Some people leave Mexico exhausted from partying — I was exhausted from good health.
Over four days last month, I met with two functional medicine doctors, two nurses, an osteopath and a nutritionist. I had my blood, body composition and cognitive abilities tested. I was cold plunged, wrapped in seaweed, zapped with electromagnetic waves and spritzed with cold atmospheric plasma. I squatted, lifted, lunged and Pilated. I sampled shiatsu and deep-tissue massages, enjoyed a radio frequency facial and subjected myself to Emsella, a chair targeting the perineum with jackhammer-like vibrations meant to strengthen the pelvic floor. I took IV treatments, talked sexuality and aging with a psychologist, and felt the agony and rush of cryotherapy. I tried acupuncture, ginger therapeutic compresses and woke daily to a bowl of miso soup.
And that was only some of what the ambitious SHA Wellness Mexico, just 30 minutes north of the Cancun airport, offers. Just over a year old, the health center boasts 100 rooms and suites — each with sweeping ocean views — and as many treatment rooms in an adjacent clinic building, designed by Mexico City-based architecture firm Sordo Madaleno. It’s the second outpost of the original SHA, which opened near Alicante, Spain, in 2008 and will be followed late next year by SHA Emirates.
My personalized program focused on well-ageing and menopause care, but other visitors come to address weight loss or leadership performance, in a setting that is both luxurious and clinical. Most guests stay for a week, but even my four-day stay would yield significant benefits, according to Dr. Diego Martinez Conde, who leads the center’s regenerative and well-ageing unit, and holds a medical degree from Mexico’s Anahuac University as well as certifications in nutrition and functional medicine.
“You’re much more capable of healing when you address your health in the most integrated way,” he tells Alexa. “We assess your blood, your hormone levels, your fatigue, the quality of your food, the quality of your sleep. There are many very basic lifestyle interventions that help massively, and create tools that you can take home with you. We do all of this with continuous medical care and monitoring. It’s very robust.”
SHA’s approach embraces both Western and Eastern medicine. (The founding Bataller family, developers from Spain, are as dedicated to real estate as they are to wellness: the skeleton of another of their new developments, the St. Regis Costa Mujeres, looms large over SHA’s fifth-floor lap pool).
Upon my arrival, a nurse drew several tubes of my blood. She then propped my arm on a device called the AGE reader, which uses ultraviolet light to assess potential protein transformation caused by excessive blood glucose levels. An InBody scanner measured my muscle mass, fat mass and water content. A trio of computer-based cognitive challenges tested my cerebral functioning.
Dr. Martinez Conde reviewed my results and tweaked my program, giving advice both hard charging and encouraging. During our session, he recommended I lift weights heavy enough that “it’s frightening,” use hormone replacement therapy, increase protein intake and carefully monitor inflammation biomarkers.
“A lot of this is common sense,” he said. “Follow it, and you can be healthier at 60 than you are at 50.”
SHA’s general ethos was one of deep care and the staff’s professional approach made uncomfortable situations tolerable, like when the talented osteopath essentially hoisted my body with his own, successfully realigning my legs, arms, neck and spine, at very close range. During cryotherapy, I shivered in the -184 Fahrenheit cabin while the technician cooed, “just three minutes, and so many benefits.”
Later, I tried the Human Regenerator, a sleek piece of equipment reminiscent of Iron Man movies. Lying on a white leather table, I gazed at the ocean while cold atmospheric plasma particles swirled around me, spurring the flow of electrons through my body. The idea, Dr. Martinez Conde said, is that optimizing my cells’ electrical balance would reduce oxidative stress and enhance adenosine triphosphate production, improving mitochondrial function and reducing inflammation.
I was prescribed Ozone intravenous therapy, which is not FDA approved but is widely used in Europe to reduce inflammation and boost antioxidant production and blood circulation. That was followed with a drip of linolenic acids, selenium, zinc, Vitamins C and D, intended to support hormone functioning and help cognition, energy and immunity.
SHA’s high tech offerings were impressive, but so was its lovely hydrotherapy floor, perched over a lush mangrove. I admired a gold finch flitting amid the trees as I moved from the cold plunge to the infrared sauna and on to the jacuzzi and jet pool.
That moment felt like vacation, as did meals, which followed one of three largely plant-based, anti-inflammatory menus, ranging from 1,000 to 1,800 calories a day. I feared austerity, having been instructed to give up coffee, dairy, wine, meat, sugar and gluten for three days prior to my arrival, but SHA’s executive chef Lixi Lineas made appealing dishes, often including small portions of local fish. Breakfasts always began with miso soup, which the nutritionists at SHA say is full of enzymes that aid digestion and promote a healthy microbiome. It was followed by guacamole or hummus with crudites, a chia pudding with fresh berries and a small dish of hemp seeds for protein. The house dressing, a coconut yogurt sauce spiked with miso, cilantro and lime juice, was delicious enough to replicate at home. Lunch and dinner came with probiotic sauerkraut and a side of hijiki (seaweed), to add Omega 3, calcium and iodine, and to fight heavy metals.
Some of SHA’s practices, like discouraging liquids from being consumed with meals, on the assumption that water weakens the gastric acid needed to break down food, are scientifically debatable. There were also a few glitches: the room I was initially assigned had neither a working phone nor wifi; the nutritionist was unavailable until halfway through my stay. But mostly, the experience was deeply restorative.
My final morning, I sat on my terrace, sipping green tea and admiring the sunrise. I then swam laps in the warm ocean water, my stroke strong and loose, my body light, my spirit buoyed. (And ready for a nap.)
From $5,600 for a 4-night “Rebalance & Energize” program in a deluxe oceanfront room
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