Our mission is to advice, and to make the people of the world healthier through the power of information.
Trying to be a real person is stressful. Lucky for us, one all-star high school teacher (shout out to you, Mr. Philips!) made a list of 101 ways for his students to stress less. Just reading through it made us feel more relaxed.
One of Philips's students tweeted screenshots of the list, which includes suggestions like "learn the words to a new song," "dance a jig," and "schedule play time into every day." Check out all the tips below:
What do you see when you look in the mirror? Is your nose too big? Are your lips too small? Are your eyebrows too bushy? That's what Rachel Levin, a popular YouTube beauty vlogger, sees when she looks in the mirror. But she quickly regrets those words when she looks at her reflection and sees herself as a child. You'll have to excuse the bad acting, but the message here is important: If you wouldn't tell your 5-year-old self about your supposed imperfections, why beat yourself up about them today?
No matter how confident you are, putting on a bikini is hard (especially if you've never worn one before!). That's why we can't get enough of Krystal Gordon's Facebook post. The Australian blogger totally freaked out—in the best way possible—about rocking a two-piece for the first time: "OMG, I just bought a bikini. What the heck?!" Check out her photo and amusing inner monologue below:
OMG, I just bought a bikini!!! What the heck? LOL. I also just took and shared a front-on photo of me without my clothes on—double what the heck!? Loving thyself baby. Embracing it all. Being proud of my progress. Accepting me for who I am right now even if it isn't where I want to be.
Now don't get me wrong, sharing this isn't easy by any means—every bit of me is going 'Holy sh*t Krystal, what are you doing?!' But if I can happily accept and celebrate everyone else's body, I sure as hell deserve the same love from myself ;) I have a goal to wear this swimsuit in public this summer too. I WILL get there. It WILL happen. You don't need a certain type of body to have a bikini body—you just need to put a bikini on!
#holybikini #cantbelieveimdoingthis #trusttheprocess #acceptingme #lovetheskinyouarein #selflove #progressnotperfection #hothappyandhealthy #workinprogress #bikini #bodymovement
For some reason, people think it's OK to go up complete strangers who look pregnant and ask them all sorts of questions: Is it a boy or a girl? How far along are you? Is this your first? Can I touch your belly? (You've got to be kidding with that last one.)
Pregnancy can be exciting and special, but sometimes it's scary, unwanted, and just really personal. And then there are times when a woman who looks like she's showing isn't pregnant. This recently happened to Elizabeth Yuko, a bioethicist and writer. She wrote about her experience in The New York Times:
I was standing up on the [bus], holding on to a pole and texting a friend. A white middle-aged man wearing pleated khakis and a blue oxford-cloth shirt sitting nearby turned to me and said loudly, “Please, ma’am, take my seat.”
I shook my head, indicating that I was getting off soon.
He persisted: “Please, ma’am, you really shouldn’t be standing up. Every bump this bus goes over can jostle and hurt your unborn baby.”
I was not, nor have I ever been, pregnant. I was just a well-fed woman in her 30s on her evening commute wearing an empire-waist dress. (Admittedly, that particular style of dress, which cascades down from the fitted bust and helps to disguise protruding stomachs, is a favorite of maternity clothing designers. But that is beside the point.)
This stranger felt as if he were responsible for the well-being of my nonexistent fetus and took it upon himself to scold me in front of the rest of the bus, providing unsolicited and inaccurate advice.
Yuko knows that this concern for seemingly pregnant women comes from a good place, but her cringeworthy story should be enough for all of us to think twice before saying anything to strangers who might be expecting:
It is absolutely possible to show concern for a pregnant person while still being respectful and not insulting. By all means, make accommodations for anyone—including pregnant people, the elderly or someone on crutches—who may look as if they could use a break.
But if someone declines the offer to take your seat on the bus, move on and let it go. Follow-up comments are unnecessary. It’s possible that a person who appears to be pregnant may have an unwelcome medical condition that she doesn’t wish to discuss.
Check out the rest of Yuko's story by clicking below.
Welcome to GreatistYou, a new social experiment where we see what happens when five people decide to change their health—and broadcast their journeys for everyone to see. Four goals, five contestants, and six weeks to crush said goals for the promise of a better life (oh, and $1,000!).
Are you as excited for this fight as we are?! This weekend Regina (@greatistregina) will step into the ring with her Muay Thai instructor for a sparring match. She'll be judged on her form and style, and the results will determine whether she's completed her GreatistYou goal.
Get pumped, guys. It's all going down soon. Stay tuned to see what happens.
You’ve probably heard there's no need to wash your hair every day, unless you work up a sweat. Even then, you should skip the shampoo.
But what about the rest of your body? It seems logical that the more you shower, the better. It turns out, though, you don't need to soap up and scrub down as often as you think.
Your arms and legs don't produce many oils, so washing them daily with soap will make the skin on your limbs super dry. Save the soap for the oily, smelly parts of your body: your armpits, butt, and feet.
The most surprising area you should stop soaping up? Your groin. While it’s a good idea to wash down there for sanitary reasons, men and women can steer clear of soap and just use water.
It was a chilly spring afternoon. I was shopping at Forever21 for an outfit to wear out with friends that night. While parsing through racks of clothing, I started feeling warm. Chalking the sudden discomfort up to a random hot flash, I kept shopping. But then things escalated: I started shaking; I felt dizzy, sick to my stomach. I ditched the clothes I was considering purchasing and booked it to my car. I’ll just go home, I thought. I’ll take a nap and then I’ll feel fine.
