Just wanted to thank those that listed my Make The Most Out Of Any Vacation article in their blog carnivals. Check out the SuccessPart2 Carnival and the InsightWriter Carnival.
This is a strong subject that touches millions of lives. Everyone is affected by anxiety at one point in time or another. Whether you are late for a meeting, pushed to finish a tedious deadline, or maybe it’s waiting in line at the grocery store. Anxiety comes in many forms and on many different levels.
Around 5% of adults are stricken with generalized anxiety. At point in time 2.4 million Americans are affected by panic and anxiety disorders.
Anxiety is such a wide spread phenomena that some Americans actually accept it as just a part of life. Under certain circumstances it very well can be, but in a general sense of health, it is in no way normal for us to be anxious on a regular basis.
There are many types of helpful and beneficial practices than can be implemented into your daily routine in order to control and even eliminate anxiety. We should all seek to achieve a state of minimal stress in life. It is detrimental not only to our health, but it is something that can affects our jobs, relationships, emotional state, and every circumstance and event in our lives. It can cause a person to contract sleep disorders, a jittery complex, restlessness, a feeling of constant tension, dizziness, or excessive sweating.
Strong and persistent anxiety can lead to depression and surges of emotion, such as anger. There are many variations of stress such as phobias, generalized anxiety, panic disorders, and even obsessive-compulsive disorder. Controlling stress and anxiety is a Must and we all have the power to do it.
There are several types, and levels, of treatments for anxiety disorders. Depending on the severity and length of the disorder the treatments can range from visits with a counselor to prescribed medication. Many patients respond well to behavioral and cognitive therapy. These types of therapies delve into the mind of the patient to resolve well being from the inside out. This happens by identifying the distorted thoughts, fears and misconceptions that contribute to the anxiety.
Other options, such as traditional psychotherapy and meditation, take a less invasive path and heal by empowering the patient. In psychotherapy it is decided that the patient can ‘talk it out’ with a therapist and find healing in revealing. Meditation is a relaxation and control technique that has helped millions of people. By relaxing your mind, thoughts, and body a person can begin to control the way they think and therefore control the anxiety without drastic measures.
If you believe that you or someone you love may have an anxiety disorder make the decision to get help. Do the research and weigh the benefits. Life without stress and anxiety can give a whole new perspective.
The West Nile Virus is a mosquito-borne disease. Although it’s not as dangerous and prevalent as malaria, it’s nonetheless a serious disease. The West Nile Virus isn’t just a disease of humans – it also affects horses, dogs, cats, bats, chipmunks, skunks, squirrels, rabbits, and – most importantly – birds. This means that even in areas where mosquitoes don’t live year round, such as northern climates, a reservoir of the disease still remains and can be transmitted by mosquitoes once they return again with warmer weather.
Mammals, including humans, are considered a “dead end” for the virus. When the virus enters a human or any other mammal, the virus can’t grow enough to be picked up by another mosquito and transmitted to another living being. This isn’t the case, however, with birds, in which the virus continues to multiply to such a level that it can be transmitted to others.
More insidiously, when the West Nile Virus infects humans, there are three different manifestations of the disease. The first manifestation is an asymptomatic infection – in short, you have the disease, but it causes you no problems. The second manifestation is much like having a cold or a very mild case of the flu. In other words, you might have a low grade fever for a few days, but it passes so quickly that most people confuse it with the seasonal flu. You can also develop a mild rash, but all symptoms usually resolve within one week.
The third manifestation is the most dangerous development, marked by neuro-invasive meningitis or encephalitis, and by the development of a near coma state. Fortunately, for every 110 people who will never even know they were infected, there are only 30 people who have the flu-like cold symptom manifestation, and only one person who will experience the life threatening coma manifestation.
In 2007, there were more than 3,600 confirmed cases of West Nile Virus in the United States and 124 people died from the disease. To put this in perspective, there are many more people killed in automobile accidents in only one week than die from the West Nile Virus over the course of one year. The media has considerably stirred the public’s fear of West Nile Virus, even though there are many more diseases that you are likely to be exposed to.
While the mosquito is necessary to transmit the virus, two North American hosts help to amplify the virus. These are the North American Robin and the American Crow, which are the most common carriers of the virus and that serve as reservoirs of the disease. In addition, there are mosquitoes that preferentially bite birds, while others will bite both birds and mammals. No additional mosquito control methods are needed to help prevent West Nile Virus – any method that effectively controls or eliminates mosquitoes will help prevent the transmission of the virus to people.
Fortunately, the West Nile Virus can’t be easily transmitted from human to human – it takes exposure to body fluids to transmit the disease.
So while the West Nile Virus is a disease that’s worth learning about – and though it offers one more reason why mosquito control is important – it certainly isn’t worth the panic the recent media coverage has seemed to incite.
Teaching your children healthy eating habits from an early age on will give them several significant benefits throughout their lives, especially while they’re still growing and developing. Perhaps the biggest benefit they’ll receive is the ability to maintain a healthy weight. These days, one of the biggest health issues facing children and adults alike is obesity. And while there are many factors besides diet that contribute to obesity and being overweight, overeating and eating unhealthy foods are two of the most common factors. Obesity is a major risk factor for many common health issues that arise later on in life, such as diabetes and heart disease.
If you aren’t sure where to start, consider visiting a registered dietitian to get recommendations for your child’s specific nutritional needs. This is especially true for children that have specific medical conditions that restrict the types of foods they can eat, like food allergies or digestive problems like irritable bowel syndrome (IBS). A professional will be able to give you all the information you need to build a healthy and easy diet plan.
However, even if you aren’t able to visit a nutritionist, you can still help encourage healthy eating habits with your child. One thing that all parents should be focusing on when it comes to improving their child’s diet is fat intake. By increasing the amount of low-fat foods and decreasing the foods that are high in saturated fat, you can easily improve the overall benefits of your child’s diet.
Tips for Getting Your Children to Eat Healthy
One thing you can do to encourage your children to start eating healthy is to make sure that there’s an abundance of healthy food choices available in your house. It’s also important to teach your children to eat slowly. Research has shown that it takes at least 20 minutes for the stomach to begin to send signals that it’s full, so eating more slowly is an effective way to discourage overeating.
Another thing that can help parents who are trying to get their children to eat healthy foods is to make sure they have set meal times. This can be extremely helpful when trying to ensure that your children aren’t eating unhealthy snacks and other foods outside of set meal times. This will also allow you to better keep track of the foods your children are eating.
Allowing your children to be involved in the grocery shopping process has also proven to be quite effective. Letting your children choose the foods they want from a selection of healthy choices will make it much easier to get them to buy into the new diet than just trying to get them to eat foods you’ve chosen without their approval. You can also take this time to teach them to read food labels, so that they’ll know what to look for later in life.
All parents that have had difficulty trying to make the shift to healthier foods will definitely be able to benefit from these techniques. However, the most important thing you can do is to start the process of encouraging healthy eating early so that it becomes a routine your children can carry on into adulthood.