To Wear or Not To Wear Sunglasses?

My parents are in their 80’s. As you can imagine, I have lots of conversations with them about how to improve their health. I win some, I lose some.

At least they’re still alive and living at home. No cognitive problems and able to move around. So something seems to be working.

I think my Dad humors me a lot by listening but likes to do his own thing. My Mom is a bit more open-minded.

She does like to say to me: “Basically everything I’ve heard my whole life about health is wrong according to you”.

Well…a lot of it. Just remember what I write (or tell my parents) is not medical advice.

Since I live in Arizona, I became interested in sunglasses. For most of my life I thought sunglasses were pretty much essential - especially here in the desert.

As I read and learn more about health - and the health of my assisted living residents - I started to see a lot of people recommend ditching sunglasses.

So I started taking their recommendations. And I don’t miss them. I still wear them when I’m outside on a bright day with snow on the ground (not in Phoenix) or on my boat on the water because the glare is strong. Otherwise, not really.

People did not have access to sunglasses for thousands of years. And yet with today’s technology and better manufacturing (supposedly) techniques, you’d think sunglasses would be getting better and better.

Yet eye problems like macular degeneration are becoming worse and worse.

The idea that our bodies are built to live outside, eat natural food, and walk everywhere seems logical. Yet then to think our eyes can’t handle the sun without protection, seems weird to me.

Turns out there’s a lot of science to back it up. Most people agree that sunlight in the right dose is good for your body. So why shield your eyes from it so much?

Eyes contain a whole lot of mitochondria. What do the mitochondria use for energy (ATP)? Free electrons, red and near infrared light. Red and near infrared light is in abundance in sunlight.

Seems like you wouldn’t want to block a source of energy for your eyes and their cells.

Sunlight also triggers your body to create melanin stimulating hormone. Melanin is the substance that protects your skin from burning. Ironically you may be making your skin more susceptible to burning by covering up another body part - your eyes.

I see so many elderly people, both in my homes and throughout the area where I live, avoid the sun like the plague. I’m convinced that during the Pandemic one of the big reasons we didn’t lose any of our residents to Covid was because we put them outside each day and let them soak up the sun for a bit.

And that included not having sunglasses for the vast majority of them.