Have you heard about grounding? I noticed buzz about it on my social platforms a couple months ago and was curious.  Grounding mats, a barefoot movement, lots of discussion about reconnecting to the earth piqued my interest.

What is Grounding?

Essentially, the Earth gives off an electric charge.  When we have our bare skin against the Earth, we are able to pick up on that charge and improve our own well being. Over the millennia, humans have taken more and more to wearing shoes (particularly of non-conductive rubber soles) and we live almost exclusively indoors. We stare at screens which affect the balance of these charges all day.  Once we reach adulthood, we rarely put our feet in the grass to enjoy that subtle vibe.  Don’t believe me?  Try googling images of feet–almost all the barefoot photos are baby feet!

This probably seems unimportant, but what if I told you that grounding can help with any number of physiological issues ranging from insomnia to autoimmune diseases? Would you be more interested?

My Issues

From the typical issues of midlife to simple sleep issues (I have a whole follow up post to this about insomnia), I felt I may benefit from this.  I’ve had migraines, some inflammation issue (joints and digestive), and was frankly just STRESSED OUT all winter and wanted to try this out. In the middle of February, however, it seemed months away from putting into practice.  I adore being barefoot in the summer.  As a kid, I never wore shoes and honestly always take mine off the second I go indoors.  Ideally, I’d wear my lovely heels when I needed and run my toes in the grass the rest of the time.  And don’t get me started on the beach.  There is LITERALLY nothing better.

 

I sleep better in the summer, most especially at the beach.  My feet are dug into the sand and I’m immediately relaxed and refreshed with the waves crashing nearby.

This isn’t unique to me, either.  Beachgoers and gardeners alike will tell you that the feeling of digging into the ground is therapeutic.

 

 

Amazon to the Rescue

Where does one find the answer to all questions anymore?  AMAZON!  They had a number of options for Grounding Mats online.  Some you could stand on, some for chairs, but I opted to purchase the bed mat, shown below.

Himself didn’t want to try my experiment, so I did the half bed. It’s linked by clicking the photo.

 

When the mat arrived, I immediately put it onto my half of the bed and remade it (it goes UNDER the bottom sheet).

 

 

The mat comes looking like a giant yoga mat, the elastic straps really hold it in place, and it has a plug and grounding tester to ensure you are getting the right charges.

Here’s the mat itself.

This little light plugs into the grounder “prong” on your outlet to ensure grounding. If so, you can plug the SINGLE PRONG plug for the mat into the grounder.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The First Night

Much like waiting for Santa, the first night I slept on the grounding mat was fraught with anticipation of serene relaxation, epic sleep, and undoubtedly waking to a fitter, younger body.  RIGHT!  What I got was my spinning mind CERTAIN I could feel the thing buzzing (I couldn’t) and overthinking it all.  It also made me hot.  Pretty hot.

To be fair, I was on night three of horrendous night sweats, so I don’t think it was entirely the mat’s fault at all.

The First Week

After those first couple of days, I noticed that I was sleeping really well.  Additionally, I’d been having some shoulder pain (it’s a hot spot for me) that seemed to diminish.  Small steps, but enough to keep me engaged.

Today–Two months Later

While there is NOTHING scientific to my experiment, I will say that I feel I’ve had improvement with this item.  Exercise fatigue is reduced compared to before the mat, my insomnia is definitely better since using this item, and when a virus ran through the house, I was the only one to avoid it.  WINNER WINNER! My digestion has been better for sure, and I’ve had zero migraines since I started grounding.  I also slept in a bed without one last week and was stiff upon waking.

The bad news, it IS on the hot side.  Most nights this isn’t an issue, but if you are a woman “of a certain age,” I warn you that it likely will exacerbate night sweats.  That said, it’s not all the time and my overall experience was more beneficial so those few nights are worth it.

Maybe it’s just a small bit of nature re-aligning.  Maybe it’s a super break from all the technology in my day.  But I’m sold!

So what do you think?  Is this something you’d try?  Will you ground INDOORS or just run barefoot in the rain?

 

xo,

 

Sam

PS this video has NOTHING to do with our topic, but I keep singing it when I talk about grounding.  So there you go.

This isn’t really about Stevie Wonder, but I just had to link it.