Recently, an American woman lost all muscle control when she collapsed after spending a whole day wearing skinny jeans. The woman had been helping her relative move and spent the entire day squatting and moving around in a pair of tight jeans. She was rushed to the hospital where she was checked for signs of muscle failure and released four days later after damage to the nerves in her legs.
Hold on for a second before you rush to toss your favorite pair in the trash. Though the case proved harmful for the woman, many experts argue that the problem may not be as severe as the internet made it out to be. But still, it made us want to take a look at the clothes and accessories in our closet and wonder if they’re doing us any harm.Continue reading “Are You Wearing Healthy?”→
The 21st century office-goer in large metros or smaller cities, spends more than half his day commuting to work and back and sitting before his desk. This behavior is making us all unhealthy. There are no immediate repercussions but every minute you spend staring at your screen, bustling through meetings and skipping lunch to read the brief one last time, you’re either unwittingly gaining weight, adding to your stress levels and fueling hypertension and anxiety. It is not exactly the healthiest thing for your heart either.
But to battle this silent assailant, people across the world are exercising at work. In small and mysterious ways, the workplace has changed from being a strictly professional work environment to a place where you can take twenty to go for a run, shove your jogging shoes in your drawer next to your files and have health food delivered at your desk. So are you working out at work? Continue reading “Are You Working Out at Work?”→
Workplace health is gradually getting regarded as one of the prime significances of the corporate world, battling the indecorous tendency of juicing out every drop of hard efforts from employees to see the company as a steady ship in a hot market. Employers are showcasing a variety of healthcare programs and technologies, some obligatory while some selectable, to protect their employees’ survival in the company. But, here’s the deal – if you can’t take care of your health and aren’t balanced between your professional and personal life risking to the cost of your health, forget about the health perks your company offers you.
The excitement that Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s participation brought about in creating two Guinness Book World Records for India, one for largest number of people practicing Yoga simultaneously and the largest number of people of different nationalities coming together to perform the exercise, has turned attention back to India’s ancient form of training of the mind and the body. International Yoga Day was declared by the United Nations of June 21, with close to 36,000 people performed asanas with the prime minister.
If you read the reports or saw the coverage and felt like pulling out your yoga pants or checking the price of a yoga mat online, let’s take a moment to understand this effective form of exercise. Deemed as one of the more balanced training vitalizing the spiritual, religious, physical and mental condition of the body. It may not be taken lightly. So before we jump onto the bandwagon, let us look at what we know about yoga, and the more important do’s and don’t’s.
What you need to know:
Yoga is not just a physical exercise, but it improves muscles and skeleton structure of the body and does wonders for your cardiovascular system
It is the purest form of meditation, and practise it regularly and notice yourself becoming calmer, reducing levels of stress, hypertension and many lifestyle related diseases
If you’ve suffered from mild attacks of anxiety or depression, you have naturally been recommended Yoga. It is a prescribed cure for improving mental stability and battling depression
Ditto for insomniacs; Yoga will relax the mind, clear the head and will help you sleep better
You’ll never have looked better. Yoga clears up your skin, improves your poster and sculpts and tightens your muscles. Like mentioned before, Yoga is not to be taken lightly. An exercise that lends so much to your system needs to have a set of guidelines. So before you start practicing Yoga at home or sign up for the next class nearby, browse through these important do’s and don’t’s.Do’s:
Drink lots of water daily: If you’re not in the habit of hydrating yourself, make one of out it now. Yoga looks like it’s a breeze, but regulars will tell you how taxing asanas can be. You need plenty of water to avoid cramping and exhaustion.
Invest in a Yoga mat: If you plan to take Yoga seriously, buy a mat. The thickness and size will save you back pain. Never practise on the floor directly. If you don’t have a mat, carry a light mattress, sheet or perform on carpeted floor.
Be an early bird: Join an early morning batch or wake up an hour earlier to your schedule to do Yoga. The benefits of waking up early to an hour of Yoga are endless. It is a healthy start to the day when your mind is at its most peaceful and calm state. Perfect for Yoga.
If you’re a beginner, join a class or perform Yoga under supervision
Breathe: Yoga helps you breathe better. Throughout the exercise, breathe through your nose. Make it a habit, and it will help you breathe easy otherwise as well.
Beginners, join a class: For people who have not practised Yoga before, it is advised to join a class or hire a trainer. Yoga is more complicated than it looks, and maintaining the right poster, stretching the correct limbs and not overdoing it is of extreme importance.
Don’t’s:
Food woes: Never practice on a full stomach. Yoga must be performed on an empty to light stomach.
Women, pay attention to your cycle: Skip the class when you’re on your menstrual cycle. Pregnant women should also keep away from Yoga.
Patients stay away: If you’ve just been through a surgery or an accident, consult a physician before you resume Yoga. Your body may not be in the right state to start stretching yet, and you may end up doing more harm than good.
