We quench irrepressible thirst, or what to drink in the bath to improve health? What to eat and drink in the sauna? What do you eat in the sauna?
Banya in Russia is more than just a tradition. Almost everyone likes to go there - for health, for relaxation, and for communication. Because of the stress on the body, you want to eat, which means that questions immediately arise about what is allowed to be eaten and what is not. Anyone who likes to visit the bath should know which snacks are allowed before and after the procedures, and which ones are prohibited.
What can you eat before visiting the bath
A light lunch will help the body gain strength before the bath
The most important rule is not to eat before visiting the bath. If the stomach is full, you can visit the steam room no earlier than after 4 hours.
The best option for a meal before visiting the bath will be light foods - yogurt, fruits, vegetables, porridge, simple soups. You can taste potatoes (boiled) and pilaf, but without meat. In the bath itself, before the procedures, radish and juice from it are highly recommended to improve digestion.
It is very useful to drink juice or fruit drink - these drinks stimulate blood circulation, which, in turn, increases the positive effect of the bath.
On a completely empty stomach, by the way, it is very undesirable to walk. Despite all the healing properties and relaxation, a bath for the body is quite a serious stress.
What can you eat after
Vegetables are rich in minerals that are necessary for the normal functioning of the body - potassium, calcium, magnesium, phosphorus and others.
After the bath, fruits and vegetables are also very appropriate. A light lunch of lean soup is welcome. A salad is obligatory, and the more ingredients it contains (apples, cucumbers, tomatoes, peppers, cranberries, cheese), the better. To restore the water balance, sauerkraut is recommended. You can eat cheese, small sandwiches. The goal is not to overload the body in the intervals between runs, but to let it gain strength.
What is prohibited
The body spends a lot of energy on digesting fatty foods, and in the bath, the loads are already high
Both before the procedures and after them, in no case should you eat heavy and fatty foods, fast food. Due to severe dehydration, such food will extremely load the liver.
Do not eat sweets, especially cakes or ice cream.
Despite the fact that after the bath, a terrible feeling of hunger usually attacks, you should wait at least half an hour before eating, and even then only light foods. But you should definitely refresh yourself, as indicated above - it’s hard for the body to survive the steam room, it’s better to eat more or less tightly in two hours.
Bath, despite its healing properties, can be dangerous. You need to spend time there wisely and be sure to eat right on the day of the visit so that there are no health problems.
Have you finally managed to get into the bath or sauna? Everyone knows that it is good for the body, the nerves calm down, stress is removed, the work of the kidneys, heart, and various glands normalizes. Regular visits to baths and saunas strengthen the immune system, promote weight loss, which is especially important for women. It is useful for children to soar for the prevention of respiratory diseases and for hardening.
However, do not forget that a bath with a sauna has contraindications for certain categories of people suffering from certain ailments and diseases.
Contraindications to visiting baths and saunas
- Heart disease, hypertension
- Oncological diseases
- Influenza and other acute viral infections (with fever)
- Epilepsy
- Pregnancy (with caution)
- Critical days for women
- Head injury
- Skin contagious diseases (in this case, you can simply infect others)
- Alcohol intoxication
- Empty or too full stomach
An alternative for those who for some reason cannot visit a classic Russian bath or sauna can be the so-called “cedar barrel”.
When going to a bath or sauna, collect the necessary set of things that will be useful to you in the steam room and in the recreation area. Be especially careful to follow the rules of hygiene and use individual bath accessories in public baths and saunas, it is not known what sores you can pick up there. Be carefull!
