Mind time vs screen time
All ages should strive to regulate and reduce screen time. As time goes by we are learning, there is a direct correlation between amount of screen time and mental, emotional, familial, relational, psychological and physical health. The less screen time, which includes traditional TV, the healthier an individual will be. If you work in front of a screen, take regular breaks and walk it off.—MR
Infants under 1 year old shouldn’t be exposed to any electronic screens
By Rachel Siegel, Washington Post, April 24, 2019
Infants younger than 1 shouldn’t be exposed to any electronic screens, according to guidelines issued Wednesday by the World Health Organization.
Simple ettiquette
The OKness of touch is a varying cultural value. Sometimes a national culture, a local culture, or perhaps a family culture. If your family was not “touchy feely,” being hugged at all may freak you out, but assuming others are crossing a line by touching is cultural prejudice. That said, hugging without permission is too. Things changed radically after the outset of the AIDS epidemic. Since fear of touch is also a symptom of PTSD, a simple “would you like a hug” or “do you mind if I touch your arm” would be a considerate national social norm to evolve.—MR
Biology loves a gentle touch. Society is less sure what the norm is.
By Mary Jo Murphy, The Washington Post, April 12, 2019
The unwritten rule can be as indelible as any chiseled into a tablet. That’s its genius and its curse. But because norms recalibrate, and today’s are still sorting themselves out, not everyone got the invisible memo that says a person shall not hug, pat, brush, graze, stroke, clasp, rub, squeeze or nuzzle another without first obtaining or at least intuiting consent.
This IS an emergency!
Over 150,000 Americans died from alcohol (car accidents, overdose and liver failure), drug overdoses (from mostly legal opioids) and suicide (by mostly legal guns) in 2017. The alcohol, pharmaceutical and domestic arms industry are making themselves billions through sacrificing the lives of individuals in our society. Since we do not have the political will to sufficiently legislate or fund assistance for our ailing community members, taking personal responsibility to keep these threats safely stored, little used, or out of the home altogether remains a personal moral choice.—MR
Deaths From Drugs and Suicide Reach a Record in the U.S.
By Adeel Hassan, New York Times, March 7, 2019
The number of deaths from alcohol, drugs and suicide in 2017 hit the highest level since the collection of federal mortality data started in 1999, according to an analysis by two public health nonprofits, the Trust for America’s Health and the Well Being Trust. To reach their conclusion, the two groups parsed the latest available data from the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Giving back, not up
Life is excruciatingly short. but if you want it to last a little longer and be a little happier, volunteering during your retirement years has been shown to add years of healthy contentment to your life. Each developmental stage has a set of things we biologically, evolutionarily, should be doing or our bodymind doesn’t stay as healthy. Just as we should learn to walk at age one and talk at age two, and differentiate from our parents at age fifteen, we should be taking care of grandchildren at age 50 plus and/or acting as the wise elder in the tribe.—MR
Want to Leave a Legacy? Be a Mentor
By Jane Brody, New York Times, March 4, 2019
Encouraged by a grandfatherly professor at Cornell, in my sophomore year I gave a speech asking my fellow students “when you come to the end of your days, will you be able to write your own epitaph?”
Go to original
Repeat after me. VERY SLOWLY
Hallelujah! Research is now backing up what I have been saying for decades. When withdrawing from an antidepressant, or frankly any psych med, you’ve been on for over six months, take at least a year to quit. Docs routinely advise patients to titrate way too fast. Then, use their withdrawal symptoms as an excuse to put them back on. But patients who VERY gradually reduced their daily dose of antidepressants over a year, even after years of use, are unlikely to experience any symptoms. I advise buying a metal fingernail file and start with one swipe of the pill across it. Then take one tiny additional swipe across the file every two weeks very slowly reducing the dosage, so your brain doesn’t go into shock making you think you’re actually mentally ill when what you are is in withdrawal. I’ve seen patients who had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder when, in fact, they had been taken off a benzo, cannabidiol or antidepressant too quickly! Think carefully before you decide to take these drugs. Do your research. And, please, be very careful getting off.-–MR
How to Quit Antidepressants: Very Slowly, Doctors Say
By Benedict Carey, New York Times, March 5, 2019
Thousands, perhaps millions, of people who try to quit antidepressant drugs experience stinging withdrawal symptoms that last for months to years: insomnia, surges of anxiety, even so-called brain zaps, sensations of electric shock in the brain.
Is that all?
