Top 10 Inspirational Female Athletes
Why Your Man Should Eat Less Meat & More Veggies
5 Second Rule -- Are Germs Good for Your Kid?
Snacks vs. Treats: There is a BIG Difference
Save Money and Help the Planet: Go Green This Month!
Is Buying Organic Really Worth the Cost?
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A slow metabolism often results in weight gain, fatigue and slow digestion. Increasing metabolic rates aids in weight loss and provides higher overall energy levels. However, fad diets and miracle foods used to boost metabolism are pure lies, according to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. No single miracle cure is available to speed up metabolism naturally. Adding several healthy habits to your lifestyle offers the greatest and longest-lasting results.
A living will can spare you from the indignities of unwanted medical care at the end of your life. It can also relieve your closest relatives from the stress of making end-of-life decisions by spelling out exactly how you want to be treated. Follow five basic steps to help you through the process of writing a living will.
While washing windows and scrubbing walls and cleaning up a winter's worth of yard waste is typically part of spring cleaning, start your spring off right with a spiritual spring cleaning as well. Take the time to get rid of emotional baggage, scrub off your best mental tools and clear away the winter's spider webs and mental dust bunnies. With a soulful spring cleaning, you'll be refreshed and ready for better relationships, a better mood and a season of personal growth.
Many people view the holiday season as carte blanche to disregard their daily diet habits and exercise routines. However, it is important to indulge in moderation over the holidays so that you can stay healthy, energized and fit. Avoiding holiday weight gain requires summoning up extra will power in order to stick to your healthy habits. You need to withstand the temptations of rich foods and drinks at work parties, family gatherings and holiday feasts. You also need to carve out special time to exercise amidst the flurry of holiday activities.
Life seems to get faster every day. We are all racing from one errand to another, trying to scratch another task off that ever growing to-do list. Thoughts are constantly flowing through our minds. Eventually, this pace can make us tired and snappy, perhaps even depressed. Meditation can be the perfect antidote to create some inner balance and peace in your life.
When calculating your personal breast cancer risk, consider any factors that may increase your risk of developing the disease. While certain factors may increase your risk more than others, the National Cancer Institute estimates that 5 to 10 percent of all women with breast cancer had a strong family history of the disease. Although there is no absolute way to determine if you will get breast cancer, being aware of the risk factors and making some lifestyle changes may help reduce the risk of developing the disease.
Some medical professionals claim that colon cleansers are a great way to help detoxify the body and enhance skin tone and general health, according to the Mayo Clinic. However, using a colon cleanser or getting a professional colonic might actually not be as helpful to health and beauty as the patient hopes. Learning more information about the ins and outs of colon cleansers and general skin care can help prepare you to make such health and beauty decisions.
A highly rewarding experience with many health benefits for your child, breastfeeding may also come with its own set of problems for mothers, including breast and nipple soreness. Nipple pain is generally caused by nipple trauma such as cracks, abrasions, blanching, vasospasm (blood vessel constriction) and milk blisters. The baby's latch traumatizes the nipple, causing painful injury or a blockage of pores and preventing the flow of milk. Breast pain problems include engorgement, plugged ducts, mastitis and thrush. Engorgement occurs when the breasts get very full and hard and sensitive. A plugged duct, in which the flow of breast milk gets blocked, may feel like a hard, tender area on one of your breasts. Plugged ducts are often a precursor to mastitis, which occurs when an infection leads to an inflammation of the breast. Mastitis can be very painful and is usually accompanied by a fever of 101.3 degrees F. According to Maureen Minchin in "Breastfeeding Matters," mastitis occurs in 1/5 of breastfeeding women in the West. But, there are ways to relieve each of these problems, so that you can continue feeding and bonding with your baby.
Whether you are a full time parent or the head of a company, the stress can zap your energy. It’s hard to be patient and present when your batteries are totally depleted. When you are on an airplane, the first thing they tell you is, “in case of an emergency, make sure to put your mask on before assisting your children.” This is a great metaphor for parenting. How can you possibly give to another when you are completely drained and have nothing left to give?
