When we returned from Mesa, Arizona -- I thought I could resume doing cold therapy the way I had previously done it. NO. I COULD NOT!!! My regular routine was toooooo much for my body. It had been 24 days without the rigorous training.
I started over - spending less time in the tub during the workout. Instead of the 12 minutes, I dropped back to only 4 minutes. Another day it was 8 minutes. The next time it was 12 minutes. A day later it was up to 15 minutes.
The workouts vary. Jan and I look at the water temp, the air temp, and how we are feeling that day. One thing I can tell you is that CT works for us. It is the workout of our choice. We burn off fat by sitting in a tub of cold water between 50 and 55 degrees Fahrenheit.
I started over - spending less time in the tub during the workout. Instead of the 12 minutes, I dropped back to only 4 minutes. Another day it was 8 minutes. The next time it was 12 minutes. A day later it was up to 15 minutes.
The workouts vary. Jan and I look at the water temp, the air temp, and how we are feeling that day. One thing I can tell you is that CT works for us. It is the workout of our choice. We burn off fat by sitting in a tub of cold water between 50 and 55 degrees Fahrenheit.
Drawing from my journal
Four minutes. I brought the tub out of storage while we were gone. The 140 gallon stock tank was bought at Orschelns Farm Supply for 96 dollars September 2018. This video gives you an idea of its size and how water is put in. There is no pump. Anybody can do this.
Loading tub onto truck bed at Orschelns in Carrollton, Missouri
Carting tank with wheel barrow around house to the back yard
Home movie from snow day north central Missouri two months ago.
The work out is called Cold Thermogenesis. It is the generating of heat and burning fat. Not at the gym. Not with exercising muscles and sweating. But by cold adaption. While sitting in water between 50 to 55 degrees Fahrenheit hormones in humans work better.
Mitochondria, the batteries in our cells, spin faster. The body creates more brown fat (brown adipose tissue). This is what we have around our neck and spine and chest to keep organs warm. During the workout of sitting in cold water the body transforms white fat (white adipose tissue) into brown fat, which gives off heat much faster. Leptin is a hormone that controls metabolism and blood sugar.
Embracing the cold activates a metabolic pathway in the body that shuts off sugar cravings and promotes the burning of fatty acids to support thermogenesis. That means calories cannot be stored in the cold when your mitochondria burns them for heat under the activation of the sympathetic nervous system. Kris Domitrovits
We've been fortunate. Cold air over nite keeps the tub in the 40s. We are able to bring water temp up with bucket heater. I have heard of others adding ice to the water to bring the temps down to the 55 degree range. This summer we'll see.
The second part of the workout is warming back up. I heat up my wrists in a bowl in the sink. The best way. I also change into clothes and walk up hillside on our street and back to the house. Sometimes I jog. It depends. It gets my blood pumping. To warm up organs that are cold.
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