Let’s see, this drug, which was a party drug for years, only has these potential side effects: according to the article below, you can pass out, fall asleep, dissociate from reality, commit suicide, get addicted to it, have problems with attention, judgment and thinking, and not to mention hallucinations, tunnel vision and dissociative effects that “make people feel untethered from their surroundings.” Sounds a lot like whiskey, doesn’t it? Its label will carry a “black box” warning – the most serious safety warning issued by the FDA! It was fast tracked through its offices and only required one study instead of the usual two for approval. Gosh, no thanks. There are more natural, less dangerous ways to positively effect glutamate balance in the brain, but maybe Johnson & Johnson just wants to make money. Ya think?-–MR
In biggest advance for depression in years, FDA approves novel treatment for hardest cases
By Carolyn Johnson and Laurie McGinley, Washington Post, March 5, 2019
The Food and Drug Administration approved a novel antidepressant late Tuesday for people with depression that does not respond to other treatments — the first in decades to work in a completely new way in the brain.
Can’t do Kondo?
You don’t have to go all Marie Kondo to get relief from anxiety by tidying up. First of all, when you do house or yard work of any type, it is a meditative activity that soothes and distracts you from your anxiety. Secondly, it makes you feel like you are a “together person” to see your living space start to be arranged in a more socially-acceptable way. Third of all, it gives your mind less to process when it looks around in an orderly home—you literally worry less. It becomes a lot easier not to lose your keys if they have a spot they always go. The human brain thrives on order. Why not give it some?—MR
Is KonMari a fad? I can say this: It tamed my anxiety as much as my stuff.
By February 14, 2019
When I unpack in a hotel room, it goes from clean to chaos in under a minute. My husband affectionately refers to me as a tornado. He can also accurately assess my mental state based on how disorganized my office is.
First things first
When it comes to changing your mind—the basic task of psychotherapy—the most effective point of entry to the disturbed system is most often through the body. You just can’t separate mind from body. If you are depressed, anxious, or even psychotic, try helping your body and it will help your mind. A body without enough sleep, sunshine or water or trying to function in a toxic soup of cannabis, nicotine or alcohol, simply cannot be content, so why would your mind? The below article is an example of a body-based intervention.—MR
The Neuroscience of ‘Rock-a-Bye Baby’
By Dr. Richard A. Friedman, New York Times, Feb. 10, 2019
Want to fall effortlessly into profound slumber and sleep like a baby? Everyone knows that infants can be lulled to sleep by gentle rocking. Well, now it seems that what works for babies works for adults, too.
You are growing sleepier and sleepier…
In the screen-lit world of modern life, sleep is expendable. There are television shows to binge-watch, work emails to answer, homework to finish, social media posts to scroll through. We’ll catch up on shut-eye later, so the thinking goes — right after we click down one last digital rabbit hole.
Dance for joy
Erroneously, we assume that to dance, sing, skip down the street, smile or create art, we first must feel joy. But, while these behaviors may be an expression of joy, forcing ourselves to do them while we are feeling blue fools our brains into feeling great! Our silly brains think, “I’m singing, so I must be happy,” and so we are.—MR
British doctors may soon write prescriptions for dance, art or music lessons
By Tara Bahrampour, Washington Post, January 22, 2019
What if you were ill and instead of — or along with — a prescription for a pharmaceutical drug, your doctor wrote a prescription for a music, dance or painting class?
Bipolar no more
No matter the segment of reality upon which we gaze, truth unfolds in tints and shades of grey. The world simply is not black and white. This is becoming particularly obvious in gender assignment. Why should an individual who is psychologically and/or physically in the middle of the continuum have to pick one or the other?–MR
Why Sex Is Not Binary
By Dr. Anne Fausto-Sterling, Washington Post, Oct. 25, 2018
The complexity is more than cultural. It’s biological, too. Two sexes have never been enough to describe human variety. Not in biblical times and not now. Before we knew much about biology, we made social rules to administer sexual diversity. The ancient Jewish rabbinical code known as the Tosefta, for example, sometimes treated people who had male and female parts (such as testes and a vagina) as women — they could not inherit property or serve as priests; at other times, as men — forbidding them to shave or be secluded with women. More brutally, the Romans, seeing people of mixed sex as a bad omen, might kill a person whose body and mind did not conform to a binary sexual classification.
Made for walking
Human critters are walking critters. After all, we walked out of Africa and perhaps a few other places to populate the entire planet. We feel good from the feel-good brain chemicals that are triggered when we walk 20 minutes. I imagine birds feel good when they fly, monkeys feel good when they swing and fish feel great when they swim. Go for a walk—the cheapest feel-good medicine out there!—MR
Even a 10-Minute Walk May Be Good for the Brain
By Gretchen Reynolds, New York Times, Oct. 24, 2018
Ten minutes of mild, almost languorous exercise can immediately alter how certain parts of the brain communicate and coordinate with one another and improve memory function, according to an encouraging new neurological study. The findings suggest that exercise does not need to be prolonged or intense to benefit the brain and that the effects can begin far more quickly than many of us might expect.
