Summer Sun

My two boys (age 6 and 5) are both blessed with my wife's skin - tans easily and rarely burns.  We have not used any sun block on them the last two years, and they are in the sun a lot.  For one, we are not afraid of the sun, as many have you believe.  But we also question whether putting pharmaceutical chemicals on the skin does more harm than good (or any good at all) - especially over the long haul. 

An interesting thing happened this summer.  Our youngest son, Forest, often goes without a shirt while playing outside.  But lately, he'll put on a long sleeve shirt or even choose to swim with a shirt on.  The more I thought about this it occurred to me that he is intuitively taking care of himself.  Because we do not make every decision for him he is taking that responsibility on his own.  He holds no judgment or belief (the sun is bad/always protect yourself), he just senses, on his own, that he may need protection.

This is a good thing to keep in mind in raising my children; holding a space for them to self regulate.  There are so many fears we pass onto our children, beliefs we have been sold at one time or another.  If I make every decision for my children's protection, how will they ever learn to tune into what their bodies really need?