But the uneasiness kept coming back. For months, I couldn’t escape the feeling of dread that followed me everywhere. I couldn’t get through a workday without feeling like I was going to be sick. I couldn’t drive more than five minutes without needing to pull over to the side of the road, struggling for breath. I couldn’t go out to clubs and bars—even though I used to love dancing the night away—because a swarm of people enveloping me was a recipe for panic. In what seemed like the blink of an eye, I went from a carefree 20-something to someone failing to cope with an anxiety disorder.
Before and after my 20-pound weight loss—but feeling worse than ever inside.
Ironically, I was in better shape than ever when my anxiety disorder developed. I had been training for my first half-marathon, losing 20 pounds in the process. But nothing, not even the hundreds of miles I logged, could quell the endless worry.
I was constantly feeling under the weather, struggling to see a way out of the fight-or-flight pattern that my mind cycled through. I tried every naturopathic remedy to alleviate my symptoms: therapy, hypnosis, essential oils, fish oil pills, and good old-fashioned exercise.
Because I appeared healthier than ever, people didn’t realize that I was fighting the toughest battle of my life. Old classmates, coworkers, and acquaintances would stop me in the grocery store to tell me I looked amazing. Friends and family loved to compliment my new body.
When you’re suffering from an invisible illness, the body that people applaud is the very same body that you resent.
I know they were just being nice—offering kind words about the body I’d worked so hard for. But when you’re suffering from an invisible illness, the body that people applaud is the very same one that you resent. Over time, I grew bitter because the body that carried me across 13.1 grueling miles that summer was also the one that crashed and burned into an anxiety attack just minutes later. If a half-marathon’s worth of endorphins wasn’t powerful enough to unlock me from the prison of my disorder, what was?
For the millions of Americans with invisible illnesses, this internalized resentment is all too familiar. During the darkest days of my battle, there was no indication that I was ill. I stopped running because my body would burst into a full-fledged panic attack as soon as my heart rate became elevated. I could barely eat, maintaining my newfound slenderness for months despite not completing a single workout. I continued to look healthy, like the carefree and athletic person that so many people thought I was.
Only those closest to me knew how much I was suffering. One evening my grandmother called me on the phone and asked if I was OK. She’d seen a picture of me on Facebook and told me, “I know you’re smiling in the picture, but I can see pain in your eyes.” She was right.
I know you’re smiling in the picture, but I can see pain in your eyes.
I finally began to crawl out of the misery, angst, and suffering when my doctor acknowledged that, despite my best efforts to cure my anxiety sans prescriptions, it just wasn’t possible. Anxiety was biological, he explained, and I couldn’t change the way the neurotransmitters work in my brain, just as a rheumatic can’t change the arthritic pain and swelling that courses through their body. He prescribed me a selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (commonly known as an antidepressant), and I prescribed myself the optimism to fight for a few more weeks.
It worked. Within days, my anxiety attacks became a thing of the past. Within weeks, I began laughing again. And one day, as I was heading to work, my dad smiled and told me how healthy I looked. That was a proud day.
I am still not perfect. I deal with side effects from my prescription—like hand tremors when I feel nervous and nightmares when I’m stressed—but that's nothing in comparison to having my life back.
Now, healthier inside and out Last November, I left my new job crying after panicking and getting physically ill on the very first day. It was an embarrassing, frightening time of my life that consisted of spending every waking hour pleading with God, the universe, and my own body to stop letting me down. Less than a year later, I can travel, go out to bars, enjoy meals out, and be more spontaneous than ever—even moreso than before I had this disorder. I don’t know how long I’ll have to deal with anxiety; my treatment has gone well, and my physician and I have hope that I can be both medicine- and symptom-free one day soon. In the meantime, I’m just grateful to be enjoying the ride.
If you spend most of your workout staring at the clock, watching the seconds slowly tick by, it's time to switch things up. This total-body HIIT routine is so dynamic, a half hour will go by like the blink of an eye.
The format of this bodyweight workout will inject energy into your workout and make it a lot more fun. You'll constantly toggle between strength and cardio moves, which will keep every muscle in your body guessing and your mind engaged (no time for to-do lists here!) Plus, trainers Pace and Go will offer valuable nutrition advice throughout so you can maximize the results of your hard work.
An exercise mat is optional, but other than that, all you need is you.
To recap: There are 5 sets, with a 30 second rest between each set.
Each exercise must be completed for 30 seconds, followed by 30 seconds of Jumping Jacks.
Exercises:
Set 1:
Floor Touch Squat
Wide-to-Narrow Push-Up
Tap Floor, Squat Jump
Full Tuck Crunch
Rest
Set 2:
Forward and Backward Lunge
Tricep Dip and Hip Lift
Kneel to High Skip
Bicycle Crunch
Rest
Set 3:
Bridge Scissor
Swimming Plank
Diagonal Squat Thrust
Toe Touch Beetle Crunch
Rest
Set 4:
Lateral Lunge to Knee Drive
Inverted Push-Up
Skater With Single-Leg Squat
Vertical Leg Lift
Rest
Set 5:
Plank Walkout and Punch
Skydiver
Tick-Tock Squat Thrust
Rock-Up to Single-Knee
Rest
Looking for more short and effective at-home workouts? Grokker has thousands of routines, so you’ll never get bored. Bonus: For a limited time, Greatist readers get 40 percent off Grokker Premium (just $9 per month) and their first 14 days free. Sign up now!