Your addicted brain lies
There are other ways to reduce or eliminate back pain other than life-destroying opioids pushed by an immoral pharmaceutical industry. Please don’t listen to your addicted brain telling you different. Almost 75,000 Americans died last year from these drugs. If your doctor doesn’t know better, get a better doctor. —MR
A different way to relieve years of back pain
By Lisa Rein, Washington Post, September 27, 2018
In my first Feldenkrais class, we lay on our backs with eyes closed and drifted our eyeballs left to right and back again. We shifted our heads from side to side as our eyes followed in their sockets. Then we changed it up, moving our eyes in the opposite direction from our heads.
Who are you fooling?
Alcohol is almost everywhere we go. Human society likes to drink and encourages you to do it. But if you do, be aware of the scientific fact that, in any amount, you are doing something that will harm your health. Particularly the health of your brain and your relationships.—MR
Safest level of alcohol consumption is none
By Joel Achenbach, The Washington Post, August 23, 2018
To minimize health risks, the optimal amount of alcohol someone should consume is none. That’s the simple, surprising conclusion of a massive study, co-written by 512 researchers from 243 institutions, published Thursday in the prestigious journal the Lancet.
Be happy
Happiness is not a permanent state. It is in a moment. The more happy moments in your life, the happier life you have. The brain is wired to make you feel happy if you do certain things. Studies show one thing you can do to have a happy moment is to plant a tree! Even better, just looking at one can help.—MR
More Trees, Happier People
When cities grow, green space dies. Replanting it has been shown to lift the human spirit.
Truth will out
Finally! Been saying this for decades. However, the author doesn’t understand the addiction. It is “secondary.” Cannabis triggers an opioid in ones brain at abnormally high levels, i.e. the reward chemical, to which one becomes addicted. It is hard to recognize cause the high feels like the personal emotion of reward not an outer opioid like heroin plus the THC high. After awhile your own reward chemical isn’t stimulated without using cannabis. Voila! An unmotivated bored depressed narcissist sucking down reefer at the expense of those around him as his own life goes off the rails.—MR
I’m Just a Middle-Aged House Dad Addicted to Pot
By Neal Pollack, New York Times, Oct. 6, 2018
Cannabis should be legal, just as alcohol should be legal. But marijuana addiction exists, and it almost wrecked my life.
My name is Neal, and I’m a marijuana addict. A year ago I wouldn’t have said that, because it would have meant giving up marijuana. I would rather have given up breathing.
Don’t sweat it
One of the most effective things you can do to improve your mental health is to exercise, but some of us aren’t going to do calisthenics or go jogging for various reasons. Another effective mental health treatment is meditation. Tai chi or chi gung are fun alternatives to both and can even be learned by watching U-Tube videos.—MR
Using Tai Chi to Build Strength
By Jane E. Brody, New York Times, September 10, 2018
Tai chi moves can be easily learned and executed by people of all ages and states of health, even elderly people in wheelchairs.
Modern myth
From personal experience over the last 50 years and clinical observation as a mental health counselor, I have witnessed cannabis as the primary cause in many cases of anxiety, depression, job loss, divorce, psychosis and suicidal ideation by users. When cannabis is removed, symptoms have disappeared without other interventions. If you suffer from any of the above, go without it for a year and see if your mental and social disorder improve. If you can’t or won’t, you have to face the fact you are addicted and the anxiety or other symptom you feel is likely a withdrawal symptom that is relieved when you take more of your drug fooling you into thinking it’s helping.-–MR
The Big Number: Most adults think marijuana can be good for health
By August 18, 2018
Can marijuana be beneficial to your health? Most American adults — 81 percent — think so, according to new national survey results published online by Annals of Internal Medicine. The survey included responses from 9,003 adults considered a nationally representative sample. The believed benefits cited by the most people were managing pain (noted by 66 percent of participants), treating diseases such as multiple sclerosis and epilepsy (48 percent), and easing stress, anxiety and depression (47 percent). That said, 91 percent of respondents said they also believe that marijuana comes with risk, the most common being legal problems (cited by 52 percent), addiction (50 percent) and impaired memory (42 percent).
Drugs versus behavioral change
Changes to your behavior, such as going for a 20-minute walk a day, improves sleep without the cost of pills or risk of addiction. Though I will admit, if I don’t go for my walk, I might not sleep. Is that an addiction?—MR
The Evidence Points to a Better Way to Fight Insomnia
By Austin Frakt, New York Times, June 26, 2018
One weekend afternoon a couple of years ago, while turning a page of the book I was reading to my daughters, I fell asleep. That’s when I knew it was time to do something about my insomnia.
Alcohol damages your bodymind
The research is conclusive. The World Health Organization says one drink a day increases your chances of cancer by seven percent. Two drinks a day, fourteen percent. Personally, I don’t like them odds. Not to mention causing depression, anxiety and relationship problems. Puh-leez don’t believe the marketing by the wealthy alcohol industry that there is some health benefit to drinking. Those rich, um, guys don’t care about you.—MR
Did Drinking Give Me Breast Cancer?
The science on the link is clear, but the alcohol industry has worked hard to downplay it.
by Stephanie Mencimer, Mother Jones, May/June 2018
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