Maybe it’s the surge in hormones, or maybe the fact that I just got home from a fantastic weekend with friends, but I’m feeling sentimental enough to acknowledge the things I am thankful for in my life right now (in true Thanksgiving fashion, of course).

For one, I’m soooo grateful to have such wonderful friends in my life, especially old ones (but also new ones!) who are kind enough to put up with a cranky, jet-lagged pregnant woman and her desire to eat lots of bagels and pizza, go to bed at 8 pm and pretty much make herself at home in their apartment for days at a time. In fact, my friends are so great, that I even got a gourmet Thanksgiving meal out of this weekend, complete with sparkling apple cider and apple tart/pie for dessert. So, dear friends who know who they are, THANK YOU.

Freezing, but smiling, in Brooklyn

Secondly, I’m thankful to be celebrating the first week of my FOURTH month of pregnancy, which also marks the beginning of the second trimester for lil’Lambert! As many of you know, the second trimester is supposed to b the most enjoyable of the three, with milder symptoms and an increase in energy, appetite and sex drive. It also marks the last period of time in which I will be able to see my toes until the baby arrives. So, thanks to still fitting in my ‘normal’ clothes (and by normal, I mean the baggiest, stretchiest shirts that are long enough to cover up the fact that I can’t fully button my pants).

And finally, I’m thankful to be back from the journey to Ethiopia, which as mentioned before, quite literally sapped the life energy out of me and made me cry for my mama. Although I’m extremely grateful to have a job that gives me the opportunity to travel to distant lands and experience new cultures, this time around pushed me beyond the limit and has me contemplating permanently trading in my frequent filer miles for a comfy home office. But I know that after a few months here, I will be yearning once again to travel, and this time will plan for a little extra time to stay and visit places beyond the confines of my hotel room and laptop. So, thank you for a great job with such wonderful opportunities, and the option to have it either way.

Hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving weekend too!

The next big thing, it looks like, will be hormone replacement therapy.

Yeah! I’m surprised, too! But I’m at this point right now where testosterone is FIRED, I am done with it, and I want to get my transition on the road already. I want to be female in more than just brain, I want to be hormonally and socially (and physically, eventually) female too!

Yes. It’s been… quick. But really, I’ve spent 32 years fighting a losing battle against my female nature, and I’m tired of waiting and hiding. I’ve been crafting a little timeline, and I think a lot of coming out/transition stuff is going to happen just after the New Year. Hormones, if I can manage it, could be sooner. Cross your fingers for me.

My wife has been taking that idea surprisingly well… I think she may have some more coping to do before everything gets started, and that’s fine. If she told me to hit the pause button, I would, for as long as she needed.

In the meantime, I’m on the hunt for an endocrinologist, and my HRT letter ought to be ready very very soon.

Here’s a thing I’ve been thinking and talking with various people about: I’m not really that hairy to begin with. I have almost zero back hair and only a little bit of chest hair (which I’ve shaved obsessively for as long as I can remember). My facial hair does not grow all that quickly. It would not be surprising if it turned out that I already have a low-ish level of testosterone or a high-ish level of estrogen for a male.

If so, that would be interesting. Hormones are powerful things… and it’s a little scary to think how fully they can shape and dominate our lives.

I am in my seventh week. And technically my baby must be 5 weeks old. It’s almost 10mm in length. Well, I haven’t taken an ultrasound scan, but this fact is from books and videos.

My first antenatal appointment with my GP was lame. I expected a lot of advice from him. He didn’t say anything at all. One friend, who is in India and is pregnant like me, was advised a lot by her doctor. May be conditions are different in the UK.

I never thought I would have nausea attack. But, oh no, it has started. What exactly can you vomit in the morning –the time when you have to empty your bowels?? I am doomed. I have absolutely no taste for any food available in the UK. But I eat anyway and that too when I am too hungry. I long for Indian foods, especially all my favourite Kerala foods. Well, pregnancy is the time when I can eat without guilt.

