How Useful Is Hydrotherapy?

Plus: recognize the early symptoms of Parkinson's disease

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The 10almonds Team
June 22, 2024

Today’s almonds have been activated by:

❝You can’t heal a body you hate. You can’t heal a body you don’t love❞

In A Rush?

Today’s 30-Second Summary

If you don’t have time to read the whole email today, here are some key takeaways:

  • Hydrotherapy is a very broad term, and refers to any (external) use of water as part of a physical therapy.

    • Today’s main feature examines some of the top ways it can be beneficial, including different kinds of swimming, non-swimming water-based exercises, and alternating temperature therapies.

  • Do you enjoy cooking in principle, but in practice find the shopping and preparatory work a bit much to maintain every day?

    • Today’s sponsor Purple Carrot is offering delicious and nutritious plant-based meals to your door, with a wide range of options to choose from (e.g. high protein, high fiber, lower calorie, gluten-free, etc).

  • Today’s featured recipe is a life-extending hot and sour shiitake soup that’s deceptively easy to make, considering how delicious it is to enjoy!

Read on to learn more about these things, or click here to visit our archive

A Word To The Wise

“Smart Pills”

What are nootropics and do they really boost your brain?

Watch and Learn

Recognize The Early Symptoms Suggesting Parkinson’s Disease

Forewarned is forearmed, as Dr. Luis Zayas explains:

Prefer text? The above video will take you to a 10almonds page with a text-overview, as well as the video!

Saturday Life Hacks

Hyyyyyyydromatic… 🎶

Hydrotherapy is a very broad term, and refers to any (external) use of water as part of a physical therapy. Today we’re going to look at some of the top ways this can be beneficial—maybe you’ll know them all already, but maybe there’s something you hadn’t thought about or done decently; let’s find out!

Notwithstanding the vague nature of the umbrella term, some brave researchers have done a lot of work to bring us lots of information about what works and what doesn’t, so we’ll be using this to guide us today. For example:

Swimming (and similar)

An obvious one, this can for most people be a very good full-body exercise, that’s exactly as strenuous (or not) as you want/need it to be.

It can be cardio, it can be resistance, it can be endurance, it can be high-intensity interval training, it can be mobility work, it can be just support for an aching body that gets to enjoy being in the closest to zero-gravity we can get without being in freefall or in space.

Depending on what’s available for you locally (pool with a shallow area, for example), it can also be a place to do some exercises normally performed on land, but with your weight being partially supported (and as a counterpoint, a little resistance added to movement), and no meaningful risk of falling.

Tip: check out your local facilities, to see if they offer water aerobics classes; because the water necessitates slow movement, this can look a lot like tai chi to watch, but it’s great for mobility and balance.

Water circuit therapy

This isn’t circuit training! Rather, it’s a mixture of thermo- and cryotherapy, that is to say, alternating warm and cold water immersion. This can also be interspersed with the use of a sauna, of course.

See also:

👆 this last one is about thermal shock-mediated hormesis, which sounds drastic, but it’s what we’re doing here with the hot and cold, and it’s good for most people!

Pain relief

Most of the research for this has to do with childbirth pain rather than, for example, back pain, but the science is promising:

Post-exercise recovery

It can be tempting to sink into a hot bath, or at least enjoy a good hot shower, after strenuous exercise. But does it help recovery too? The answer is probably yes:

For more on that (and other means of improving post-exercise recovery), check out our previous main feature:

Take care!

Our Sponsors Make This Publication Possible

Spring Into Spring With Plant-Based Meals From Purple Carrot

Welcome the warm weather and lighten your to-do list with scrumptious, fully plant-based meals delivered straight to your door.

Purple Carrot wants you to spend more time soaking up the sun and less time stressing over mealtime. They offer a variety of meal kits that help you prepare delicious recipes, prepared meals that are ready to eat in two minutes or less, and grocery items that save you a trip to the store and help you keep your fridge fully stocked.

Whichever option you choose, you can trust that you’re getting nutritious, plant-based meals that are packed with flavor. Pick from high-protein, lower-calorie, high-fiber, and gluten-free options every week - if you want to build muscle, shed a few pounds, or just eat a little cleaner, Purple Carrot has meals and groceries that suit your needs.

This spring, they’re sweetening the deal with five new fun and tasty meal options:

Please do visit our sponsors—they help keep 10almonds free

You May Have Missed
This Or That?

Vote on Which is Healthier

Yesterday we asked you to choose between dates and figs—we picked the dates (click here to read about why), as did 52% of you!

Now for today’s choice:

Click on whichever you think is better for you!

You (Also) May Have Missed

Recipes Worth Sharing

Hot & Sour Shiitake Soup

This is a popular, easy, and delicious soup that nonetheless is not found in many western kitchens, despite being enjoyed in restaurants/take-out. Best of all, making it at home means that you know all the ingredients, can account for quality, and also can customize it per your preferences (i.e. how much heat/sourness you like)!

As a bonus, it also brings many angles of good health, but don’t our recipes always?

Click below for our full recipe, and learn its secrets:

One-Minute Book Review

It's Not Hysteria: Everything You Need to Know About Your Reproductive Health (but Were Never Told) – by Dr. Karen Tan

Firstly, who this book is aimed at: in case it wasn’t clear, this book assumes you have, or at least have had, a uterus. If that’s not you, then well, it’ll still be an interesting read but it won’t be about your reproductive health.

Secondly, about that “reproductive health”: it’s mostly not actually about reproductive health literally, but rather, the health of one’s reproductive organs and the things that they affect—which is a lot more than the ability to reproduce!

Dr. Tang takes us on a (respectably in-depth) tour of the relevant anatomy, before moving on to physiology, before continuing to pathology (i.e. things that can go wrong, and often do), and finally various treatment options, including elective procedures, and the pros and cons thereof.

She also talks the reader through talking about things with gynecologists and other healthcare providers, and making sure concerns are not dismissed out-of-hand (something that happens a lot, of course).

The style throughout is quite detailed prose, but without being difficult at all to read, and (assuming one is interested in the topic) it’s very engaging.

Bottom line: if you would like to know more about uteri and everything that is (or commonly/unfortunately) can be attached to them, the effects they have on the rest of the body and health, and what can be done about things not being quite right, then this is a good book for that.

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Wishing you a wonderfully restorative weekend,

The 10almonds Team