You may recall I wrote a post on aging gracefully. I pointed out the simple fact, that no matter how rich, how poor, how thin, how happy, how unhappy you are, there is one thing in this world you cannot fight, and just happen to be battling at the EXACT same rate as the next person… AGING. Madonna is over 50. Yes, Even Madonna turned 50! Enough said. But in that Blog post, I talked about my desire to age without any help from Dr. 90210. I wrote about how to age “gracefully.” But, today, we’re taking it one step further. Today, we’re talking how to put that aging process on slow-mo. And I’m not on the fence here. I just turned 35 and because I don’t intend on going the plastic route, I’m gonna fight the crap out of this aging process.
You may be carrying around a bit of extra weight that you'd like to lose, either from your last pregnancy or from not keeping up with a diet and exercise routine. Perhaps you are a bit softer around the middle than you'd like to be. You don't have to make drastic changes to your diet in order to lose those extra pounds or to tighten up your love handles. A few small, daily changes are all you need to lose a few pounds.
The very idea of public bathrooms makes many people cringe. Sharing such an intimate area with hundreds of strangers can send fear straight to the heart of germaphobes. Even the most courageous bathroom users can get queasy upon entering dirty, wet or drippy toilet areas. The way that users are able to dry their hands can directly influence the general ambience of the bathroom and the health of the users. Paper towels and electric dryers are two of the most popular options. Be aware of the advantages and disadvantages of each.
It's easy to remember to wash your hands when your hands are full of sticky molasses or dirt. It's a lot harder to remember when the filth is invisible. It's easy to wipe down your hands and move on. Meanwhile, germs can settle in and make themselves at home in your mouth, eyes and eventually your body. IF you can remember how critical hand washing is to your immune system, you will get to it a lot more often--whether you can see the grime or not.
Sometimes, the thought of sex holds no appeal. Like many things in a woman’s life, your sex drive can fluctuate over time. Some changes in libido stem from medical or emotional conditions, while others result from boredom and exhaustion. Although your feelings of lust may not cause your husband to complain, a decreased sex drive can create tension and affect other aspects of your relationship. Non-medical treatments and home remedies may boost your flagging libido and increase your appetite for sex.
Unfortunately, even domestic life can contribute to those wrinkles settling into the skin. Families, careers, friendships and hobbies come to a head in the home, leading to wrinkles from laugh lines to furrowed brows. Since your home has contributed to those deepening lines, use your home's resources to alleviate and prevent them.
If your smile isn't looking as shiny as it could be, you might be tempted to seek an intervention. Although your dentist and the toothbrush aisle offer dozens of whitening options, you may find some cheaper, more long-term aides at home. Don't rush out for a professional whitening treatment without trying some at-home tips.
Body Mass Index, or BMI, is a calculation obtained by a person's height and weight. While your doctor or fitness trainer may have a handy calculator to feed the numbers into for instant results, it may be helpful at home to learn to do this fairly straightforward equation. Tracking your BMI is an excellent tool to use in estimating your body fat and setting goals in your weight loss program.
You've started your exercise routine and are getting pretty good at sticking to a schedule. Now you notice that the more you work out, the more your exercise mat seems to get a bit grubbier. Common sense tells you that it's collecting dust and perspiration, since it lies on the floor and you work out on it. But how do you clean an exercise mat? You should clean your mat on a regular basis to maintain its effectiveness and keep it free of germs and bacteria.
When money is tight, the food budget is the one area that usually gets trimmed first. Let's face it, they can turn off your gas bill, but they can't lock your pantry! Cooking on a tight budget can be a challenge; but by keeping a few rules in mind you can keep the table full without sacrificing your health in the process. By learning the tricks that grocery stores use to entice you to spend more, you can beat them at their own game and still serve nutritious, tasty meals.
Going under the knife can be a scary experience for even the most stoic individual. While most plastic surgery procedures are classified as routine, there are always risks with surgery. You want to be sure that your surgeon holds a current, valid medical license to perform your operation. In many states, physicians of any type can call themselves cosmetic surgeons and perform certain procedures. If it is important to you to use only a licensed plastic surgeon, you can take steps to check the licensing of the surgeon you plan to use.
