As the summer approaches, in a year where (finally!) more of us are able to travel again, I wanted to gather a selection of ways to keep health optimised while travelling.
There are two facets to travelling that require a little bit of attention if we want to feel great:
- The travel itself, whether that be by plane, boat or car
- Challenges we might face while we’re on holiday that require us to be prepared
When I travel, I prepare for both of these.
Firstly, by equipping myself with all the supplements, foods and products I need to minimise the effects of the travel itself (including jetlag), and secondly by making sure I have to hand a bunch of nifty remedies, supplements, products and other bits that will help me if I do come up against health challenges while I’m away, especially with little ones in tow!
Let’s think about why it’s so easy to feel unwell when we’re travelling:
- Airport and plane food
- Recycled artificial air
- Extreme levels of EMFs (electromagnetic frequencies) and artificial blue light from airplanes, airports, service stations and other stores or places we may visit on our travels
- Too much time sitting down
- Dehydration (easy to happen on a plane but also when drinking low quality water)
Not to mention that when we slow down, we give the body permission to feel everything it’s been holding off, in order to allow us to continue functioning – I’m sure I’m not the only one here who has arrived on holiday only to come down with a stinking cold a few days later!
Other challenges we may face while on our jollies:
- Food poisoning
- Sensitivity to new drinking water
- Sun stroke
- Lowered immunity
- Bites, stings or allergies
- Dehydration
Wow this sounds so negative Nora – I’m NOT trying to put a downer on your holidays! Let’s just be prepared, just in case!
So, here are my top recommendations to optimise health while travelling:
*discount codes and links for many of the recommendations available at the end of the article
- Biomolecular Oxygen
When flying especially, our oxygen levels decrease, and stomach complaints, tiredness, jetlag, lowered immunity and compromised brain function will be more prevalent in an oxygen-poor environment in the body. This Biomolecular Oxygen supplement uses intelligent technology to actually get the oxygen through to the organs, tissues and cells
- Blue Blocking Glasses
You’d have to have been living in another solar system to have not yet cottoned on to the fact that nutrition directly impacts health – we all know this, but less people pay attention to the very real and damaging effects of artificial blue light on our wellbeing. Quick science lesson: we need melatonin to sleep. When we are around lots of blue light (screens, LED and fluorescent lighting etc) after dark, cortisol levels go up which causes melatonin levels to decrease, leading not only to poor quality sleep but also to lowered immune function, anxiety and even depression, not to mention retinal damage in the eyes. I won’t travel anywhere without my blue blocking glasses
- Supplements / superfoods:
- Glutathione; protection from oxidative damage and aids detoxification – necessary when consuming the toxins associated with travel
- Liposomal Vitamin C. No vitamin C works more quickly or effectively for immune boosting, energy levels and collagen formation than when delivered via liposomes. These nifty little sachets by Your Zooki are super convenient when travelling.
- Magnesium Glycinate. We’re all deficient in magnesium, and no other mineral affects as many bodily functions as magnesium, so make sure to have some magnesium glycinate for all those bodily functions that need help, and some MagEnhance to help you sleep and relax better – one of my fav magnesium supplements
- Extra Virgin Cod Liver Oil. This helps our bodies absorb the fat soluble vitamins A, D & K and helps our bodies to synthesise the vitamin D from the sun
- Good quality probiotic. Essential for stabilising and maintaining healthy gut flora, which is compromised when travelling
- Medicinal Mushrooms & Adaptogens. I use medicinal mushrooms and other adaptogens to improve many of the bodily processes including immune function, cellular defences and regeneration, cardiovascular health. As it’s hard to travel with bags full of different adaptogens, this supplement provides them all in one
- Activated Charcoal for food poisoning. Activated charcoal is highly porous so can help absorb unwanted substances and carry them out of the digestive system – an integral process following food poisoning
- Melatonin. There is a school of thought that taking exogenous melatonin will stop your body from producing enough itself. However, after much research, I believe that this only happens when. you take it regularly because you’re not putting into place systems to help you sleep when you’re not travelling: ie on screens too much, not enough natural sunlight, bad diet, high stress levels etc. Taking a good quality, liposomal melatonin to counter the negative effects that travel can have on your circadian rhythm, actually benefits our systems hugely, as we are helping to reduce cortisol and set our circadian rhythm back where it needs to be; helping our body to find its way back to its natural state using an exogenous (but safe) substance to help us get there. Biohacking at its finest.
- Elderberry syrup (especially for kids) for immune boosting if anyone gets ill. Works like magic!
- Salves and creams: arnica cream for bruises, calendula for cuts and grazes, comfrey for bones
- Homeopathic Kit. I take my Ainsworth’s kit with 40+ remedies EVERYWHERE, but some essentials are: arnica (bruises), aconite (shock), chamomilla (calming), belladonna (fevers & sunburn), apis (bites), arsenicum (food poisoning). You need to call Ainsworth’s or Helios direct to order over the phone as laws state that homeopathy cannot be bought online. I literally do not travel without this kit
- First Aid Kit with bandages, hydrogen peroxide to clean open wounds, plasters, sterile cotton pads, scissors
- Sensate – Palm-sized device Infrasonic resonance system to calm body’s nervous system and aid meditation, offering nature and other sounds to calm autonomic nervous system during flights and other times
- Portable Red Light Therapy Panel. We absolutely HAVE to mitigate and counter the levels of artificial blue light we’ll experience when travelling, in order to reduce cortisol levels and help cellular functions. This portable panel allows us to take it with us everywhere we go!
- Blue Light-Free Reading Lamp. As above, we need to reduce our exposure to artificial light if we want to keep in optimum health, so instead of watching the iPad at night, try reading with a blue light-free reading lamp in order to help drive up melatonin
- Avoid caffeine and alcohol on flights. Avoiding stimulants on flights is an important way of ensuring we keep optimum states of health alongside everything else we’re doing. Immune function reduces on flights so we have to do everything we can to boost that
- Grounding upon arrival. Step onto the earth barefoot, and allow Mother Earth to ground and recharge you away from all the EMFs you would have encountered during your travels.
I hope this was helpful and that you manage to implement some of these in order to really biohack your travels!
With love & gratitude,
Lauren
Resources:
Block Blue Light blue light blocking glasses, reading lamp and red light panel. Use code LAUREN10 for 10% discount
Amrita Nutrition for Glutathione, Biomolecular Oxygen, Magnesium Glycinate, Liposomal Melatonin Rosita Cod Liver Oil, Probiotic, Medicinal Mushrooms, Activated Charcoal . Use practitioner code 63T091 for 10% discount (follow links on article itself to choose correct product)
Intelligence Labs for MagEnhance. Use code LAUREN15 for 15% discount
Your Zooki for Liposomal Vitamin C. Use code LAUREN10 for 10% discount
Sensate – Use code LAUREN20 for £20 off
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