I am concentrating more on fruits now. Kiwi fruits, apple, oranges, grapes, and banana – these are the ones that I eat without much problem. I prefer having them as juice. The pizzas, hot & spicy chicken, chicken pies, fries, crisps, cakes, everything that used to be my favourites are so not now.

I have a pregnancy journal, a blog, a daily journal and a writing pad for day by day pregnancy. Nothing’s working. I frown and sit the whole time. My upset stomach is making me dull. And I can’t eat my favourite foods. It isn’t available here.

Am I whining too much? Can’t be me. It’s the hormones.

Whatever be it, the feeling of carrying a 10mm long living thing within me….WOW…it’s just amazing. Sometimes you are more of a parasite than an essential one, but still….mmmuuaahhhh….love you dear darling baby…every moment is special and amazing. Next year this time, I will be holding a sweet, cute, tender baby in my arms. How heavenly that will be!

Magnesium is a mineral, a critical  mineral that is stored in our bones,  which provides magnesium for our nerves, muscles and cells that enable us to relax.  It was once thought that calcium was the main ingredient for optimal bone health, now it is proven that magnesium is of equal importance. For females during adolescence, low intakes of calcium and magnesium can lead to osteoporosis. Boys and girls require magnesium for bone health, hormone balance and energy. It is good for heart health as well a help relief with Premenstrual Syndrome and Tension.

Sources for Magnesium Include:  Dark leafy vegetables, nuts, sunflower seeds and cooked brown rice. Others include:

• Grapes
• Sesame Seeds
• Avacados
• Bananas
• Brown Rice
• Kale
• Spinach
• Watercress
• Alfalfa Sprouts
• Kelp
• Almonds
• Hazelnuts

Info/g.mckeith’s food bible/pg.53,92,94,105/tasteforlife/nov.09/pg25/Image/http://www.pdphoto.org/PictureDetail.php?mat=&pg=7969

What’s the matter Richard? Don’t you
like my little surprise?

With all the hormones we’ve filled you
up with, your poor little cock is just not
up to the job of pleasuring anybody
any more. So we’ll keep it tucked away
in it’s little metal cage tonight. I’ll only
be a distraction.

So, tonight you’ll be wearing this gorgeous
little dildo mask. You now have a cock
that’s even bigger than yours was when
we began your training. Ironic, don’t you
think? And a nice little cock on the other
side for you to spend the night sucking on.
All in all, it’s the perfect little training tool.

So tonight you are to facefuck anyone in
the club who demands it. Male or female.

If you don’t want to do it – say so now.
Oh yes, you can’t say anything. Perfect.
Now let’s get you to work….

From Financial Times:

In a study published on Wednesday in PLoS ONE we found that testosterone had little to do with trading skill. Traders with higher testosterone did indeed do better at this type of trading, because they took more risk. But there was no link between the hormone and their trading skills, as measured by the Sharpe ratio (of which more later). Testosterone alone was not enough.

Sex is not just good, it seems to also be good for you.  Oxytocin, endorphins, dopamine, seratonin are some of the chemicals that are hard at work when you are, well, hard and working. These things sound like illegal street drugs but you know what they say: Sex is the best medicine.

But why and how? I say don’t look a gift horse in the mouth but if you’re curious then why not.

Let’s start with prolactin and oxytocin. They are like yin and yang. Twins on the opposite sides of good and evil except I will let you decide how you wish to label them. After orgasm, prolactin levels rise sharply to counter the effects of dopamine which is responsible for sexual arousal. Meaning this is what gets your mind off of sex when your done. This is the time when the person next to you in bed doesn’t look as good as they did earlier. Prolactin may be the cause of the sexual refractory period aka “Don’t touch me”. That’s when you can’t get it up for a while and its so sensitive after orgasm its probably uncomfortable. Oxytocin is responsible for giving us great orgasms. It stimulates the prostate, sensitizes nerves and causes muscle contractions which are the main ingredients for a good orgasm. It is also known as the cuddling hormone. It is found in breast milk and helps to create a bond between child and mother, and between lovers. This is why you hold your girl after sex, or even a great BJ. You should know by know that a female needs to feel trust and calmness with someone before they can have a real orgasm and oxytocin helps that happen.