List of things in the bath and sauna
- Slates, rubber slippers
- Terry towel or waffle bath towel
- A sheet, bathrobe or bath novelty - a towel skirt, a kind of hybrid
- Felt or felt cap for the head (saves from overheating, protects hair)
- Swimsuit
- birch broom
- Mittens or mittens for a bath (they are convenient to work with a broom, not so scalding)
- Steam room mat
- Soap, shampoo, shower gel
- Skin care products: creams, scrubs, masks
- washcloth
- Essential oils (it is useful to add them to the stones in the steam room)
- herbal tea
- Comb
What to take from food and drink
Noisy young companies celebrating birthdays or other holidays in a bathhouse or sauna often get beer and salted fish for it. Chips, nuts, and other crunchy, savory snacks also come in handy. Someone brings a whole collection of alcoholic beverages, but, as we have already noted, this adversely affects the heart and blood vessels.
It is better not to load the stomach at all during bath procedures, but we can recommend taking your favorite drinks that replenish the balance of fluid in the body: tea, juice, fruit drink, mineral water, compote.
From food, take light snacks: fish and cheese cuts, fruits and vegetables, vegetable salads, sandwiches. Japanese rolls and sushi are good, or you can order a delicious pizza or barbecue.
After the bath and sauna
After a bath or sauna, you need to cool down and only then should you wear clothes, preferably from natural fabrics to prolong the effect of steaming. If you feel a surge of energy after the procedures, then, undoubtedly, a visit to the bath did you good. Do not abuse, do not sit in the steam room for a long time in the hope of a stronger effect, very often there are cases of heat strokes.
A bathhouse is a place where you can not only cleanse your body, take a break from everyday fuss and problems, but also recharge your health “in full”, that is, tone the body as a whole. But from the water-bath wellness procedures, you can get serious harm if you do not follow the rules and some of the subtleties of visiting this specific place. First of all, this concerns the diet before, during and after the bath. Let's try to figure out what to eat before and after the bath in order to get the maximum benefit and pleasure from this event. 
Food in the bath
In addition to the fact that each person has their own individual preferences in food, the features of the functioning of the digestive system are important. You should definitely not take a steam bath, exposing yourself to thermal stress, immediately after a hearty lunch or dinner. It is generally accepted that for the normal functioning of the stomach and intestines, as well as a positive effect on the body of bath procedures, it is advisable to postpone a visit to this "institution" for 4-5 hours from the moment of the last meal.
This is due to the fact that as soon as food enters the stomach, the body begins to work to digest it. If you go into the steam room immediately after eating, the body temperature rises sharply, the body heats up intensely.
Under the influence of heat, juice secretion increases, and the fermentation process starts in the stomach. Food is not digested properly, but wanders - first in the stomach itself, and then in the intestines. How unpleasant this can be, it is not necessary to tell at length. In addition, such a violation of digestion is fraught with negative health consequences.
The high temperature and humidity of the bath air causes the vessels to expand. The circulatory system speeds up work and begins to intensively distribute toxins throughout the body. In addition, actively losing moisture in the steam room, the human body is rapidly dehydrated, resulting in an increased load on the liver.
Therefore, in order not to end up with severe pain in the abdomen, nausea and dizziness, it is necessary to eat food long before coming to the bath. Fatty, fried foods, foods with various food additives, fast foods, smoked meats of various varieties and types, and other “heavy” foods are better not to eat at all on the eve of going to the bathhouse.
The same applies to meat and fish dishes. The ideal option is to exclude high-calorie and hard-to-digest foods from the diet on "bath days". Food with a high content of animal fat, cakes, ice cream, creams - all this junk food before the bath can worsen your well-being.
Of course, you should not go to the bathhouse on an empty stomach. The ideal option is carbohydrate food 1.5-2 hours before the bath, for example, durum pasta, buckwheat, light fruit salad, pilaf without oil and meat, boiled potatoes.
And for the active removal of toxins from the body during sweating, it is worth drinking a glass of cabbage pickle or natural kvass without preservatives, preferably home-made. Such a light lunch will help the body gain strength, since the bath, although it is considered a place of rest and relaxation, is, first of all, the strongest stress for the body.
You should also not eat immediately after leaving the steam room, especially for those who want to lose weight. The recommended meal time is 1-2 hours after visiting the bath. If, nevertheless, the feeling of hunger is strong, you can have a snack with sauerkraut, apples, light vegetable salad.
