“Get high on your own supply!”
The winter I was born, it was cold and at least two feet of snow had turned Berlin into a winter wonderland. I always hated the cold. I was constantly freezing as a kid and young adult. Summer was my season. Decembers of Central Europe were the worst for me. Twenty-something years later, while traveling to Brazil and celebrating my birthday under the Ipanema summer sunshine, I realized that maybe I was just born in the wrong hemisphere. This was the actual December-weather I liked.
In the fall of 2016, having been back in Germany for six years, I splurged and purchased an Arc'teryx winter down jacket. It's still the most expensive piece of clothing I have ever bought, but it felt like it was worth every penny. The gray and gloomy German winter was approaching, but this time, I was prepared.
I don't remember when and how I discovered Wim Hof and the "Wim Hof Method". When my severe health issues started at the end of 2017, I knew that I would have to adjust my life. Looking for every possible way to become healthy and knowing that, due to my symptoms, any additional illness or disease could be problematic, I figured that strengthening my immune system would serve me very well, especially during these hard times. I remembered the Wim Hof Method and gave it a shot.
His method requires some determination and persistence, but my health issues were1 a lot harder to deal with. This made jumping under an ice-cold shower after a couple of rounds of conscious breathing a lot more manageable. Still, it took me quite some time to really make it a habit.
I immediately noticed the benefits. During this time of regularly taking cold showers, I never caught a cold, I wasn't freezing anymore. My Arc'teryx stayed on the coat rack not to be used anymore. I was still struggling with health issues, but the cold was not an issue anymore.
Fast-forward a couple of years to 2022 and I had already stopped taking fully cold showers, usually switching to cold for the last 1-2 minutes only2. I rarely did the breathing exercises. A stroke of fate in the family pushed me further down. This was followed by getting COVID and sustaining multiple injuries in two separate accidents. This all resulted in me losing the habit.
In December that year, my apartment's water heater broke3 and that made me revisit the Wim Hof method. I did three rounds of his breathing (see the video below) and was surprised that I managed 2:45mins of breath-retention in the third round. Then I took a shower that felt like the coldest shower I had ever taken, at least in those first painful seconds. It was rough. Then it was great.
To me, this is nothing less than a superpower. Let's make it a habit again. And I urge anyone reading this to do the same.
I would still like to get my water heater fixed, though.
1 and still are
2 the so-called "Scottish Shower"
3 no heating either while temperatures were as low as -10C