Lena Dunham isn't shy about sharing the ups and downs of living with endometriosis. People who have heard of the disorder—and that's still not many—usually think it just causes women to have painful periods. Dunham's recent Snapchat challenges that stereotype as she shows the world her scars from endometriosis-related surgeries:
Here's what everyone should know about the disorder: It causes the tissue lining the uterus (which usually gets flushed out during menstruation) to grow where it shouldn't be—on the ovaries, fallopian tubes, or intestines. Symptoms include terrible cramps, long and heavy periods, pain during sex, or even infertility. Sometimes surgery is required to properly diagnose endometriosis and remove the excess tissue to ease the pain.
The crazy thing is one in ten women in the U.S. deal with endometriosis at some point in their lives, making it even more important that Dunham is sharing her story to raise awareness of the common disorder.
Learning about periods in middle school was pretty much the most awkward thing ever. (I'll never forget when my health teacher made us watch a video of girls eating vagina-shaped pancakes at a sleepover.) The reality is many women (and men!) are pretty uninformed about menstruation, and making girls feel like it's a gross topic isn't helping.
That's what makes The Period Game so great. Dreamed up by two students at The Rhode Island School of Design, the board game uses classic Monopoly features (plus a giant 3-D uterus) to teach about menstruation:
Players start the game by rolling the dice rotating the giant uterus, which releases a marble. Red ones represent your period, while clear marbles signify any other day. As you move around the board, you collect protection cards (like "tampon") and preparation cards (like "take a hot bath!"). Plus, the game also comes with instruction packets labeled "Wait, really?" that give players more info on periods.
Unfortunately, the game isn't available yet. The creators are currently shopping it around to toy makers. When it does appear on shelves, it won't be just for kids. All of us could use a fun, casual way to talk about periods. Because, you know, saying the word "tampon" out loud won't kill you.
You promise yourself you’re going to wake up earlier. You want to be more “adult-like,” which obviously means waking up with enough time to make breakfast and eat at a table. Who are we fooling? It never happens. You know what does? The snooze button—and that means you’re sprinting out the door to get to work on time.
This is where these filling, high-protein breakfast egg muffins come into play. They’re the fast and easy solution to your crazed mornings because no matter how you get to work—car, subway, bus, train—you can eat these little guys anywhere. The only utensils needed are your fingers.
Set aside 30 minutes on a Sunday and throw this three-ingredient recipe together: Creamy eggs, crunchy bell peppers, and mild spinach make these protein-rich muffins a no-brainer when you're short on time. And guess what? You’ll have breakfast for the next five days. Don’t worry about getting bored with this combo either; it’s really just a base recipe, so you can add whatever toppings you please. We’ve made them four different ways (since a 12-cup muffin tin has four different rows): Keep one with just veggies, add goat cheese to the second, bacon to another, and then get really crazy and add bacon and goat cheese to your final row.
Recipe by: Jamie Webber
Serves: 4-6
Base recipe:
12 eggs
1 red bell pepper
1 yellow bell pepper
1/2 cup spinach
Pinch sea salt and black pepper
Cooking spray
12-cup muffin tin
Optional toppings:
1/4 cup goat cheese
2 cooked bacon slices, chopped
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Spray a 12-cup muffin tin liberally with cooking spray. Set aside.
3. Chop bell peppers and spinach into small bite-sized pieces, about 1/4 inch.
4. Divide vegetables evenly among muffin tins.
5. In a large bowl, whisk eggs together until combined. Sprinkle in salt and pepper to taste.
6. Pour the eggs into the cups, dividing evenly; filling up about 3/4 of the way full. You can always go back and add more with any eggs leftover.
7. If you're adding additional toppings, now is the time. Sprinkle desired amount of goat cheese or cooked bacon bits (or both) to the top of your egg muffins.
8. Bake the eggs in the oven for 20-25 minutes. They will puff up, but as soon as they come back to room temperature, they will deflate.
9. Store in the fridge for up to five days.
Women deal with a lot of bullsh*t in the workplace (yep, even in 2016), and Kristen Bell is not having any of it. In this hilarious parody, she highlights one of the biggest inequalities that working women face: the pay gap. Bell jokes that American women are the cheapest workforce around—all they need is free tampons in office bathrooms and they'll never ask for a raise! The two-minute spot is video gold, making us laugh out loud and roll our eyes.
Welcome to GreatistYou, a new social experiment where we see what happens when five people decide to change their health—and broadcast their journeys for everyone to see. Four goals, five contestants, and six weeks to crush said goals for the promise of a better life (oh, and $1,000!).
As we enter the home stretch of GreatistYou, our contestants are either freaking out or relaxing hard. Brandon (@greatistbrandon) seems to be somewhere in the middle. He has only one pound to go before reaching his goal, so this last week is probably both stressful and a total relief.
While he's a bit further away than he'd like from his personal goal weight, he's come a long way!
Like it or not, summer is coming to an end. And even though we’re mourning the passing of those lazier months, we have to admit we’re a little (OK, extremely) excited to stop sweating.
Some may begrudge the coming cooler weather (so long, fresh fruit smoothies and granola bowls!), but we’d like to offer a tip: Save fruit now and make better-tasting treats for the rest of the year. Prepping your own frozen fruit may seem an unnecessary step (can’t you buy that stuff in the grocery store?), but you’ll thank us after that first sip of an summery peach smoothie in the middle of November. You’re a little curious now, aren’t you? Hold onto that feeling.
Now let's spell that out with just a tad bit more detail.