The use of "heavy" food in the bath between visits to the steam room is also undesirable. But drinking plenty of water is welcome.
Drinks after the bath
First of all, it is worth drinking as much plain clean water as possible. Mineral water without gas, green or mint tea, natural juice, herbal infusions are also suitable.
The fact is that for the normal functioning of the body, all organs, including the brain, water is necessary. That is, in the bath you need to constantly drink liquid, because the loss of 10% of the total amount of water in the body can lead to painful disorders. The loss of 20-25% of the fluid is fatal. In this regard, replenishing the balance of fluid in the body immediately after profuse sweating in the steam room, we ensure the proper functioning of all its organs and systems.
During bath procedures, it is considered especially useful to drink freshly brewed green or mint tea. Tea promotes the active removal of toxins from the body. In addition, this drink contains a whole range of useful vitamins, has tonic properties.
However, it is worth remembering that excessive consumption of black tea can have the opposite effect and only harm the body up to severe poisoning. At the same time, all infusions and herbal teas have special tonic properties and, at the same time, each infusion performs its own special task.
For example, linden tea helps fight cold symptoms and strengthens the immune system. St. John's wort improves bowel function and has an anti-inflammatory effect. Mint relieves fatigue, muscle tension, calms nerves and improves sleep.
An excellent effect is also given by sour fruit drink, rosehip infusion, fresh natural juice from vegetables and fruits, and, of course, kvass, which is considered an essential drink of a real Russian bath.
Definitely do not drink coffee or strong black tea in the bath. The steam acts in such a way that the main burden goes to the cardiovascular and nervous systems, and these drinks will only increase the tension. You should also not get carried away with carbonated drinks, since carbon dioxide, under the influence of high temperatures, triggers gas exchange processes, which is harmful to the human body.
Cold beer is considered to be a traditional drink in Russian baths. But! From a medical point of view, the use of even weak alcoholic beverages can lead to serious consequences, especially for people of the older age group. Cold, acting on organs, constricts blood vessels, and prolonged exposure to their tissues leads to a decrease in the intensity of blood flow, causes overflow of small vessels with blood and the appearance of abscesses and bruises in the walls of internal organs.
It is worth paying special attention to the fact that the use of any alcoholic beverages and smoking in the intervals between procedures in the steam room and subsequent hardening are strictly prohibited!
There is nothing related
We talk a lot about nutrition in general, including how we should eat before the bath, forgetting that food after the bath is no less important than before the bath.
The main mistake of many is a feast after a bath. We deliberately activated the body to turn on the cleansing processes, and after that we suddenly begin to overload it sharply, diverting it from important functions to digestion.
Well, are we really so hungry for a week that we can’t just fast in the evening after the bath? During this time, all processes in the body will calm down and the body will tune in to the processes that needed to be done for many days, but due to congestion it was not possible.
Of course, there are certain nutritional requirements, so if a person has high acidity, then you need to eat something, but it should not be a ham or sausage, or a sandwich. In such cases, it is better to eat salad, cottage cheese, fruits, berries, juices, tea. The main thing is not to overeat.
But it is better to eat nothing in the evening after the bath. Drink tea or water. It is better to drink warm water, because then you will drink exactly as much as the body needs. In addition, warm water has the effect of pain relief and soothing. It is better not to drink cold water because energy will be spent on its assimilation and warming up and this will increase appetite even more. For the same reason, it is better to drink green tea. With tea, you can use berries, fruits or dried fruits.
A visit to the bathhouse allows not only to wash, but also to strengthen your health. The benefits of bath procedures have been known since ancient times. In different countries, baths were arranged with some differences, but the essence was very similar. Bath procedures included the impact on the body of high temperature, aromatic oils, massage and contrast baths.