Endorphins are the body’s pain relievers. Symptoms include feelings of euphoria and pleasure, well being and relaxation. Dizziness and drowsiness can also occur. Sounds like cocaine or morphine. Endorphins are released during sex same way they are released whenever you are doing something that you find exciting.

Adrenaline is what makes your heart flutter faster when you are getting busy. Adrenaline gives you that do-all feeling, the brave heart. This causes a refractory period as well. Damn that adrenaline and prolactin.

Phenylethylamine triggers the release of dopamine which is an endorphin. Comes out during sex, peaks at orgasm.

Testosterone is the hormone that makes us want sex and gives us our aggression (Grr) and gets us suspended in sports. In men and women its whats backing our libido. Low testosterone keeps us from wanting sex.

Sex also keeps us from being depressed. You ever noticed someone just all happy and maybe even gleeful one day? They likely had sex. Or had some good oral performed on them. Serotonin is the chemical in your brain that is responsible for depression. During orgasm an extra shot is released into your brain. Keeps us content, happy and emotionally-balanced. Think about it, after sex how many people are you really mad at for the following 15 mins?

Maybe one day scientists will bottle up these chemicals or put them in pill form for us to use when we just cant get busy for whatever reason. The goal feels great but I don’t want to bypass the road to getting there.

Source:

http://www.askmen.com/dating/love_tip_250/271_love_tip.html

Follow me, so I can call the cops on you!

www.twitter.com/hittingcorners

Scientists have discovered the chemical cascades that occur when a woman is under stress, and who would have guessed that it’s very different from men and make them respond differently? LOL! And you can bet that it has an impact on your relationship and marriage.

There is an author by name of Gale Berkowitz whose work I keep running across in researching women and their behavior. She impresses me tremendously because she is thorough in her research and doesn’t interject a lot of opinion in her writing; she presents a lot of facts and when something is hypothetical she’s labels it as such, something I insist upon in this work because the stakes are too high in a troubled or failing relationship or marriage to consign anything to guesswork, theory, opinion, or anything else except solid logic based on the hard facts of vast and relevant experience.

(You can find a listing of a lot of her articles here on Google if you want to follow up).

In >an article in Melissa Kaplan’s “Chronic Neuroimmune Diseases” newsletter, Gale Berkowitz discusses research that confirms that women’s chemistry causes them to respond to stress in a very different way than we men do. She and other researchers refer to it as a “tend and befriend” response, as opposed to the more masculine “fight or flight” response.

You can refer to the original article for the full details on the chemistry, but the short version is that they have isolated a hormone called “oxytocin” that buffers the fight or flight response and causes her to tend to children and gather with other women instead.

It’s interesting to note that estrogen enhances the effects of oxytocin and testosterone diminishes it. Both genders have both estrogens and testosterone (estrogen is in fact a whole family of hormones, all of which are “metabolites,” or by-products, of the metabolization of testosterone – yes, fact is sometimes stranger than fiction!), but the balance is different. Men have more testosterone than estrogens, while women have more estrogens than testosterone.

This lays waste to a common misconception about stress-handling, and it is one that you need to be VERY aware of in your interaction with women. When a crisis arises, stress is created, and in men, the fight-or-flight response engages, and we move very quickly to eradicate the threat and neutralize the crisis. We’re biologically driven to do so.

Not so with women. They don’t just choose to sit and talk about problems instead of correcting them. They are as biologically driven to pull the kids up under their wing and have what appears to us to be a “drama fest” as we are driven to tell everybody to hide and lock the doors while we deal with the threat.

Not all threats can be immediately dispatched. You can kill a barbarian or wild bear crashing through your door, but other problems can take time, such as health or financial problems. Our method of dealing with the barbarian doesn’t work with a wife who has just found out she has breast cancer any more than calling a dozen girlfriends and talking for hours would deter a barbarian or a bear.

