Sunburn, bug bites, Lyme disease, poison ivy. Sometimes, it seems the great outdoors is just one big health hazard.
So it’s easy to forget that communing with Mother Nature is actually good for us, at all ages and in all sorts of ways.
“We grew up as a species being outdoors,” and our minds and bodies thrive there, says Victoria Maizes, executive director of the Arizona Center for Integrative Medicine at the University of Arizona-Tucson.
“There’s risk in nature. That’s one of its attractions,” says Richard Louv, an author and advocate who has written several books about connecting with nature. But, he says, staying inside is risky, too. “Pediatricians are telling me they are not seeing many broken bones in kids anymore. What they are seeing are repetitive stress injuries from using computers and mice.”
Obesity is, in part, another side effect of the indoor life, he says.
Robert Zarr, a pediatrician in Washington, D.C., who goes by the nickname Dr. Nature, is so convinced that outdoor time is essential to good health that he writes “park prescriptions” for his patients.
“It has been very well received” and has increased physical activity and outdoor time among children in his practice and others, he says.
Don’t have a doctor who writes nature prescriptions? Write your own this summer. You and your family just might:
Exercise more. Studies show people who start an exercise routine outdoors are more likely to stick with it than those who exercise inside, Maizes says.
Outdoor exercise also might be more effective, Louv says.
“When you are hiking a trail or building a treehouse, you are working on core strength,” something adults and kids skimp on indoor workouts, he says.
Stress less. “Being outside seems to tap into the relaxation side of our nervous system and does it in as little as five minutes,” Maizes says.
Improve attention. One study at the University of Illinois found kids with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder were able to concentrate better after a walk in a park.
Sleep better. Get some morning sunlight each day, and you will sleep more soundly at night, says the National Sleep Foundation. Morning light can be especially helpful for someone with an out-of-sync body clock – as many jet-lag veterans know.
See better. “Over the past 30 years or so, rates of nearsightedness have been increasing,” and studies strongly implicate the decline in time children spend outside, says David Hunter, chief of ophthalmology at Boston Children’s Hospital and a clinical spokesman for the American Academy of Ophthalmology.
Louv says that when we spend time outside, we simply “feel more alive.” That’s more than enough reason, he says, to open the front door: “What parent wants their child to be less alive? What adult wants to be less alive?”
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