Raspberries and blackberries: Rinse > Pat dry on towel > Place on a parchment-lined baking sheet > Freeze until solid > Store in a freezer bag > Drop into a pot of oatmeal while it’s cooking
Blueberries: Pick off all stems > Rinse > Pat dry on towel > Place on a parchment-lined baking sheet > Freeze until solid > Store in a freezer bag > Use as a topping for a smoothie bowl
Strawberries: Rinse > Pat dry on towel > Cut off stems > Chop into small pieces > Place on a parchment-lined baking sheet > Freeze until solid > Store in a freezer bag > Drop into a bowl of Greek yogurt
Cherries: Rinse, pat dry on towel > Slice in half > Pit > Place on a parchment-lined baking sheet > Freeze until solid > Store in a freezer bag > Blend into a smoothie
Bananas: Peel > Slice into even pieces > Place on a parchment-lined baking sheet > Freeze until solid > Store in a freezer bag > Whip up a batch of banana ice cream
Stone fruit (peaches, nectarines, plums, etc.): Rinse > Dry > Peel (optional) > Cut into chunks > Place on a parchment-lined baking sheet > Freeze until solid > Store in a freezer bag > Defrost, top with granola for a quick fruit crisp
Apples and pears: Rinse > Dry > Peel (optional) > Cut into chunks > Place on a parchment-lined baking sheet > Freeze until solid > Store in a freezer bag > Defrost, cut smaller and add to muffin batter
Melon: Cut into chunks > Place on a parchment-lined baking sheet > Freeze until solid > Store in a freezer bag > Blend into a smoothie bowl
Citrus (oranges, lemons, limes, etc.): Rinse > Dry > Cut away any abrasions on the peel > Slice into rounds or half-moons > Place on a parchment-lined baking sheet > Freeze until solid > Store in a freezer bag > Grate zest over meat, salad, cocktails, and more!
When it comes to birth control methods, IUDs (intrauterine devices) are having a moment. From 2006 to 2010, IUD use has increased 83 percent among women between ages 15 to 44. Based on this meteroic rise in popularity, you’d think that American women know all about the perks of IUD, including its high effectiveness, safety, and ability to be reversed.
But it turns out, not a lot of U.S. women have realistic ideas about the best contraceptive method. According to a recent survey by the Urban Institute, only 55 percent of women had heard "a lot" about the IUD, while 9 percent hadn't heard about it at all. (In contrast, 90 percent of women said they knew "a lot" about condoms, and 86 percent about the pill.)
Even more telling is how effective women believed various birth control methods to be. Sterilization (male or female) was viewed as most effective, with IUDs, shots, and pills fairly behind. While 64 percent considered condoms "somewhat effective," only 31 percent thought the same about IUDs.
Compare this to the actual stats on effectiveness: Over one year of "typical use" of condoms, 18 percent of women will become pregnant; on the pill, that drops to 9 percent. And don't even get us started with withdrawal (or pull-out) method, which has a measly 73 percent effectiveness rate. But with an IUD? Only 0.2 to 0.8 percent of women have the same chance of becoming pregnant. (*Sigh of relief.*)
This goes to show that most American women's assumptions about the most effective birth control are basically the opposite of the facts—not good. Bear in mind that the pill's efficacy issues are usually attributed to women failing to take it as directed. (Let's be real: It's hard to take a pill every single day at the exact same time without fail.)
Health safety of various birth control options can be harder to gauge, but the FDA has approved all prescription methods as safe for women. (Although there was a scare about recalling IUDs in the 1970s, the researchers note that there haven't been any big issues since, and they've been called OB/GYN's contraceptive method of choice.)
The bottom line: Do your research and talk to your doctor before choosing the BC method that's right for you. And checking the actual stats on effectiveness and safety is always a better bet than trusting your friend who waxes poetic about withdrawal.
President Obama is the first president to call himself a feminist, (he wrote a bomb essay about it!), but that doesn't mean women on his staff don't face gender discrimination. Women are constantly being interrupted at work, and that applies even if your office is, well, the White House. When Obama took office, two-thirds of his top aides were men, so his female staffers came up with a genius strategy called "amplification" to make sure their voices were heard.
When a woman made a great point in a meeting, other women in the room repeated the point and gave props to the woman who said it, so that men couldn't take the idea as their own. Obama's former aide told The Washington Post that this strategy worked, and everyone in the room noticed. Hopefully there will be a day when women don't have to use special strategies like this, but for now, amplification is a totally doable way to make sure no (good) opinion is left behind.
Finding the teeny-tiny area where feminine products are hidden in convenience stores may as well be a scavenger hunt. One 13-year-old girl who was on such a quest for tampons decided to text her mom about the ridiculousness of the situation (how absurd would it be if tampons were in plain sight?!), and the resulting conversation is hilarious.
Before you can blink, the Gilmore Girls-level banter moves from estrogen laser beams to fist pump-worthy promises of smashing the patriarchy. Someone pass us the popcorn:
Welcome to GreatistYou, a new social experiment where we see what happens when five people decide to change their health—and broadcast their journeys for everyone to see. Four goals, five contestants, and six weeks to crush said goals for the promise of a better life (oh, and $1,000!).
With only a few days left until the big race, Darby and Adrienne (@greatistdanda) are focusing on the following four things to ensure victory: hydration, rest, fuel, and confidence. While a 10K is nothing to sneeze at, we have faith in them and know they'll leave a trail of smoke in their path.
Adrienne's knee continues to give her problems, but a new shipment of RockTape should stop the issue before it starts, since, according to Adrienne, this is the only kind that really works for her.
“I hope I'm still playing tennis when I’m her age,” my mom says as we admire my impressively active 94-year-old grandmother. I nod as I think to myself that she will never make it anywhere near my grandma's age.
