health

by Nina Dahlia by Melina Meza It has only struck me recently that while we�ve written about what aging is and the many ways yoga can help foster healthy aging, we�ve never really addressed what �healthy aging� is. So I thought I�d take a moment to give an overview of the thoughts that Baxter and I currently have on this topic. At this point�we�re still just discussing these ideas�we consider healthy aging to have three important aspects: Compressed Morbidity Independence Equanimity And the reason why we�re such proponents of yoga for healthy aging is that we believe yoga can help with all three of these aspects of healthy aging. For now, I�ll just give you a brief overview of how. Compressed Morbidity. Last week I wrote a post Longevity vs. Morbidity comparing the difference between longevity and morbidity. The medical term �morbidity� refers to the period of time you spend in ill health before you die. Obviously we all would like�both for ourselves and for our loved ones�to keep thi...

This week�s question is a follow-up question that came in after the post we did on yoga and knee replacements (see Knee Replacements and Yoga ) and Shari's answer to another reader about pain after a total knee replacement (see Friday Q&A: Pain After a Total Knee Replacement ). It seems that pain isn't uncommon after a knee replacement, but in this case, the pain is coming several years after the replacement: Q: My partial knee replacement was April 2007. I started back to Yoga this past summer-one day a week, but I found child pose with the knees wide uncomfortable, but I did do it for a few weeks this fall. I now have some pain in my knee and I'm hoping that I haven�t loosed the cement in the joint. Any help would be appreciated. A: Thanks for writing in about this new pain in your knee. As always, I am not able to diagnose or prescribe a yoga program for you without first doing a more detailed history and physical exam in person, but I can share some thoughts that co...

by Nina Kale by Melina Meza The other day Baxter and I were talking with an editor about a possible book on Yoga for Healthy Aging�isn�t that exciting?�when he said something about healthy aging that really struck me. We were going through the possible definitions of "healthy aging" (look for a post on that topic from me soon) when he mentioned that for a lot of his students, healthy aging meant being able to continue to do the activities they loved. Some examples he gave included a woman who wanted to be able to take her grandchildren on hiking adventures and another who wanted to be able to continue with her intensive gardening work. What's so great about yoga is that a regular yoga asana practice can help with these goals for healthy aging. You can use your yoga practice both to fortify yourself and balance your body to keep yourself in shape to continue doing what you love. Let�s take the example of gardening because that�s something I do a lot myself. Gardening can a...

by Ram Jelly Fish by Melina Meza It is difficult to live in complete isolation. We all need the support of other people around us to survive. So we develop relationships with others whether on a personal, professional, or commercial level. Thus, interpersonal relationships have a critical role to play in our lives. In order to lead a happy, smooth life, an individual must have healthy relationships with others around him. In other words, the secret to a happy life is a healthy relationship. We all have a natural drive toward establishing relationships and in these relationships we long for acceptance. A healthy relationship is one in which all the individuals feel that they matter. A healthy relationship is characterized by: harmony among all individuals a natural desire to foster additional relationships an effective and harmonious communication between individuals in the relationship a tendency to be patient with or tolerant of the opinions or practices of others increased sense of b...

by Baxter The posterior aspect of the rectum exposed by removing the lower part of the sacrum and the coccyx I received this email a while back, and at first I thought someone was pulling my leg! "I have a family member who was recently diagnosed with Proctalgia fugax. I was wondering if you could tell me if there are any ways that yoga can support preventing and dealing with flare ups of this." You see, because "proctalgia fuguax" means pain in the rectal area, I read this as �I have a family member who is a pain in the rear�.� But then I realized it was not �is� but �has�! Proctalgia fugax (PF) is a condition of pain in the rectal area that you might not think is super common (there might be some reluctance for many patients to come forward with the condition due to embarrassment) but it turns out the prevalence ranges from 6-18% of the population of the developed world. And a very unwelcome guest it is when someone develops it. The presence of pain in the rectal ...

by Nina   Ice by Philip Amdal �Stated succinctly, lower mortality is being replaced by higher morbidity (ill health).� �Daniel Lieberman, from The Story of the Human Body For some time now I�ve been meaning to write about the difference between longevity (the number of years you live) and morbidity (the number of years you spend in ill health). I think it�s an important topic because morbidity, not longevity, is the issue we�re trying to address here on this blog. I�ve definitely had people challenge me about the longevity issue, saying for example, that if overweight people live just as long as thinner people, what�s the problem? Well, the answer is that the number of years you live is not the whole story. It�s also important to consider what your quality of life might be during your lifetime, especially your later years. �As more people are living longer and fewer are dying young from diseases caused by infections or insufficient food, exponentially more middle-aged and elderly p...

Hello everybody. During the past month I received more than 150 questions which PRODUCT is the best for a quick weight loss that will also help you get rid of fat easy. After I started writing everybody, I understood that it's a difficult and slow process to answer everybody's questions (*Please excuse me for this!), I decided to do a deep investigation and read a lot of forums and reviews about top 5 weight loss supplements . The result was clear. More than 89% of people had chosen Fat Loss Factor ... My first question to them was WHY? It was not a surprise that the most common answer was something like "Because it is REALLY working!". So, I decided to post this information here and I would be happy if I managed to help people choose the best weight loss product for them. (Excuse me again that I ignored some of the emails, but I am sure I just gave you an answer here!). I almost forgot. One of the answers was NOT text, but a picture that describes the weight loss...