Red Hot Mama!

For someone who prides themselves on being sun safe, to the point of literally chasing my son around the hotel pool area, trying to zap him with the sunscreen, I am still trying to piece together just exactly how this happened!

[Now this is the section where I was supposed to insert photos of my horrendous sunburn. But due to the locations (yes plural) of said sunburn, it was proving difficult to get a photo that wasn’t R-rated or would prompt the game 20 questions. Not for a lack of trying mind you, but I didn’t have enough arms to cover and take photos.  I even solicited my girlfreind’s help to get that perfect photo, but it started looking more like a botch-job boudoir photo shoot and well I am digressing here badly…. What I am trying to say is that  I am actually doing you a favour. Just picture ad hoc red welts in sensitive areas, mainly on the left side of my body. The one on the side of my thigh looks like I had a run-in with an iron! Which would be crazy because I don’t even iron on a normal day never mind while on holiday. In fact I would rather clean toilets than iron.]

I look like a candy cane! Or worse… a Vaalie! On thier first day in Durb’s.  In December. On the beach.

I have done some investigating and I suspect the answer is threefold.

#1 Over eagerness

I was so excited to see the sun and be out in the sunlight so, after what felt like 40 days and 40 nights of solid continuous rain, I ran for the sun lounger, threw my towel down, and settled in to work on my tan. My plan being to see how long I could stay there before being interrupted. I felt like I had just disembarked off the Ark and arrived at the promised land.

#2 Unfamiliar Invisible Sunscreen

After packing everything, including the kitchen sink, and with only one thing on my mind, (lazy day poolside in the sun) I cannot believe I left my SPF 50 sunscreen at home! So, I applied for a small loan and purchased the only sunscreen the hotel offered. SPF 30 invisible continuous spray sunscreen.

#3 Unbalanced?

I promise I sprayed the fancy SPF 30 invisible sunscreen everywhere. Everywhere! I sprayed myself stukkend. It was even one of those “you can use it upside down, continuous spray” spray bottles. But because it was “invisible” I couldn’t bloody see where I had sprayed the stuff. And being right-handed somehow left the left side of my body at a disadvantage. Except for my right ankle but only the left side.

A note on the SPF’s as I have done some reading up. If you burn, say after 10 minutes, an SPF 30 will provide 30 times the protection of no sunscreen. This means it will protect you for 300 minutes or for those of you trying to do the math in your head right now….5 hours. HOWEVER, apparently that doesn’t matter, as due to swimming and sweating, (because tanning is hard work) you need to reapply every 1-2 hours regardless of the SPF. And before you go there, yes I did, but perhaps I wasn’t as thorough while spraying with one hand and holding a cocktail in the other. I have told myself several times over that no good comes from multitasking. Case in point.

I now find myself being a walking poster for sun protection. 😔
And… a reminder that wearing the right style bikini while tanning could go a long way in avoiding a kaleidoscope of tanning lines showing when wearing a boobtube dress.
And… soliciting reactions like “Eish, you need Aloe Vera/ Lavender/ Aftersun cream”.
And…just when I thought it couldn’t get any worse, I’m now rummaging through my wardrobe trying to find something to wear that doesn’t require a bra for my mom’s annual Christmas Eve dinner. Yes… on the 18th. Why are you looking at me like that?

When I tried to give Aiden a hug he told me “Mom, you’re so hot!”
I am my boy, I really am one hot mama! 😳

My summer holiday sun tan, perfectly sorted.

Bron