Consequently, fight-or-flight works best for immediate threats, while tend-and-befriend works better for long-term problems, especially with regard to stress relief. We can stress ourselves to death while feeling helpless as weeks and months of cancer treatment lag on, just as women can be stressed to death by being thrown into a situation requiring immediate action. We need closure, they need familiarity, social interaction, emotional build-up, and emotional release, THEN action if there is still any call for it.

This is another wonderful example of how understanding our differences and using them to compliment each other instead of competing with each other works to make a stronger and more intimate relationship. If you’re faced with a long-term problem, try to take it more at your wife’s pace than your own; don’t indulge in dramatizing and such, but ease up a bit on the push, handling things as they can be effectively handled instead of trying to bully everything into submission. If you’re faced with an immediate threat, don’t waste time trying to goad your wife to action.

Give her a brief period for input if she wants to give you some and then move on and eliminate the threat. Tell her that there will be time to talk after the threat is no longer bearing down on you, but for right now, since the window of opportunity to deal with the threat is so narrow, you just have to go with the best you can do at the moment and you can talk about emotions or further corrective actions later.

Cooperation, not competition, is the single most distinguishing characteristic of a successful long-term relationship of any kind, and it’s especially true in a marriage or other live-in arrangement. You’re right there in each other’s faces, and you need things to share and draw you together, not constant points of contention to tear you apart.

There are many differences that we can treat as complimentary, and others, such as opposing values, which cannot be resolved. Hence, some great relationships have problems that make them look bad, and other, utterly terrible relationships have a few redeeming features that make them look more attractive than starting over – the comfortably unhappy crowd that I talk about from time to time who will eventually split or torment each other into a wasted lifetime of misery. The difference is not always obvious, but if you’re ever going to be happy with another person, you must know it and recognize it when it confronts you. There is no other way.

To know this and everything else you need to know to fix, maintain, and enhance a good relationship with problems or end a bad relationship with dignity and as friends, go to >http://www.makingherhappy.com/ and download your copy of “THE Man’s Guide to Great Relationships and Marriage.” Life is short, so don’t spend it guessing…

In the meantime, live well, be well, and have a wonderful day!
David Cunningham

Labels: Handling Conflict, hormones, How Women Behave, Leadership

I didn’t realize how upset I was by yesterday’s test results until tonight.   My husband and son were playing on the couch, and my son inadvertently nailed DH in the nads.   DH exclaimed jokingly “Now you’re really not going to get a brother or a sister!” and my son replied “But, I want a brother or a sister!”    I just broke down in tears, those big bawling, sobbing tears….then they both stared at me.   My son doesn’t have a clue that we have been trying to give him a sibling or even the concept that this is something that we can “control”–he just knows that everyone else has one but him.   My husband just gave me a hug–he has no idea how to handle me right now, but at least he does remember that hugs help.  I feel like a hormonal disaster.    My breasts hurt, I cry at the drop of a hat, I’m cranky one minute and peppy the next…if I didn’t know any better I would say I am pregnant, but the tests say otherwise.

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving and I have so much to be thankful for–I do have one wonderful child already, a loving husband, wonderful family and friends too.   Lots of blessings.   Tomorrow I will try to focus on everything I do have and not take them for granted for a minute.

Know what bothers me about the human body usually? It’s the libido. Libido is the one thing that sets my talk apart from true anachronism. Most women ages ago were unable or too embarrassed to discuss sex and urges. Yet, I’m not. That’s one reason I started writing this, to get these things off my chest. I certainly haven’t told anyone about this blog. I write this for anonymity and relief. I like to write.

With no partner to satisfy my urges, I find that my libido veers toward preferring human contact. That means no self-service can heal what ails me. Why is there no satisfaction without someone else present? I’ve decided that sex REALLY is more than just a physical urge, it’s definitely a psychological one, too. It’s times like this when a person realizes for themselves the truth about what science and psychology have to say about women and men and their perceptions of sex. Is it true that men have no problems helping themselves as long as they can see something stimulating? Because as a woman, I can honestly say that it’s being with another person that makes the experience so gratifying. It’s one thing to know what is said about sex, it’s another to really understand for one’s self the implications of those studies. I am really learning from experience what it means when they say that women are more emotionally involved in sex.