Take thirty: Wait for twenty minutes to half an hour before you eat or drink anything. Your body has been through an intense workout. Give it time to cool off.
Do what you can: If you’re a beginner, take it easy. If you can’t strike a particularly tricky asana, try it later but don’t push yourself too hard. You’ll end up pulling a muscle instead. If something hurts, stop. It is your body telling you that it can’t take it.
Yoga is not easy; if something aches, back off. It’s your body’s way of telling you it’s in pain
Keep calm and carry on: You’re not going to see results in one or two sessions. But continue for a few weeks and you’ll start feeling the difference. If the first few classes bore you out, (yes, it’s a slow exercise and there’s no music) stick it out. You’ll not regret it.
Under the practised care of an expert, Yoga will elevate your exercise experience. So if you’re a beginner, an expert or just interested to give it a shot, there’s no better time than now. The world is, literally at its feet. So take a deep breath and begin.
If the last time you let your anger get better of you and it took you by surprise, you need to take a more serious look at the problem. If you’ve raised your voice more than once at a dinner party, punched a wall after a fight, stormed out of a room in anger or more importantly, felt the increasing urge to do any of the aforementioned things, you’re probably angrier than you think you are.
Anger and anxiety are problems that can easily go undiagnosed and untreated. The issues may be boiling under layers of denial and ignorance years before they finally burst out. The more serious worry though is that people may not even be aware that they may be suffering from serious anger issues.
Even if you think you have your anger in control, here are some things you probably didn’t know your anger could lead to. No matter in what stage you think you are, inadvertently your anger is taking control of you with every temper tantrum. There is a list of scary and serious effects of anger including, mild to severe headaches, digestion problems, such as abdominal pain, stomach uneasiness, insomnia, depression, high blood pressure and skin problems. If you’ve been battling with anger for a while, you must have also been warned against the high level of stress it causes you, the risk to your heart .
Anger affects your health through migraines, depression and increases the risk of heart diseases
To get you acclimatized to your issues, you need to identify your problem. Here are some quick pointers:
Admit to your problem:
Notice your behavior carefully for a week. If you think your problem is not chronic, or not as serious, be vigilant with yourself. The next time you get angry, make a mental note. If your anger episodes are occurring more frequently than you thought, Houston, we have a problem.
Aggressive or repressive:
Here’s the tricky part. Even if you’ve not yelled at the cashier, packed a punch at the punks who ticked you off or raised your voice in anger, you may still want to take a closer look at yourself. You may be repressing anger by keeping it bottled up. It is just harmful as aggressive anger, possibly even unhealthier.
Pay attention to physical symptoms:
Usually when a person gets angry, the body reacts to that anger. If a colleague is inefficient, your employees have walked in late or your spouse is driving you up the wall, your body will react first. That pain in your neck will start acting up, your joints will probably call for attention or the throbbing pain in your temple will return. This is your body telling you that a storm is coming.
One or many:
Once you’ve identified your issues, try and figure out if it is only one problem you’re stresses about or many. If it’s a one-situation only anger, then it is slightly easier to handle. For instance, if only work-related issues stress you out, then the problem is at work, and not at home. If this is not the case though and the problem is your temper and not the environment, then you need to work on yourself.The point of the matter is, don’t take your anger lightly. If not today, a year or five later, you will be left facing either physical or mental consequences of your anger. Treat it now when you can. Here are some simple DIY anger management tips:
Get help:
A visit to a doctor is probably the smartest thing you will do all day. Not only will you know how serious your problem is, a therapist might help subdue the problem before it gets worse.
Find your exit activity:
If you see the familiar symptoms of the imminent anger outburst, excuse yourself and walk away. Find an activity that will help you cool off. Take a walk or go for a run. Go talk to a more friendly voice or put on your favourite music playlist. Change the mood and return when you feel calmer.
Find an activity that calms you down, change it monthly
Don’t get angry at the same thing twice:
You can be better than that. If you’ve already realised you have no patience for incompetent drivers on the road, or your child’s messy bedroom, don’t return to the same issue. Accept some inevitable life truths, and try moving on from the small stuff.
Discover a new hobby:
Distraction is the key here. People who have anger issues usually hate the Hulk monster they become once they turn green. So add an aspect to your personality that you really enjoy. Take up cooking, music or sports. Become a cinephile for a month. Change your activity monthly.The important positive to remember here is the amount of advancement medicine has made in terms of mental health. So today you have therapists, pain relievers and medication to help you pull through. The equipment is ready, so it’s now time to let go and breathe easy.
A new study by the JAMA Internal Medicine journal has proved that smoking causes more than 48 per cent of deaths from the 12 types of cancer. In a recent news story, TIME magazine quoted the journal saying that, ‘Smoking resulted in more than 80 per cent of lung cancer deaths as well as 77 per cent of larynx cancer deaths. Other top cancers caused by smoking include esophagus, kidney and liver cancer.’
