The ingredients DO concern me. I typically use SPF daily on my face in burts bees day creme and when I use sunscreen it's typically Jason spf (which is pretty much at least 3-4 times a week). I will spray bananna boat on myself and my kid before getting burned though, because I recently saw a study (I cant find it right now) that showed where children who are sun burned before the age of 10 are 4 times more likely to get skin cancer.
Pretty much everyone on my moms side of the family over the age of 50 has skin cancer of some sort. We shade ourselves, wear hats and sleeves, etc, but there is really only so much physical limitation I am willing to do to avoid the sunshine. We live on a farm, we are outside everyday.
I dont worry about vitamin D because we get plenty of sunshine, and lets face it- people cant both have the argument that sunscreen doesnt block uv rays AND it prevents you from absorbing vitamin D- that is just absurd.
There is a big, long, sunscreen thread around here somewhere that I spent hours and hours reading one time before making my final "we will be a sunscreen wearing family dammit" decision :) Ill see if I can dig it up.
Maybe it's not locked and will provide hours of entertainment for some propaganda pushing people who seem to need a lot of attention.
Do you wear sunscreen year round? Do you burn year round?
I only wear sunscreen in summer, but I am further north than you. I have only burned June-September. I am quite pale.
Does winter sun that is too weak to cause sunburn also cause skin cancer? It is sad how little I know about this subject.
I am fairly militant about sunscreen use during peak sunlight hours. I had also heard that burns in childhood increase skin cancer risk. I am a sun avoider to some extent, though, particularly in summer. I do not love the heat, and find repeatedly putting on sunscreen a pain. I do worry about Vit. D a bit. It is an issue where I live due to the long winter. I guess I worry about skin cancer more. We have started taking a vitamin D supplements this winter. It turns out it is difficult to get enough vit. D where I live in winter even if I do hang around outside on sunny days.
Well, we are in Kentucky, so the hot sun is out for a little longer than Canada. In the summer I wear sunscreen if we go outside for more than 10-15 minutes. Period, everytime. That is probably from April-October. I run super cold, so if it's under 65 degrees, I am pretty much covered up, other than my face. I do wear SPF (that is in my day lotion) all year long on my face. If we are going to be outside all day long in the early spring/late fall I do make sure we all have sunscreen on. In the dead of winter, we are never outside all day long because Im a wuss :)
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