'Tis The Season

July is here, yay! And so is the potential for skin cancer. My mother was diagnosed with a stage 4 melanoma five years ago, she had beaten incredible odds, waiting every six months for the results of her fully body CT scan to detect malignancies. Last July I had surgery to remove a basal cell carcinoma (a much less lethal form of skin cancer) from my eyebrow, more extensive surgery than I realized going into it. I am no stranger to the havoc fun in the sun can wreck. I have been very careful with Riley and the application of sunscreen. He has never had a sunburn in his six + years. The naturopath in me cringes inwardly while we slap on the chemicals in sunscreen, one of the many voices in my head tells me to just suck it up and do it, stop worrying about the other unknown hazards behind those. I am always on the look out for something more "natural". Last summer a friend suggested a kids one made by Alba simply called "Sun". It has a nice fragrance and the texture is OK. It claims to be water resistant. I don't mind it, it claims to be "natural" as well although it does have the dreaded ingredient of "oxybenzone". As well, I was reading all kinds of acclaim last summer for a kids sunscreen made by the company called "Badger" but it wasn't on the shelves and all online sources had it sold out. I found some a few weeks ago and tried it this morning. It's horrible - sticky, oily, doesn't absorb but leaves a while film over the skin. Blech. My favorite so far is likely far from "natural". It's Coppertone made for kids in a pump bottle (no aerosol so it's fully recyclable), it's light, absorbs quickly and doesn't leave you feeling as if you are wearing an extra layer of skin. And I can guarantee it is fully waterPROOF for the six hours it claims on the bottle. Oh yeah, another bonus is it doesn't make me break out although this year I tried Clinique's City Block which is also very nice. But more pricey so I use it just on my face. This isn't an advertisement for any one brand, but I'm throwing the question out there - does anyone have a brand they like and would recommend?

P.S.The option of living in the shade is neither rational nor feasible. We have to be outdoors some of the time and there isn't always shade. Swimming is part of our family culture, it's good exercise and it's a lot healthier than staying indoors on a sunny day. I believe in kids spending time outside in an old fashioned way even though there seems to be nothing old fashioned about the holes in the ozone.