Based on her height and weight, my mom is obese. She's only in her 50s and has struggled with her weight since before I was born. She's already had four weight-related surgeries—multiple joint replacements, accelerated by excess impact. Every time I go back home to visit, she seems heavier and slower, less able to do things like walk up and down stairs, stand for long periods of time, and ride her bike. I’m afraid that I’m running out of ways to help her.
I’ve run three full marathons, I go to CrossFit every morning before work, and I love planning and cooking nutritious meals. My friends tell me I am the one of the fittest people they know.
I genuinely enjoy all of these activities, but I would be lying if I said that a major part of my motivation doesn’t come from the nagging fear in the back of my mind: If I don’t make my health a priority, I will end up like my mother.
Ironically, my love of healthy food and exercise comes from my mom. She is not the depressed, sedentary picture of obesity you might expect.
She worked in the fitness industry for most of her life as a group and personal trainer. I remember practicing aerobics routines in the kitchen with her when I was little. She met my father on a hiking trip; they both ran marathons in their 20s. Throughout my childhood, our family vacations consisted of camping, hiking, and nonstop family sports games—although my dad was often the one who participated while my mom cheered us on from the sidelines.
I can’t help but sense the giant elephant in the middle of the conversation.
Since recovering from knee surgery, my mom has slowly returned to the things she loves—swimming, going on long walks, and cooking elaborate meals for dinner parties with ingredients from our local farmer's market.
But every time she talks about wanting to get better at yoga, improve her arthritis pain, or be able to bike for longer distances, I can’t help but sense the giant elephant in the middle of the conversation.
I see her weight standing between her and everything she loves to do. I remember feeling like crying when we went to New York City for vacation and we had to limit our excursions to places within very short walking distances.
While I’ve never directly mentioned how I feel, we’ve had vague conversations about food, weight, and health. At first glance it seems like she’s in denial. But I’ve realized that she thinks about getting healthy just as much as—if not more than—I do, so I don’t want to add to her struggle.
If it were any other chronic disease, we might be able to talk about it more openly. Cancer, for example, is incredibly sad and often hard to talk about, but it doesn’t carry the same blame and judgment that obesity does.
My friend with a family history of skin cancer openly talks about her increased preoccupation with sun protection because she has a very real picture of what can happen if she doesn’t pay attention. She is motivated to take care of her skin that much more because she knows that she’s at risk.
With my mom, we dance around the topic and talk generally about “feeling healthy” and “having energy.” There’s something about weight and obesity—how it’s all tangled up with pride, emotion, and guilt—that makes it feel like so much more than a clinical disease. And I have trouble getting out the words about how worried I am for her long-term health.
Fitness has become a huge part of my identity and is a positive motivator for everything I do. But I can’t shake the nagging feeling that if I slip, gaining weight means so much more than just seeing the number on the scale go up a few pounds. Studies suggest that children of obese parents are much more likely to be overweight or become overweight in their lifetimes. And I have a painfully clear picture of what it looks like and how it could limit my life.
I have a painfully clear picture of what it looks like and how it could limit my life.
All of this sounds incredibly selfish. I shouldn’t be the one struggling; I’m not the one carrying around extra weight every day, unable to regain control of my body. I’m not the one with joints failing under the weight of my lifelong struggle. I’m not the one agonizing over my emotional eating habits.
So why am I the one complaining?
After all, I don't resent my mom. Her weight hasn't prevented her from being an amazing mother and role model, and I love her no matter what she weighs. When I was little, I used to tell her I never wanted her to lose weight because she was such a good hugger, enveloping me in her arms. But because I’m so close to her, I am hyperaware of the pain that she has gone through: the guilt, the agony, and frustration with her disease.
Over the years, I've realized the best thing I can do for my mom is to love and support her in whatever she does. But when it comes to something I can control, I direct my energy toward staying fit and healthy, and ensuring that my own children never have to face the same struggle.
We all know we’re supposed to drink a lot of water every day to stay hydrated (about 11 cups for women and 16 cups for men is recommended). But who actually wants to do this? It takes a lot of reminders and even more trips to the bathroom.
If you’re constantly battling dehydration or just want a foolproof way to hit your goals, here’s a simple tip: Eat foods that contain a lot of water too. Your top choices for max water intake are greens like celery, lettuce, and broccoli, along with fruits and yogurt (all foods that, no surprise, are also good for you!). Yep, even coffee made the cut, since caffeine isn’t dehydrating as long as you drink it in moderation. So now you can sip your morning cup in peace.
For the full details on how to stay hydrated without chugging water all day, check out Vox's article.
Welcome to GreatistYou, a new social experiment where we see what happens when five people decide to change their health—and broadcast their journeys for everyone to see. Four goals, five contestants, and six weeks to crush said goals for the promise of a better life (oh, and $1,000!).
If you've been too busy to check out the action, don't sweat it. We've got a quick video to catch you up. Sit back, relax, and let GreatistYou recapper Jeremy Glass run through the highlights.
Instagram goes crazy for bearded men, but guys aren't the only ones with facial hair. As Tina-Marie Beznec, an Australian blogger, reminds us in an inspirational Facebook post, women have hair on their face too—and people need to stop freaking out about it. Beznec has polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS), a hormonal condition that affects one in ten women and can lead to weight gain, irregular periods, depression, infertility, and, yep, facial hair.
