The Story of Icebox
Alia Alston has spent her entire career trying to help people as it feeds her soul. From helping families find their forever homes when she was working in real estate or creating and developing an all-natural baby care line, she has always looked for a way to touch other people’s lives. When she was introduced to Whole Body Cryotherapy in 2012, it was a natural progression in her professional career to start her dream company Icebox so she could share with her community this healing modality that helped her so much.
Why Icebox
When Alia was 18, she was hit by a drunk driver. She went through a year of physical therapy and other modalities of recovery to fully recover from her neck and back injuries. After the birth of her last baby, everything went from tolerable pain to excruciating. She was told she had to have invasive surgery to place titanium rods to stabilize the old injuries or her condition would continue to worsen.
She and her chiropractor stepfather spent six months researching alternative treatments that would help her avoid surgery. Eventually, they came across cryotherapy, a new technology that Nike and the Mavericks, the NBA team, were using to help athletes recover. This relatively new technology was only available in professional or medical facilities at the time.
On her first try at this healing modality, she had 2 sessions per day. By the second day, the numbness and pain in her left arm and leg started to fade and she regained feeling on the left side of her body. These days, she stays pain-free with a maintenance schedule of 2-3 sessions a week. “It’s more than most might need, but it keeps me happy”.
Because she knows how busy schedules can get, and how easy it can be to rationalize putting off self-care, she designed Icebox sessions to be as short as possible. In fact, from the moment a client walks in the door, it only takes 12 minutes until they are leaving again.
How Cryotherapy Works
So how does cryotherapy work? The science is similar to why ice baths are a popular treatment for pain and post-workout recovery. When your body gets cold, it directs blood to your internal organs to protect them from damage and your system goes into hyper-circulation. Once your body returns to a normal temperature, it’s like your system has restarted and does a scan to find places that are damaged to put additional energy into fixing them.
Cryotherapy utilizes a dry comfortable cold to achieve maximum results. That means that temperatures in a cryotherapy treatment will get much, much colder than a traditional ice bath, leading to enhanced healing but not as invasive as a cold water plunge. A typical cryotherapy session will reach a temperature of -160°F. As cold as that is, clients are exposed for only three minutes and a wellness technician never leaves the room. Once the session is over, your inflammation is lessened and pain is reduced.
About Icebox
Icebox was founded eleven years ago and was the first brick-and-mortar, retail cryotherapy provider in the US. Over the past decade, the company has brought the healing power of the cold to states across the country and improved the lives of thousands of people. Experience our version of cool and learn more about Icebox right here.