The Russian steam bath was no exception, which today is visited with pleasure not only in villages, but also in modern megacities. A bath broom and light steam work real miracles - the skin is effectively cleansed of keratinized particles, acquiring a healthy look and velvety, with sweat, toxins accumulate in the body, getting into the polluted air, and the improvement of metabolism allows you to normalize your weight .
But in order for the bath to give the desired positive effect, it is necessary to carry out preparation before steaming, which we will discuss below.
Get used to the bath gradually
In order not to harm your body, you should not be dumbfounded by sudden changes in temperature, entering a steam room from frost or jumping out of a steam room and jumping into a snowdrift.
This will bring nothing but harm to the modern city dweller. The body for such procedures must be prepared in advance. Otherwise, problems with the heart, pressure or exacerbation of chronic diseases are possible.
Even if your blood pressure is in order and you have never complained about your heart, you should not abuse cold water pouring between visits to the steam room.
The same applies to diving into a contrast bath or the nearest pond. Instead of a charge of vivacity, such experiments with the body can lead you to a hospital bed with a severe cold.
Before going to the bath, do not try to tune in to a long procedure.
On the first visit, you should not stay in the steam room until you feel faint. In addition, an unnecessarily long stay in a very hot steam room instead of benefit can negatively affect the skin.
Don't Go to the Bath When You're Tired
Another tip to remember is not to go to the bathhouse after physical exertion when you are tired. After all, a bath is an additional load on all body systems and it is best to go to a bath after having a rest.
If during the day you were busy with physical work, you should have a good rest before visiting the bath.
Do not overeat before the bath
Like physical fatigue, a full stomach is not the best companion for visiting a Russian steam bath.
Undigested food puts an additional burden on the body, forcing the stomach and intestines to process the food in them. A feeling of heaviness in the stomach can spoil all the joy of the steam room.
To prevent this from happening, try not to overeat before going to the bath. It is enough to have something light to eat - drink a cup of tea with a sandwich or eat a small portion of salad so that the stomach is not empty, but at the same time it is not overloaded with food.
Immediately before the bath and when visiting the steam room, you should not drink cold water.
How to prepare a steam room
In order for the bath to be beneficial, and the steam to be light, you need to properly prepare the steam room in advance. It will largely depend on this whether you enjoy the bath procedures or leave the bath with a feeling of fatigue and heaviness in the muscles.
Even before you fire the stove, you should carefully prepare the room. A steam room lined with wood is able to absorb all the secretions that come out of the body with sweat. Therefore, it is recommended to periodically clean all surfaces in the steam room.
Such a cleaning procedure is especially relevant if not only members of your family are in the bathhouse, but, for example, your friends also come in.
To wash the floor and shelves, you can add a few drops of fir, spruce or pine aromatic oil to the water. This will help fill the steam room with a pleasant aroma.
The air in the steam room should not be filled with clubs of burning steam. It should be transparent, and the vapor should be light and almost invisible. In this case, the steam can be soft or dry, more rigid.
Too dry steam can be harmful, burning the mucous membranes of the throat and nose, causing unpleasant painful sensations. Therefore, you should carefully dose the water, adding it to the heater, preparing the steam room.
Walls and floors should not be wet. If they have been washed with water, allow a little time to warm up to dry the woodwork and shelves.
When pouring water on the stones, one should alternately pour small portions on hot stones, then on stones with a lower temperature, located on the edge. A fairly popular way is to splash water with a fan.
With the right concentration of steam, you can feel a slight crackle in the hair, as if they begin to twist.
When the temperature in the steam room drops below 80 degrees, you should slightly raise the temperature. Otherwise, all the air will be filled with supersaturated heavy vapor.
Take care in advance to create a supply of water in the steam room, which you will splash on the stones. Place a bowl of warm water in the steam room. You can also add a couple of drops of essential oils to it.
After preparing the steam room, you can proceed to the bath procedures.
How to take a steam bath with a broom, what to drink in the bath, how to lose weight in the bath, how to massage and much more you will find in subsequent publications.
Enjoy Your Bath!
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