Why do we feel healed when we take a shower when we are sick?
In: Biology
Hot water and steam are some of the world’s oldest remedies to illness.
The heat from the shower relaxes your muscles, which makes you feel better right from the off.
But it also helps to clear congestion in your chest and to dilate your airways if they are spasming. Steam is an ancient remedy for asthma, one that is still used today for croup. I have used it myself in the middle of the night with a small child struggling to breathe. It reduces panic and helps them calm down enough to be able to take the actual medicine that will help them better. The humidity makes it easier to breathe in the air, and helps to settle down the reactivity of the lungs.
A shower helps you feel better by combating dehydration. Lots of people drink water during showers without realising that they are doing it. When you are ill, it’s easy to get dehydrated. Hot water from a shower – even the little bit you drink unconsciously – helps, and you will feel much better afterwards.
It helps rid you of a headache by dilating your blood vessels. Hot water has this effect.
It helps clear your sinuses and stuffy nasal passages. Steam and hot water will temporarily resolve this misery.
It will warm you up when you have “the chills.” Fevers make you feel cold, even though you are hot to touch. Being in a hot environment is a good way to help your body raise itself to the temperature it needs to be, and you feel better once you’ve warmed yourself through.
It eases ear aches by clearing congestion. Most of it is clearing congestion, really – most of the misery when you have a cold is caused by congestion and fever, and most of what a hot shower will do is temporarily melt away this congestion.
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