Beznec has always been self-conscious of her facial hair, but as she says in her brave post, there's nothing to be ashamed of:
Hi my name is Tina and I have polycystic ovary syndrome. As well as depression, anxiety, infertility, weight gain, hormonal imbalances, bloating, abdominal pains, acne, cysts, increased risk of cancer, and everything else, a lot of woman including myself have to deal with facial hair!
Do you know how UNFEMININE this can make a woman feel?!? I've always been super self-conscious about it, but I really just have to put this out there because I want create more awareness around this syndrome and how much it can impact someone's life, especially if they don't know they have it.
When you see someone who is overweight, has bald patches, or a woman who has facial hair, DO NOT JUDGE
You never know what a person is going through, and it's unfair to put someone into the "lazy and unhealthy" category without knowing their story. I know it's only natural for some of us to judge someone based on how they look, but remember we are all fighting our own battles and you can never understand if you aren't willing to learn and listen...
If you think you may have polycystic ovary syndrome, please don't be afraid to reach out and seek medical advice. It's a hard battle, but the sooner you get diagnosed the sooner you can manage your symptoms.
Welcome to GreatistYou, a new social experiment where we see what happens when five people decide to change their health—and broadcast their journeys for everyone to see. Four goals, five contestants, and six weeks to crush said goals for the promise of a better life (oh, and $1,000!).
A big question that's been following Jasmine (@greatistjasmine) around since she joined GreatistYou is: What's going to happen when she goes on her cruise? Anyone who's gone on one knows how difficult it is to stick to a diet when you've got a never-ending buffet of food at your fingertips.
But as with most things, Jasmine is rocking it: She found a healthy snack and climbed a mountain. No biggie.
Some foods are a straight-up gamble. Open up a box of chocolates, and you could get caramel filling or that weird pink marshmallow fluff. Bite into a peach in mid-February, and you could get cardboard. Hard-boiled eggs are another story. They might not be super exciting, but they’re steady. You know (the majority of the time) they're going to taste good. But you can also bet a year’s worth of your vacation days that they’re going to be annoying to peel.
I know this because I eat a hard-boiled egg for breakfast every single day. And after wasting countless hours of my life painstakingly picking bits of shell off of my brutalized egg in a silent rage, I decided it was time to solve this problem once and for all. Here’s what I learned.
Eggs are packed with protein, especially the whites. When those proteins are exposed to heat—like when an egg is being cooked—the proteins coagulate, or turn from liquid to solid, explains Cathy Davies, PhD, Food Science Communicator for the Institute of Food Technologists.
Coagulation is a good thing, because it means you get to eat a solid egg instead of a gross, goopy mess. But the process also makes boiled eggs difficult to peel. “Proteins are very sticky. When the egg white cooks, it can bind to the membrane and the shell,” Davies says. And you end up with a torn, pockmarked egg.
An egg’s pH also plays a role. Egg white proteins that contain more acid are especially sticky, Davies says. Fresher eggs tend to have a lower pH, which is why the eggs from your local farmer’s market tend to be more stubborn than the ones from the grocery store.
If you’ve ever had to deal with unpeelable eggs, you probably already know that the Internet is chockablock with potential solutions. Except they don’t all actually work. And some of them are downright ridiculous.
To achieve a boiled egg that slips happily out of its shell, one of two things need to happen: You either find a way to stop that pesky membrane from becoming so sticky or find a way to raise the pH of your egg. Here are the methods that got the job done and the ones that were a complete waste of my time.
Carefully dropping an egg into a pot of boiling water instead of starting the egg in a pot of cold water is touted as the best route for easy-peel eggs. That’s because adding eggs directly to hot water helps them cook faster and keeps the egg whites from reaching too high a temperature, which seems to make it harder for the membrane to stick to the shell, Davies says. Plunging the eggs into an ice water bath once they’re done stops the cooking quickly, further preventing a sticky situation.
I had always started my eggs in cold water, so this made a big difference. Davies suggested letting my eggs sit in the ice water bath for a full 15 minutes, but I didn’t have time to wait that long. Fortunately, chilling the eggs for just a couple of minutes worked well enough.
The verdict: This wasn’t totally foolproof, but it nixed about 95 percent of my peeling problems. It might’ve been even better if I chilled the eggs longer, but in the interest of time, it was a trade-off I was willing to make.
Steaming is gentler than boiling. Supposedly this makes it harder for the whites of the eggs to get too hot and make the proteins ultra sticky. It was the other cooking method that Davies recommended, so I had high hopes. Just like after boiling, I plunged the cooked eggs in ice water for a few minutes to help them cool down.
The verdict: This worked just as well as dropping eggs into boiling water: I hit a couple of snags, but the shells mostly came off.
3. Use older eggs.
Older eggs have a higher pH than fresher ones. And if you’re buying them from the supermarket, you can check the carton to see when your eggs were actually packed. (Look for the three-digit lot number, which will list a consecutive day of the year. So eggs packed on January 1 would say 001, eggs packed on February 1 would say 032, etc.)
Problem is, there’s no official definition for what "old" actually is. My eggs were packed three weeks before I brought them home, and they weren’t any easier or harder to peel than other supermarket eggs I’d bought in the past. But if you buy very fresh eggs from the farmer's market (or you keep chickens... ), it might be worth seeing whether letting them sit for at least a few days makes for easier peeling.
The verdict: Not that helpful if you’re buying eggs from the supermarket, but could have an impact if you’re buying super-fresh eggs.