Does that mean I fall in love with any and every person I sleep with? I doubt it. I’ve had fewer partners than I have fingers on one hand, but that’s because I prefer it that way. Of those partners, I only thought I loved two, and one of them I really did love. The other was youthful infatuation. One partner was just a friend with benefits, even though he eventually thought we had something. I never did. The last one was someone I found attractive, but I never believed I was in love with him. So, of my experiences, I suppose they’re 50-50.

That doesn’t change the fact that I’m not interested in a friend with benefits. I want a real relationship with someone I care about. I’ve found that that makes for the best sex. So, I suppose I fall into some stereotypical category about women. I think sex is best when you love someone. Sex is also awesome when you’ve not had it in quite some time. It doesn’t beat love sex, but it’s good, too. I mention this because someone asked me to be a FWB, and I can’t go along with that even if I’m craving the interaction like mad. So, I suppose this leaves me in a bad place for now. I hope it clears up soon. Unfortunately, I’m not holding my breath. I’m a bit too discriminating regarding the people to whom I give chances. That’s almost too bad for me.

I get very cross when people believe that progesterone is simply a female sex hormone – it is not just that! So can you imagine what I told my male friend when he came to me for advice about his anxiety and migraine, then turned to me and said: "I do not want to become a woman"! Progesterone is commonly thought of as a ‘female’ hormone. This is misleading, because it is essential to maintain not only health but life itself in all mammals of both sexes.

As a man gets older testosterone is converted to di-hydrotestosterone (DHT), which some believe is the cause of benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH) and cancer.

Estrogen levels also increase as a man gets older. Estrogen is known to stimulate cell growth. Reading between the lines, because there is still no definitive study on this, it seems the increased estrogen levels are the problem and not the two testosterone. Since progesterone is a powerful counterweight to the estrogen, progesterone for men is crucial.

If testosterone was indeed the culprit, because men aged 22 ± would have the highest incidence of BPH and cancer, as testosterone levels are at their highest point in the early 20s, but of course they do not. From the early twenty’s to late twenty’s testosterone makes the largest decrease, then it continues to fall but at a slower pace.

Progesterone also down regulates the effect of estrogen when used in a high enough dose. Endogenous estrogen, as people are now supplemented with synthetic estrogens found in the environment. They are now found in food, air, water, plastic, skin care products, no one can avoid them. Some authorities speculate that the reason for the increase in problems such as hyperplasia or cancer of any related hormone-sensitive tissues such as prostate, endometrium, cervix and breast. So despite the often wrongly conceived as a ‘female’ hormone progesterone for men is important to maintain masculinity!

Well I’m sick again folks. I’m sick again and I’m really not taking it well. This is my fourth bad cold in two months. That means I’ve been sick for about half of the last two months. Coupled with the fact that I can’t take ANYTHING to make myself feel better and you might have an inkling of where I’m at right now.

I’m sick and I’m feeling pretty down. The anxiety of the past month is finally calming into a low-grade depression. I guess this is how it works. I let myself get all worked up with my worries about losing this pregnancy and then when I’m finally too exhausted my anxiety subsides slightly and I just feel down. I’m very disappointed in this new turn of events because a dream I had the other night had actually been making me feel better, or so I thought.

It will probably be surprising that this dream would make me feel better but it did. It was a very short dream, I was driving in a car and I suddenly looked up and their was a giant garbage truck in our path. We were barreling towards it with no hope of avoiding the onslaught. It was then that I woke up. I don’t remember feeling fear or panic, and as I woke up I had the strong feeling that the dream was my subconscious trying to tell me something. It was trying to remind me of how much more than this pregnancy I could lose, of how much I have that I mustn’t take for granted. I’m sure it could seem morbid, but I felt like that dream really calmed me. It was a way to put things into perspective.