To put it more simply, almost half the deaths caused by cancer were linked to smoking. Though these figures were limited to the United States of America, it is not too difficult to extrapolate these numbers globally, or to India.
These figures that scream to you across news headlines are not new. With every research paper published, the case against smoking is getting stronger. But to quit smoking is never easy. If you’re reading this, you’ve probably tried to quit, more than once perhaps, and undergone a relapse.
But there is no shame in admitting defeat and giving it another try. So if you’re trying to quit, helping a friend/spouse or child cut down or have never tried to cut down because you don’t know how to, here are some pointers to nudge you to stub it out.
What’s your number? Identify the problem you’re dealing with. Make a note of the number of cigarettes you smoke daily. Be completely honest, even if you smoke more than you thought you do. The aim is to cut that number down. Once you give a face to the problem, it gets easier to deal with it. So if you smoke ten cigarettes a day, the number needs to go down to eight, then five. Set yourself a target for each week. After two or three weeks, cut the number of cigarettes by one. Go slow, set a reasonable number for yourself.
Find a Reason to Quit
The reason will make your resolve to quit even stronger
Even though quitting to stay healthy is reason enough, give yourself a separate reason. Are you bringing up kids? Did you quit swimming after you started smoking? Does your husband hate the fact that you smoke? Is it making your skin look darker and making you look older? All you need is one reason. You’ll find that it is easier to latch on to your resolve, once you have a strong reminder of why you’re quitting.
Employ ‘The Buddy System’
Find a friend who wants to quit too. But it is important to keep in mind that this friend must be equally motivated to quit. Once you have your ‘person’, make a pact of how many you’re allowing each other to smoke. If you cross the line, tell him, he’ll understand. If you do well, tell him, he’ll want to do better. Two is always better than one, whether it’s to complain about craving a smoke, or discuss withdrawal symptoms. Drag this buddy to parties so that you can keep a tab on each other.
Make some rules
Promise yourself you won’t smoke after dinner, in the car or in the bedroom. Stay away from your usual smoking zones such as the smoke room at work, your terrace and your balcony. Don’t buy a packet of cigarettes on your way home. Throw away your ashtray and lighter. You’ll find that refusing a smoke after a couple of beers is hard, but physically trying to clean out your life is much easier.
Ask for medical help
Try Nicotine Replacement Therapy, which means supplying your body with nicotine but not through tobacco. Try options such as nicotine patches, gum, lozenges, inhalers, and nasal sprays. You can also ask your doctor for prescription pills to help with the withdrawal.
Try using a nicotine patch as an alternative to tobacco
Replace smoking with a hobby
Discover a new activity that will excite you. Take up cycling, running, swimming (exercise will also help you feel better about quitting). Pick up a musical instrument or a fresh hobby such as cooking. gardening or painting. You don’t need to be very good at this, just good enough to be distracted.
Exercise will help you get back into shape and also prove as a distraction
It’s okay to slip
Don’t be too hard on yourself. If you decided to smoke four cigarettes a day, and have not stuck to your word, try again tomorrow. Don’t abandon your plan midway. It’s a long road, and a few bumps along the way never hurt anyone.
Aim towards quitting altogether
Once you have your cigarettes per day in control, take the plunge for the next step. If you’ve cut down successfully and feel comfortable enough, concentrate on quitting. It’s only the next step.
Anyone who has quit smoking successfully will tell you that it was not the easiest thing in the world for them to do. But the rush of taking your life in control is going to make the long and hard journey worth it.
Oral health is as vital as any other health segment, be it related to your skin, hair, etc. Young adults often face embarrassment in their social communities because of poor oral health. Nonetheless, there is always a solution for every problem. With these oral care tips, you will walk tall amongst your peers and friends and face the world confidently.
Bladder and urinary tract infections (UTIs) are more common in women than in men. Also known as bladder inflammation or cystitis, bladder infections are commonly diagnosed in women because it’s easy for bacteria to enter the urinary tract as the urethra is located very close to the vagina and anus. Here are some home remedies to help you get healed from bladder infections.
Low libido or decreased sex drive is a common concern among both males and females. While 15% men suffer from the sexual problem, 1/3rd of women are on the same lines. The result usually is lack of regular sex between couples. So, what can be done to put back the “passion” in life again? You need to bring these important changes in your daily lifestyle.
Stress! Is it driving you crazy? It’s time you calm down your horses and adopt these proven techniques to practice relaxation. Stress does not always brings you bad; it sometimes helps to bring the best out of you. For example, you could perform well and discover hidden skills such as multitasking when working under pressure. However, when your mind and body are incessantly forced to work in emergency mode, you experience stress.
Continue reading “Are You Wearing Healthy?” 
