Five Sauna Benefits for Your Health and Mood
We love our modern outdoor sauna. My wife and I use it 5 days a week. We have big windows to look out on our backyard. Our backyard sauna makes us feel great, and it’s a great break from work. There are so many benefits to saunas, a 2000 year old tradition, but I’ll start by keying in on five great sauna health benefits that I have genuinely felt on a day to day basis. It’s a great way to lift your mood on a winter’s weeknight, but we used our backyard cedar outdoor sauna almost just as much in the dog days of summer. Here's a picture of our backyard sauna:
Here are 5 reasons why saunas are good for you, and what saunas are good for: Slower Aging effect, good for the heart, lowers blood pressure, increases weight loss, increases energy. There are many many other benefits, but I’ll get into those later.
If you spend half an hour per day in your sauna, you will feel better, your doctor will give you more compliments, you will perform better, and you might even live longer! Your body responds to the heat from a sauna with good stress. Similar to exercise, saunas create stresses in your body to learn from the experience through homeostasis, and get better for next time.
Stop Getting Older!
I wish I found this 20 years ago… This publication from 2014 followed over 2300 men aged 42-60 over 20 years, a rare longitudinal study. The study showed that men who used a sauna between 4-7 times per week were 40% less likely to die from all causes compared to the control group that did not use a sauna. That’s insane!
The reason for this is likely because of something scientists call Heat Shock Proteins, which can help to repair cells that are damaged, recycle damaged cells more efficiently, and help prevent the damage of future cells as well.
Cardiovascular Benefits - Show your heart some love
That same study of over 2300 men resulted in even more great scientific results. Those who used a sauna 4-7 times a week were 50% less likely to die from any cardiovascular disease than those who do not use a sauna. It’s not only the risk of death that you’re avoiding, it’s also keeping your heart alive and healthy. Saunas have been proven to promote blood flow and increases oxygen delivery to blood cells, which helps your heart to function on a day-to-day basis. Your cardiologist and your family will thank you for living life to the fullest and living with less risk!
Lower Your Blood Pressure
According to the Heart and Stroke Foundation, high blood pressure is the number one risk factor for stroke and a major risk factor for heart disease. High blood pressure is when the blood pressure in your arteries rises and your heart has to work harder than normal to pump blood through the blood vessels. Saunas have been proven to help lower blood pressure and therefore decrease these risks. Are saunas good for you? Yes.
Lose More Weight! Maintain Weight for Efficiently!
Now, full disclosure, you have to exercise to experience the sauna weight loss benefit. A sauna will not make you lose weight alone, but it has proven to lose a lot more weight if you use a sauna post-exercise than if you do not. One study found that participants who used a sauna after a 15 minute exercise session lost 1.8 times more weight than those who did not use a sauna. That’s incredible! They also dropped 4.6 times more body fat than the control group.
Using a sauna is an extremely powerful weight loss tool. Another study found that saunas can also subdue appetite, which makes for more normal caloric intake and better overall health! Saunas are proven to increase metabolic weight and oxygen consumption, which specifically helps people who cannot exercise due to injury or illness to maintain their weight. This is perfect for those retirees who aren't quite as active as they used to be, or for people who suffer from conditions that make it difficult to exercise like arthritis.
Increase Your Energy. Feel More Alive, Be More Productive!
This is my favourite sauna benefit. I feel I have more energy now than I did 15 years ago, and I have my sauna to thank for that. Simply put, sauna use can increase the function of your mitochondrial health. The mitochondria is the energy source of your cells, and if you increase its function you will increase your energy!
Not only does it help your cells to its core, it also helps your muscles to have more endurance to get through the day. With common sauna use, your muscles will have increased blood flow which improves nutrient delivery, allowing you to have more energy throughout the day. Isn’t that amazing?
A sauna is a significant investment, let’s be honest. However, with these 5 life changing sauna benefits and 20 more sauna benefits to come in future blogs, it’s time and money well-spent. It’s so great to have my energy back, and my heart will work harder and more efficiently for the duration of my life. I’m so happy that I have a sauna in my backyard, because it looks great and it makes me feel great.
We make all of our log cedar saunas in Canada, made for either your backyard or a cabin sauna for your cottage. We have had a ton of customers get a panoramic barrel sauna with bubble window to look out onto the lake! Check out our huge collection of saunas on our website! Do you like the modern sauna look with lots of windows? Or do you prefer a cedar barrel sauna? We’re even introducing mini saunas in the near future for 1-2 people! We can ship you a sauna kit to make by yourself, or we can install it for you.
We have many types of sauna heaters to offer, including many types of electric sauna heaters, and two types of wood burning sauna heaters. The choice is yours, but we recommend an electric sauna heater if you’re installing a home sauna in your suburban backyard like we did. If you're off grid at the cottage with lots of wood to burn, of course a wood burning sauna would be your best choice! We also have many sauna accessories from Canada to help you get the ideal sauna experience!
Here are just a few comment from people who love the saunas they ordered from our website:
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Just letting you know we got our sauna installed last weekend and we love it. We love the look and smell of the cedar. Wish we had done this years ago.
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We live right on the lake, and sitting in this and looking at the lake is so relaxing. We got the big one because we always have company over, and our guests absolutely love it! Thanks for you help.
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This is truly a fantastic sauna. The huge windows are great and it gets very hot. The top of the sauna has a water proof fabric which works great but if you have a top view down looks a bit weird but we love it. Way better than others we have seen.