Last night I was home alone. Again. I was supposed to be getting grading done and making progress on grad school work but instead I was parked on the couch, just like the day before. I’m realizing now that I couldn’t get myself to do anything Monday because I was already starting to feel sick again. By Tuesday, I was definitely coming down with another brutal cold, not even a week after my last one. I felt so frustrated that I wasn’t getting work done and that I felt sick again. I also was bored and annoyed. Mi.Vida was out with friends having dinner for the second time in a week. I probably wouldn’t have gone anyway because I want to give him time with his friends without me, but knowing I couldn’t set anything up myself was so frustrating. The reality, I wouldn’t have had anyone to call anyway.

I have almost no support network at this point. I don’t have many friends up here and of the ones I do, none understand this step I’ve taken in my life, at least not yet. Being only 10.5 weeks the rest of the world still doesn’t acknowledge that I’m even pregnant so I can’t yet join groups specifically for pregnant woman. It’s even too early to go to prenatal yoga, as all those women are much farther along in their pregnancies. I feel very isolated and alone. Very few people at my work know that I’m pregnant so I can’t share anything about it there. The friends that do know don’t really have anything to say about it. Therapy has been on and off because of my colds and now my therapist’s flu. Poor Mi.Vida ends up taking the brunt of my emotional mess because I don’t have anyone else to talk to about it. It is definitely starting to take it’s toll on him.

My hormones are raging out of control. Lame commercials make me tear up, and TV shows send me sobbing. If simple television can do that to me, imagine what my self-loathing about not getting grad school work done, or letting my house fall to pieces makes me feel like! I’m an emotional mess to be sure. I’m unhappy a lot of the time and I can’t seem to find any kind of balance. I am sure that grad school is a huge contributor to my inability to cope, but I feel like I need to keep taking classes before the baby’s born, or I will never get it all finished. Also, the time commitment of grad school keeps me from doing things like yoga or meditation that would help me cope better with what I’m feeling.

I keep telling myself (and Mi.Vida) that it will get better. The first trimester is hard for a lot of people, especially those with anxiety issues who have lost a previous pregnancy. Once I’ve graduated to a safer place and I start to show and I can tell people and the world recognizes me for what I am, and all the books out there actually apply to me and I’m not stuck in this limbo where I’m affected inwardly by my pregnancy to an enormous degree, but it is acknowledged outwardly only minimally, then things will get better.

Mi.Vida doesn’t feel so sure. He says that before trying was so hard and then trying was even worse. He doesn’t think that historical trends warrant an assumption that things will improve over time. I feel like that puts a lot of pressure on me and takes away hope. But who knows, maybe his realism is the proper course. Hell, maybe he’s right and it’s only going to stay bad, or god forbid, get worse.

So that is where I am right now. I’m supposed to be elated that I’m finally pregnant and I’m squandering it feeling miserable. I can’t express the guilt I feel about that. I truly thought that once I was pregnant I’d be elated, but this first trimester has been so much harder than I had anticipated. It’s such a strange time because you’re body is going through such enormous changes, you feels exhausted and vomity and every minute you’re reminded that you’re pregnant and yet almost nobody knows, and those who do treat it tenuously because it is a tenuous reality, at best. There is very little written on the first trimester and fewer (if no) support groups available to help you navigate it. The general message is, It’s hard, you change a lot, most people don’t tell anyone because you could miscarry but don’t worry about miscarrying because everything will probably fine. See you in trimester two when people give a shit! I’m sorry if that seems intense or unfair, but it’s kind of where I am right now.

I really must go and write my grad school paper. Squeaks is presently meandering very close to the keyboard so I must persuade her to hunt elsewhere as I end this post. I hope you all have a very happy Thanksgiving tomorrow.

BUENAS NOTICIAS – I don’t have work today and I’m meeting up with my sister and Mi.Vida downtown for lunch. I hope it’s stress free because Mi.Vida and I desperately need something to be stress free right now.