Baking soda is alkaline, so adding a sprinkle to your cooking water will raise its pH. Which, theoretically, will raise the pH of your egg and make it easier to peel. But for this to actually work, the baking soda would need to pass through the egg shell and come in contact with the egg white before the proteins start to coagulate, Davies said. So I used a pin to prick tiny holes in the top and bottom of the egg to make sure the baking soda could get inside ASAP.
The verdict: Not very effective. Maybe I needed to use more than just a sprinkle of baking soda? Even if adding more helped, though, I still wouldn’t do this. Pricking holes in the egg was annoying, and the egg had a faint soapy taste.
Gently rolling the cooked egg on a cutting board (or other hard surface) with the palm of your hand makes lots of cracks in the shell, which supposedly helps to detach the membrane from the egg white. So after dropping the egg into boiling water and chilling it in an ice bath, I gave it a try instead of my usual one big crack.
The verdict: Even though the boiling and cooling method worked on its own, the initial peel would sometimes still be a little tough. Rolling the egg first made the process even easier.
A hack that went viral a few years back showed a video of a guy putting an egg in a glass cup, adding a little bit of water, covering the mouth of the cup with his hand, and then shaking vigorously for 20 seconds. The combination of the water and the shaking seems to cause the shell to detach from the membrane in one giant piece. Amazing, right?
The verdict: I tried this in place of gentle rolling, even though I was sort of afraid that the glass might break in my hand. It didn’t—and the shell really did slip right off. Even so, I didn’t love it: It was kind of loud, and I like quiet in the morning. Plus, who’s to say the glass won’t break next time?
There’s no one foolproof trick to perfectly peel a boiled egg. Instead, it’s a combination of how you cook the egg, how you cool it, and how you crack the shell afterward. So start your eggs in already-boiling water or steam them, cool them quickly in ice, and roll them gently to make lots of cracks in the shell before peeling. Or, if you’re a daredevil, go ahead and shake it up in a cup.
Everyone has experienced that familiar pang of jealousy when someone they know seems to have it better—a nicer car, a bigger apartment, a higher-paying job. And even though it makes us feel like sh*t, we still continue to compare ourselves to others. It’s as if our success in life is measured by how we’re doing against the success of other people—rather than just letting our own success be.
It’s not uncommon to experience a sinking feeling when someone “does better”—lands a killer promotion, gets married, buys a home, or finally takes an extended trip to Europe. Yes, we’re happy for our friends, but that frustrating feeling of falling behind can sabotage our well-being in the wake of another person’s good news.
To help beat back your own green-eyed monster, ask yourself these five questions before you start comparing your success to someone else’s.
Say you feel eternally single and your best friend suddenly lands a great girl or guy. What’s it to you, really? Does it impact your dating life at all? Of course not! Sure, you might spend a little less time with your friend now that he or she is in a relationship. But why not use that time to find new ways to put yourself out there on the dating scene? If anything, it’s wonderful proof that great people exist and meeting one in any moment is truly possible.
When someone else triggers your envy alarm, what does their success reveal about your own desires? For example, if a friend just got a juicy raise, did he or she ask for it? If someone got fit and toned this summer, were they trying a new, fun workout class or a great, doable diet? Figure out what you can learn or leverage to your advantage. Don’t let your envy cloud the lesson that could jump start your next success.
Take a step back and remember all the great stuff going on in your life too. Envy blinds us to this completely. While you are eyeing someone’s ability to speak in public, they may well be envying your writing skills, muscular arms, or ability to dress like Anna Wintour. Taking regular note of your own blessings (daily if you can) makes you far less likely to freak out when someone gets something you really want.
Life is long. It's not measured in days, weeks, or months—but years. Don’t blow up someone else's recent achievements into something life-altering. The real measure of success? Compare yourself today to who you were last year and consider how far you’ve come. (Here are some questions that can help you do so.) When you really evaluate this, the truth is likely to surprise you.
Your negative emotion is revealing something important to you.
If you're consistently triggered by certain events, your negative emotion is revealing something important to you. It’s showing you something that you secretly want too. Think of those pangs of envy as prompts, giving you a little nudge. If you're frustrated or jealous that a friend starts a side business or reaches the next level at work, it’s probably because you have a deep desire within you, waiting to bloom. It's in there, just waiting for you to take action.
Finally, cut yourself some slack. It’s common to feel that we are not going fast enough, doing well enough, or aren’t capable enough when we see people surpass us in any area of life. Comparison is unhealthy and destructive. But we can overcome the illusion of competition that comparison creates. You just have to redirect your focus to what really matters and the only thing that you have control over: yourself.
Susie Moore is Greatist’s life coach columnist and a confidence coach in New York City. Her new book, What If It Does Work Out?, is available on Amazon now. Sign up for free weekly wellness tips on her website and check back every Tuesday for her latest No Regrets column!
When we think of high-fashion models, we usually imagine lanky bodies walking down the runway. But this year a number of shows at New York Fashion Week showcased curvy women. Notably, Project Runway alum Christian Siriano featured five plus-size models in his show. These models are still a small percentage of those at Fashion Week—Tim Gunn called out the entire industry for ignoring plus-size women last week—but it's an important step.
Check them out below.
Plus-size women are everywhere, from magazine covers to runway shows. But new research found that the heavier a woman is, the harder it is to land a job.
To conduct the study, researchers modified the faces of thin men and women to make them look heavier:
The cheeks are fuller, and the neck is bigger, but the changes are subtle. (All of the photos in the study were of white people to remove race as a potential factor, but we’d be interested to see if the findings differed with a diverse group of images.) Scientists showed participants each photo separately, plus they added in diversions—people with tattoos or piercings to test for other biases.