If you wear contact lenses, you might find it more challenging at first learning how to put the contacts in your eyes. However, it is just as important to learn the steps necessary to remove the lenses safely. The truth is you can harm your eyes if you are not careful about how you take them out. You also run the risk of losing one of your contacts by not removing the lens properly from each eye.
You've said it a million times: "Turn off the television; you need to get more exercise!" With cartoons on 24/7, movies on the shelf and video games the latest rage, it's hard to motivate your kids to get the exercise they need. According to an April 2007 article by the Mayo Clinic, the number of overweight children between the ages of six and eleven has doubled in the past 20 years, and for teenagers it has tripled. Instead of nagging, learn how to entice your kids to exercise and give them a habit they will benefit from for a lifetime.
As summer rolls around and bikini season approaches, the war on belly fat begins. According to Dr. Michael Jensen, an endocrinology specialist with the WebMD website, most people lose proportionally more fat around the abdominal region than other parts of the body during weight loss. While you can't choose where on your body to focus fat loss, you can take steps to lose weight all over your body, abs included, while strengthening your abdominal muscles and eating foods to help eliminate excess fat storage. With ab exercises and a healthy diet, you'll slim down, build up six-pack abs and develop habits for long-term health.
Love handles are unsightly and are also nothing to joke about, according to the Mayo Clinic. Excessive abdominal fat in women can cause heart attacks and other serious problems, such as stroke. Unfortunately, no surefire way to remove those love handles permanently and quickly really exists. Women fighting this particular battle of the bulge must really pay attention to their diet and exercise routines to reduce unwanted belly fat and also to protect their overall health. Pregnant moms should not try to get rid of love handles until after delivery; losing weight during pregnancy can cause serious birth defects in growing babies.
There is no need to be embarrassed by naturally-occurring body odors. As moms, you know that there are more revealing moments in life that go beyond the occasional odor. Even though you know that normal menstruation comes with an odor, realize that the odor is more noticeable to you than it is to other people around you. If you are self-conscious about it, first rule out any medical reason for an abnormally strong odor by visiting a doctor. Then take other simple precautions to keep the area clean and to make yourself as comfortable as possible during your period.
Taking medication when you are not sure what it is can be dangerous. Finding strange pills in your teenager's bedroom can be scary, too. Although most pills are kept in prescription bottles that are clearly labeled, there may be instances when you need to find out what a pill is and what it is used for, and the only information you have is the pill itself and the imprint numbers/letters on the pill. Talking to your local pharmacist or going online are both valid methods to use in identification.
Finding a pill at the bottom of your purse or in your teenager's bedroom can conjure up all kinds of questions. In addition, knowing how to check a pill for its identity before you take it can put your mind at ease after leaving the pharmacy with your new prescription. Knowing there are several methods that will identify a pill by its markings can help put your mind at ease.
Low cut dresses and tight tops are made to show off the breast area. This can be a problem if you aren't happy with your breast size. If you weren't naturally endowed with big breasts, there are ways to make your breasts look bigger without the use of surgery or expensive creams. All you need to do is alter the way you dress to boost and boast what you've already got.
In the United States, the common custom of the father, or another important person in the newborn's life, cutting the umbilical cord holds significance for the new family. It marks the end of the pregnancy and beginning of a new life in a way that allows the father or family member to participate in the birth of the baby. The preservation of the umbilical cord, common in many Asian and African cultures, further celebrates the birth of the child and exemplifies the significance of the umbilical cord. Making a keepsake out of an umbilical cord may seem more than a little extreme at first, but many moms see more than just a scab or unwanted tissue. They see the emotional value of preserving the very item that allowed them to nourish their baby for nine months.
Low sexual desire is a common problem for many women. If ignored the problem may become chronic. Unfortunately, this can become a real problem when a woman with low libido is paired with someone with a higher sex drive. Luckily the problem of low sex drive has been well studied and there are several things any woman can do to stimulate sexual desire. No matter what the cause of low sexual desire, these tips are sure to help get your love life back on track.
