[bregma]

If you lived where I live and did this you would be dead.

In winter the temperature of my water at the well-head is about 4 C, but if it's sitting in the pipes over night it can hit 0 C (which means no shower until it thaws, of course). The ambient air temperature in my bathroom is often below 10 C in the morning before I rouse the fire when it's -20 C or below outside, and that happens for weeks at a time. A 4 C shower followed by standing wet in 10 C air means a fairly quick excursion into hypothermialand.

I guess if you live in, say, an apartment in Saudi Arabia or Florida a "cold shower" might have a completely different meaning than if you live in a cabin in the Canadian back woods.

[autoconfig]

You won't die even in those temperatures if you take the time to build up tolerance. That's key. Wim Hof has trained his body to survive longer than one hour with his entire body submerged in ice. Similar feats have been replicated by people using his method of cold therapy to build resistance. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/science-explai...

[kyuudou]

I was waiting for someone to bring up Wim Hof. I think he's amazing and pioneering but I think there may also be a genetic component to his work since NW European DNA already gives him a headstart IMO plus probably has neanderthal DNA which was probably well-attenuated with extreme cold.

[autoconfig]

I wouldn't be surprised at all if there is a genetic component but that's why I mentioned that these attributes have been replicated in his students. But then again the fact that your body can acclimatize to cold or heat is not exactly groundbreaking news. We've known that for a long time.

[michalu]

Nope, where I live it gets -25 celsius in winter :) I wish I was in Florida though.

Yes the bathroom is cold and it sucks to get out of warm bed but what motivates me is once you're out of the cold shower it's all over. I prefer short term pain than getting out of warm shower back into cold bathroom and feeling demotivated.

[zaat]

You can heat the bathroom too...

[jackfoxy]

You won't die. I fully immersed myself in the Arctic Ocean at Barrow, Alaska, which was about at 0 C, and the air temperature at the time was about 2 C. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JkOVKu7Mvb4

[zhynn]

my well water varies between 4C and 10C from the ground, and I don't full-cold shower, but I do finish my shower cold, with as cold as it can go. It is bracing, but as the parent says, mentally fantastic. I find that it works as a quick meditative reboot (I can't follow any thought threads while the cold water is full on, so it interrupts my main mental loops). It is easier to achieve a "new day" state where it feels like you have permission to begin again. Now, that's just an illusion, just as the particular day of a new year is an illusion, but the "new day" effect is very powerful for behavior modification.

[hi5eyes]

i live in the gta/ontario and take cold showers 🧐

[makapuf]

Offtopic, but thats the first time I remember seeing an emoji on HN. Is that recent ? I assumed it was frivolous and judged kind of bad taste ; is it? (Real question in general, not talking about this specific comment!)

[frosted-flakes]

Most emojis are automatically stripped out. Apparently that one isn't.

Edit: just tested, 🧐 is let through but others are not.

[rntksi]

🧐 I'm sorry, I just had to try that.