What they found was not encouraging. Participants said they were more likely to hire women when they appeared thinner, especially in customer-facing jobs (like waiters or receptionists). Men didn't face the same type of discrimination. While this study focused on service jobs, it suggests that women face more weight-related judgment in the workplace, which is not cool at all.
I didn’t always see it that way. I've struggled with my body image for as long as I can remember. As a kid, I would encircle my wrist with my fingers and compare my ankles to the delicate ones at the school desk next to me. My body always came up shorter, fatter. I was born premature, so it took me a long time to catch up to my peers, but I always saw myself as bigger than I really was. Still do.
My insecurities about my body overwhelmed my desire to enjoy myself.
When I spent my sophomore year of college in Italy away from family and friends, my insecurities grew. For the first time, I was completely in control of what I ate, what I bought at the grocery store, and what I ordered at restaurants. And without anyone watching, I fell apart.
“How’s the food?” my friends asked, when I called long-distance. I told them it was great, and it was. But I held up poorly without the support system I didn’t know I had until I left it an ocean away.
For one hellish year and change, my insecurities about my body overwhelmed my desire to enjoy myself. I counted noodles and measured sauce by the spoonful. I dragged my exhausted body miles of postcard-worthy streets each day, sizing up the impossibly fashionable women around me through a malnourished haze.
While my roommates made frittatas with the brightest, freshest produce in the world, I sat down to a small cup of penne with jarred sauce and told myself—and them—I didn’t like to cook. When we stopped by the gelato shop on the way home from class, I made that tiny cup my sustenance for the day. Delicious? Of course. Sufficient? Hardly. Most Americans gorge themselves in Italy; it’s hard not to, surrounded by fresh, preservative-free food that’s worlds away from most of our own. But with my anxiety-fueled starvation diet running rampant, I came home 20 pounds lighter instead.
I returned to the States defeated and diminished, but desperate to go back. I kept thinking of the crusty bread with olive oil fresh from the trees next door and gelato so rich it was a religious experience.
In Mediterranean culture, moderation and appreciation is the crux of living well.
Almost a decade later, I took a job leading high school trips back to Italy. The Americans I traveled with either bellied up to overflowing plates of pasta with a bottle of red wine and a loaf of bread, or sadly nibbled at a salad. But in Mediterranean culture, moderation and appreciation is the crux of living well. My Italian friends shared a sampling of first courses, followed by prudently portioned meats and pasta with a glass or two of wine, and never a mention of what it would do to their waistlines. They savor food as an essential part of la bella vita (the good life).
Around me, everyone else enjoyed life in big, gulping bites. I saw Italian women dress to leave the house as if they were stepping onto a runway, secure in their own skin—regardless of their size. Everyone from my whippet-thin neighbor to my voluptuous linguistics professor savored sitting down to the table with their families and friends. I missed that essential part of the experience in my desperation to whittle myself into an Americanized concept of femininity.
While I couldn’t get back the semester I spent hiding from food, I could teach the next wave of girls not to follow the path I’d stumbled down.
“Oh my god, I am going to get so fat,” one of the girls groaned as we ordered ice cream.
“We are eating, like, twice as much as I do at home,” another complained after dinner.
“This food is so carb heavy,” one whispered as we explored the tradition of homemade pasta.
In American culture, food and imperfect bodies are equally villainized. We’re fed the latest diet fad like a moral imperative. Thin is virtuous, strident, and strong. Fat is deviant, lazy, disgusting. Our bodies and how we feed them are tied to our standing as members of society, and these imperatives teach us we can’t disconnect our diets from our personal worth. But we are more than what we put in our mouths. We are so much bigger than our waist sizes.
We are so much bigger than our waist sizes.
“What does food mean as part of this culture?” I ask my students. They sit in silence, staring at their feet and each other, daring someone else to speak first. It’s social, someone offers. Communal. An essential part of expressing love, nourishing the spirit as well as the body.
Every summer, something exciting happens as we consciously explore the cuisine around us—not only the food itself, but the way the locals interact with it. As we watch our European counterparts dive into a plate of pasta and the aquamarine ocean with equal gusto, we stop seeing the dimples on their hips as indicative of their character. From their example, we learn to enjoy local dishes without commenting on their caloric content. And best of all, we take to the beach and the streets without pointing out a jiggle here, an extra wiggle there. We savor la bella vita, warts and all.
My former self stares back at me through the eyes of a student picking at a salad while the rest of the group chows down on plates of pasta. I offer her a bite of mine while we talk about the different ways our cultures approach food and bodies. We talk about how Italians carry themselves, and one bite at a time, we let go of our critical internal monologues.
Broken self-perceptions don’t change in the three weeks we spend in the Mediterranean, not completely. But we question the voices that tell us we’re wrong for being the size we are, the shapes that make us as different as snowflakes. By challenging them, I hope to give those students what I needed when my own negativity overwhelmed me: an alternative to the self-hate our culture shoves down our empty throats.
Welcome to GreatistYou, a new social experiment where we see what happens when five people decide to change their health—and broadcast their journeys for everyone to see. Four goals, five contestants, and six weeks to crush said goals for the promise of a better life (oh, and $1,000!).
Our contestants proved that weekends are just a few extra days to pursue greatness. Let's start with Darby and Adrienne (@greatistdanda), who used their time off to participate in a Komen Race for the Cure in Prospect Park on Saturday. As if that wasn't enough, they went back to the park the next day to train for their upcoming 10K.
After giving it their all, the Brooklynites took a much-deserved break on the roof where they took this amazing panoramic pic of their view.
