I don’t know about you, but my body isn’t getting any younger as it reminds me on a day to day basis. For the younger audience reading this, I am jealous of your physical capabilities, but know that all of our bodies eventually start to give way with the passage of time. Trying to maintain my physical youth in how functional my body is, I looked to many different recovery techniques for preserving my body’s physical longevity.

Over the course of my exploration, I’ve tried stretching, massages, compression garments, improved sleep and nutrition.. you name it. All of those techniques have their merits, but there was still a niggling feeling that I was missing some profound recovery technique.

After spending some more time researching how ice and heat can help with body recovery, I came across a newfound recovery technique known as hydrotherapy.

Now you might be thinking that hydrotherapy is the same as icing your body or that it’s reserved for older folks (P.S. slightly taking offense to that statement against me now.. just slightly), but I can assure you that it’s actually much different from what you’d expect. It’s actually quite accessible and useful for people of all ages and is more relaxing than other recovery techniques.

What is Hydrotherapy?

Broadly speaking, hydrotherapy is the use of water and act of fully immersing oneself in it for therapeutic purposes. It acts as a type of treatment for any skin-related issues or chronic health issues, such as arthritis. Our hope is to take advantage of hydrotherapy in order to preserve our bodies prior to experiencing health conditions that come with time and age.

Water therapy is quite simple since it uses either hot or cold water. Additionally, the water pressure and flow can vary among different hydrotherapy treatments. While focused on relieving the physical symptoms, hydrotherapy has the added benefit of relaxing and easing mental symptoms too - just think about how you felt if you’ve ever been in a hot tub and had the jets hit your lower back!

Having said that, hydrotherapy practices can be quite simple for you to do at home. People often think that you need a large pool or sauna to perform hydrotherapy whereas you can take advantage of it in the comfort of your own bath or shower. The most important part of hydrotherapy is interacting with water and not necessarily the apparatus used to interact with water.

Benefits

Hydrotherapy offers the following benefits:

Reducing Pain

Studies have found that therapeutic activities using warm water had significantly reduced pain in people with chronic diseases or physical ailments to the musculoskeletal system. The warm water can induce a pain-relieving effect by increasing the blood flow to relax your muscles.

Similarly, medical experts have shown that cold water therapeutic activities can similarly reduce pain, most notably from those due to injuries that cause significant swelling or inflammation. Basically, cold water therapy is akin to the idea of applying ice to an injury in order to restrict the blood flow to reduce the swelling and inflammation.

Recovering from Workouts

If you’re an athlete or someone who regularly exercises with a great deal of force on your joints, hydrotherapy in the form of switching back and forth between hot and cold water can prove instrumental to your recovery. Athletes around the world take part in this therapeutic technique and find that it helps them recover from hard workouts and delay or reduce muscle soreness.

If you’ve even lately been feeling general stiffness or soreness in your body having exercised for many years, hydrotherapy is a great way to open and loosen up your muscle tissue to “reset” your body.

Mental Relaxation / Improved Mental Health

Health organizations have found that water-based activities can improve the mental health of some people by reducing their anxiety and depression. Knowing that exercise is a great way to manage our stress and anxiety levels, swimming is commonly found to help improve people’s moods and release tension following that basis.

Science has also shown that even looking at and hearing water makes us feel more relaxed on a biological level. By looking at and hearing the soothing sounds of water, our brains trigger a flood of neurochemicals that increase blood flow to both the brain and heart, which in turn induces mental relaxation.

Types of Hydrotherapy

Please consult your doctor or health practitioner to determine which of the following types of hydrotherapy best suit you and your health goals:

Aquatic Exercise

Performing aquatic exercise is a great low-impact form of hydrotherapy suitable for those with arthritis or people coming back from significant cartilage based injuries. Typically, you can perform aquatic exercises in a pool with specialist equipment, such as aqua dumbbells or a water jogging belt.

Immersion Therapy

Immersion therapy is a form of hydrotherapy where individuals completely immerse themselves in water for relief. Some examples of immersion therapy include:

• Whirlpool baths

• Jacuzzis with jets

• Ice baths

Water Circuit Therapy

Similar to immersion therapy, water circuit therapy is a type of hydrotherapy where an individual cycles between different forms of hydrotherapy, typically alternating between hot and cold water to promote blood circulation and ease one’s pain and symptoms. The circuit will generally depend on each individual’s tolerance for warm and cold water, but you could include the following techniques into your circuit:

• Warm baths

• Ice baths

• Cold showers

• Steam baths

• Sitz baths

Summing it Up

Find the type of hydrotherapy technique that suits you best by consulting your doctor or practitioner to understand what’s safe and healthy for your particular condition. Cold water and/or hot water can have profound impacts on your circulatory system, so plan to start out with smaller sessions at first with an increased focus on gradually warming up (no pun intended) to your desired hydrotherapy technique.

Whether it’s for relaxation, injury rehabilitation, or physical recovery purposes, hydrotherapy techniques are great to incorporate into your lifestyle to increase your body’s physical longevity. Here’s to a longer and healthier physical life with ice baths and/or warm baths!