent Psoriasis. I started taking Vitamin D myself and it certainly has improved my situation greatly, but moisturizers are still a good idea. I'll get into how you should get Vitamin D in areas with low amounts of UV and sunlight soon.

So already we can see how Vitamin D is essential to us. From a Paleolithic viewpoint our ancestors came from Africa, a place with enormous amounts of UV. Well our ancestors didn't have sunblock there, but instead they utilized the UV to produce Vitamin D, which ironically, and gratefully, also decreases your risk of skin and all other forms of cancer. In the Paleo world the Sun is natural, it's what organisms evolved to deal with and even utilize. So wouldn't it be logical that what's natural for our bodies is good for us, after all that is the whole point of the paleo diet.

Now if you live in an area where you don't get many rays, or have a job thats mainly indoors, or your even in an area where the sun don't shine, at least for part of the year, have no fear. Vitamin D supplements are just as effective. The recommended dose by the label is around 400 i.u. But current research points that around 1,000 or 2,000 i.u. is even better. Some even suggest a dosage of a whopping 10,000 i.u. After all this would make sense in Africa our Paleo ancestors got incredible amounts of UV.

The pinnacle point I must address, and I'm sure some of you are already thinking about this: if UV radiation is so good for you, then why are there so many cases of Skin Cancer in the world, even though it produces the wonderful Vitamin D. This has a simpler answer than you might think. Because Gluten, Caseins, and other non-paleo foods help deactivate you immune system, which also includes those fancy natural killer white blood cells, and cause a havoc throughout your body, your immune system become way sub-par. Not only is your immune system being deactivated, but it's also busy trying to fix all the other damage done to your body by those non-paleolithic foods. So preventing cancer, important as it may be, may be an impossible thing for you immune system to do occasionally, which combined with the vast amounts of sunlight that your body usually protects, cancer is then usually a ticking time bomb.

Finally a small note about sunscreen. Though i recommend using it if your fair skinned and going to the Caribbean, but only for the first couple of days and a low SPF at that, it does block the UV radiation that supplies us with Vitamin D. Not only that but some forms of chemical sunscreens have been found to promote cancers once they get absorbed into the deeper layers of the skin, where if they are hit by a ray of UV the become Super-Free-Radicals (look at prior post "A Microwave Goodbye"). These are extremely dangerous and help explain one interesting fact: The largest amounts of cases of skin cancer are in the populations that use sunblock the most. SO think twice when reaching for that sun-tan lotion next time and give your body the Vitamin D it deserves.