STRESS, OR LESS?

      Recent studies warn against taking the platitudes of achievement too seriously.  Carey of NYT reports that the new research focuses on a familiar type, perfectionists, who panic or blow a fuse when things don’t turn out just so.

     The findings not only confirm that such purists are often at risk for mental distress — as Freud, Alfred Adler and countless exasperated parents have long predicted — but also suggest that perfectionism is a valuable lens through which to understand a variety of seemingly unrelated mental difficulties, from depression to compulsive behavior to addiction.

     Some researchers divide perfectionists into three types, based on answers to standardized questionnaires: Self-oriented strivers who struggle to live up to their high standards and appear to be at risk of self-critical depression; outwardly focused zealots who expect perfection from others, often ruining relationships; and those desperate to live up to an ideal they’re convinced others expect of them.

    “It’s natural for people to want to be perfect in a few things, say in their job — being a good editor or surgeon depends on not making mistakes,” said Gordon L. Flett, a psychology professor at York University and an author of many of the studies. “It’s when it generalizes to other areas of life, home life, appearance, hobbies, that you begin to see real problems.”

     The burden of perfectionist expectations is all too familiar to anyone who has struggled to kick a bad habit. Break down just once — have one smoke, one single drink — and at best it’s a “slip.” At worst it’s a relapse, and more often it’s a fall off the wagon: failure. And if you’ve already fallen, well, may as well pour yourself two or three more.

The British have a saying that encourages people to show their skills while mocking the universal fear of failure: Do your worst.

If you can’t tolerate your worst, at least once in a while, how true to yourself can you be?

   Exercise is the

most powerful antidote

to

     More Sleep can help new Mothers lose prenatal weight gain...

     Erica Gunderson of Kaiser Permanente, and her colleagues, made this startling discovery while studying 940 prenatal and postnatal female patients, at Harvard Medical School in Boston.

 

     Gunderson stated: "We've known for some time that sleep deprivation is associated with weight gain and obesity in the general population, but this study shows that getting enough sleep -- even just two hours more -- may be as important as a healthy diet and exercise for new mothers to return to their pre-pregnancy weight."

     Mothers who slept five hours or less a day, with infants six months old, were three times more likely to keep on their prenatal poundage.

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 Nicotine Accelerates Baldness, says new Medical study ...

     We all know that smoking causes cancer and heart disease. 

     Now there is serious evidence that cigarette smoking, known to reduce circulation of blood and hormones, can cause baldness, said Lin-Hui Su of the Far Eastern Memorial Hospital, and Tony Hsiu-Hsi Chen of National Taiwan University in Taipei.

  Baldness-chic?

     The study of 740 male smokers in Taiwan indicated "the development of moderate or severe" hair loss, Su and Chin said. 

     Caucasians already typically experience higher hereditary male baldness than Asians, but for Asians, smoking increases baldness, researchers said.  

     For all of us, nicotine lowers blood flow to the skin, and especially those extremities farthest from the heart.  Not good!

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   Younger American Women the Newest Heart Disease Victims!

     Alarming evidence reveals that American women, 45 and younger, suffering clogged arteries, are dying more and more often... while the death rate for men 45 and younger is declining.

                              Scan during open-heart surgery...

     Cardiac researchers believe that increasing rates of obesity in younger women are the direct cause. 

    

     Diabetes is another huge additional risk factor for the rising number of young obese women.

     Dr Wayne Rosamond, a University of North Carolina epidemiology professor and expert on heart disease statistics, said "This could be a harbinger of things to come.”  Which may be the most profound health understatement of the year!

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                    November 20, 2007

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     New Drug shows amazing promise for aggressive brain cancer... 

 

     A study presented by the Society for Neuro-Oncology in Dallas, Texas, showed that the dug Avastin can, in some cases, greatly slow the spread of gliobastoma, a devastating form of cancer.   

     Avastin was given in conjunction with the chemotherapy drug Irinotecan.

.....Brain cancer cell

     We can only hope that preventative health care by each of us will reduce the chance of cancer in the first place. 

     But we also know that we live in a toxic world, and that we are daily exposed to carcinogens, in our air, our water, and our food.

     Its up to each us of Healthies to work to rid our environment and our bodies of toxins and carcinogens. 

 

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American Meat-eaters Beware!

 

     Mad Cow Disease is an ongoing threat from older Canadian Cattle entering the USA food chain. 

     The Consumers Union warns that the US Department of Agriculture is relaxing its rules, putting meat-eaters at risk of contracting the brain-wasting Mad Cow disease. 

... Revenge of the Cow?

     Beginning monday, the FDA will be allowing Canadian cattle born after 1999 to be slaughtered and eaten in the United States.  

     Under the previous rule, no cattle older than 2.5 years could be imported.

     The terrible disease gradually perforates and consumes the brain mass of its victims. 

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  Self-regeneration, the dream of mankind for thousands of years, may be in our near future!

 

     Stem cells have now been cloned without embryos. 

     This is an amazing breakthrough.  It means that some day you may be able to repair yourself--- to clone new body parts--- using only a few of your own skin cells. 

     This new life-extending technology eliminates the moral dilemma of using human embryos. 

human stem cells---  

    

     "This work represents a tremendous scientific milestone, the biological equivalent of the Wright Brothers' first airplane,"  said Dr. Robert Lanza, chief science officer of Advanced Cell Technology, who heads one of the teams that made the breakthrough.

 

November 19, 2007

         Thin is not always healthy!

         The top fashion models of today exhibit impossible body shapes for most of us to attain to, despite all manner of exercise and diet. 

     Tall and impossibly thin, the top fashion models sometimes approach other-worldly design, like exotic creatures from another planet.

     The most extreme form of this human shape can even be a possible symptom of disease. 

     The Marfan syndrome is inherited. Its victims are very tall and thin and many die of heart ailments caused by the disease. 

     Low weight and low consumption has recently been shown (in animals) to be the only proven path to longer life.  But low weight can also be a sign of serious health issues.   

     Healthies never assume than mere thinness always means healthy! 

     Nutrition, strength, and stamina, are the foundations of long life and good health.  And such well-conditioned bodies can reveal themselves in many varied and excellent "real-world" body types.

November 18, 2007

     ARE YOU AS HEALTHY AS YOU FEEL?

     According to a major insurance company's health  survey, your perception, and your sense of emotional well-being, are primary factors in your overall health---

• The “Worried Well” – Those with relatively few unhealthy behaviors but low perceived health.

• The “Truly Healthies” – Those with relatively few unhealthy behaviors and high perceived health.

• The “Health Evaders” – Those with a relatively large number of unhealthy behaviors and low perceived health.

• The “Health Illusionists” – Those with a relatively large number of unhealthy behaviors but high perceived health.

      We must each ask ourselves every day, "Do you KNOW yourself?"

     To honestly self-evaluate is the hardest task of all, and the most critical.

November 17th, 2007

Is the Big-C HEALING YOU?

     Decades ago, Linus Pauling, the Nobel prize winning physicist, urged everyone to embrace Vitamin C as the key to life renewal. 

   Today, many researchers believe that Vitamin C is best ingested, not merely by artificial supplements, but by ingesting fruits and veggies high in C.

    The most common source of C is acsorbic aid, taken daily by millions.

 We are, of course, made of cells.  Every cell is a life in itself, continually dying and being reborn. 

     The role of vitamins in this cycle is just beginning to be understood.

  But is ascorbic acid as effective as foods rich in vitamin C?  For now, eat your citrus fruits and veggies.  They are a treasure of many other vitamins, not just C! 

     Healthies realize that research is always evolving, and that eating the widest variety is the best way to hedge your body's many needs.