People in recovery may be returning to a relationship or trying to rediscover the passion of earlier times. This article from Readers Digest may be of help.

You and your partner can rediscover intimacy and pleasure with these tips.…

Note: Cross posted from Recovery Is Sexy.com.

Permalink

What is a drink?

A standard drink is:

One 12-ounce bottle of beer or wine cooler

One 5-ounce glass of wine

1.5 ounces of 80-proof distilled spirits

Keep in mind that the alcohol content of different types of beer, wine, and distilled spirits can vary quite substantially.

Alcohol presents yet another health challenge for women. Even in small amounts, alcohol affects women differently than men. In some ways, heavy drinking is much more risky for women than it is for men.

With any health issue, accurate information is key. There are times and ways to drink that are safer than others. Every woman is different. No amount of drinking is 100 percent safe, 100 percent of the time, for every woman. With this in mind, it’s important to know how alcohol can affect a woman’s health and safety.

Sixty percent of U.S. women have at least one drink a year. Among women who drink, 13 percent have more than seven drinks per week.

For women, this level of drinking is above the recommended limits published in the Dietary Guidelines for Americans, which are issued jointly by the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. 

The Dietary Guidelines define moderate drinking as no more than one drink a day for women and no more than two drinks a day for men.

The Dietary Guidelines point out that drinking more than one drink per day for women can increase the risk for motor vehicle crashes, other injuries, high blood pressure, stroke, violence, suicide, and certain types of cancer.

Some people should not drink at all, including:

• Anyone under age 21
• People of any age who are unable to restrict their drinking to moderate levels
• Women who may become pregnant or who are pregnant
• People who plan to drive, operate machinery, or take part in other activities that require attention, skill, or coordination
• People taking prescription or over-the-counter medications that can interact with alcohol.

Why are lower levels of drinking recommended for women than for men? Because women are at greater risk than men for developing alcohol-related problems. Alcohol passes through the digestive tract and is dispersed in the water in the body. The more water available, the more diluted the alcohol. As a rule, men weigh more than women, and, pound for pound, women have less water in their bodies than men. Therefore, a woman’s brain and other organs are exposed to more alcohol and to more of the toxic byproducts that result when the body breaks down and eliminates alcohol

The Chicago Tribune (http://tinyurl.com/autism-alternatives 11/23, Tsouderos, Callahan) reports, “Thousands of US children undergo” alternative “therapies…at the urging of physicians who say they can successfully treat” some “children with autism.” However, “after reviewing…scientific studies and interviewing top researchers in the field, the Tribune found that many of these treatments amount to uncontrolled experiments on vulnerable children.” Some therapies include vitamin and supplement regimens, oxygen chambers, hormones, and even “chelation,” even though “last year, the National Institutes of Health halted a controversial government-funded study of chelation before a single child with autism was treated” after finding that “rats without lead poisoning showed signs of cognitive damage after being treated with a chelator.”

A(nother!) friend of mine was recently (and tentatively) diagnosed with PCOS.  I was just talking to her sister and realized that, of our group of eight women – we get together once a month for a girls’ night potluck – 50% of us have PCOS!!!  That is INSANE!  So of course, I immediately hit up Google, which claims that the number is more like 5-10%.  So what’s going on here?? 

I have long maintained that hormone disorders like this are due, in large part, to the hormones added to our milk, meat, etc.  For this reason, I try hard to buy only organic meat, dairy, and vegetables…although, sometimes my wallet precludes complete adherence to that rule.  But one thing I know for sure, my kids (and me, once I’m pregnant) will be eating ONLY organic.  I know, I’ll be the mom all of the kids hate, but I’m willing to sacrifice popularity.   Or else I’ll get very good at tricking them!

But seriously, this is SCARY!  And so much more serious, medically, than *just* not being able to get pregnant.  To my readers, how many people do you know with PCOS?  And has anybody heard anything definitive about causes???

(P.S. For those just diagnosed, check out my Resources bloglist to the right).