Feelgood 13-04-2012

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GOOD CATCHWe taste fish cakesto rate the best: 12

NO EXCUSEYour willpower is like amuscle – just flex it: 4, 5

TOP NOTEUse your voice to loseyour inhibitions: 6

FeelgoodFeelgoodFeelgoodFriday, April 13, 2012

How beauty and brainscan work for women: 8, 9

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FRIDAY, APRIL 13, 2012

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Feelgood

HEALTH NOTES

Kate O’Reilly

WHAT’S ON

www.irishexaminer.com www.irishexaminer.comFeelgoodMag FeelgoodMag www.irishexaminer.com [email protected] Editorial: 021 4802 292 Advertising: 021 4802 265

News front

BABY SURPRISE: Most pregnant womendon’t want to know sex of baby, according tonew research. Picture: iStock

Seven out of 10 pregnant women wouldrather not know the sex of their baby untilit’s born, according to a survey of 100 expec-tant mums. The research was conducted bythe organisers of the SMA Know How Preg-nancy & Baby Fair, which is at the RDS,Dublin, this weekend — Apr 14 and 15 —and at Cork City Hall on Apr 21 and 22(10am-6pm daily). The survey found thatover eight in 10 expectant mums had plannedtheir pregnancy and about the same numbersaid they would be returning to workpost-pregnancy. Tickets to the fair cost €10per adult and are available on www.ticket-master.ie. For more on the event — whichfeatures shopping, expert advice, professionalservices and entertainment — visitwww.pregnancyandbabyfair.ie.

With its 1 in 1,000 campaign, the Cystic Fibro-sis Association of Ireland (CFAI) aims to getover 1,000 women participating in the 2012Flora Women’s Mini Marathon on Jun 4. The1,000 runners will aim to raise €200,000 forvital isolation beds and new treatment centresin Dublin, Limerick, Drogheda and Castlebar.Among celebrities running for CFAI in June areHorse Outside star Madeline Mulqueen, TV3’sKaren Koster and 2011 Rose of Tralee TaraTalbot. To join the campaign, email [email protected] or Lo Call 1890 311 211. Regis-tration for the Flora Women’s Mini Marathonends on Fri, Apr 20.

One in five people report having troublesleeping and 15% suffer from bad dreams,according to a UK ‘dream survey’. And surveyauthor Professor Richard Wiseman is on amission to help people have sweet dreams.The University of Hertfordshire-based psy-chologist is set to conduct the world’s firstmass dream experiment, which will see himtry to manipulate specific dreams in people.Using a free smartphone application, Dream:ON, trial participants will get a chance to im-prove and even influence the type of dreamthey have. Once the experiment’s underway,Wiseman expects to collect thousands of dailydream reports and use the feedback to see if

it’s possible to give people sweet dreams.

Women with type 2 diabetes or who areobese could have a higher chance of havinga child with autism or another developmentaldisability, according to a US study. The studyfollowed 1,000 two to five-year-olds and theirmums for seven years and found that justover 9% of children of mothers with type 2diabetes had autism, while over 11% ap-peared to have a developmental disability.The researchers believe high glucose levelsduring pregnancy may affect foetal braindevelopment. However, experts urge againstalarm, insisting more research is needed be-fore a definite link can be established.

Taller women, as well as those who areobese, run a slightly higher risk of gettingovarian cancer, say Oxford University-basedresearchers. The review of 47 epidemiolog-ical studies in 14 countries found that ashorter woman will have a lifetime risk ofabout 16-in-1000 of developing the cancer— this increases to 20-in-1000 for a tallerwoman.“A similar difference in absolute risk

would be seen when comparing a slimwoman with a body mass index of 20 to aslightly overweight woman with a bodymass index of 30,” said a spokesperson.

Helen O’Callaghan

■ ROCK NIGHT: A Rock Night will be heldin aid of Féileacáin (Stillbirth and NeonatalDeath Association of Ireland), featuring upand coming Irish bands-Grounds ForDivorce, The Cedar Sound and The BlackStalks at An Cruiscin Lan, Douglas St,Cork, tomorrow night from 8pm. Tickets€10 from [email protected]■ COMMUNICATION COURSE: EffectiveCommunication for Better Relationships isan eight-week (20-hour) course, open tomen and women, run by SHEP (TheSocial & Health Education Project). It willbe held in SHEP, Ballincollig on Tuesdaynights, from 7.30 to 10pm, from Apr 17.The cost is €50 (or €25 unwaged). Forfurther information phone 021-4666180.■ DIABETES PROGRAMME: The HSECommunity Dietitian for Carrigaline/Pas-sage West and surrounding areas will berunning a free group education pro-gramme for people with type 2 diabetes inCarrigaline starting on Tuesday, May 22.The X-PERT programme is a six-week (2½hours a week) interactive programmewhich aims to provide patients with theknowledge, skills and confidence to man-age their condition. Further programmeswill take place in locations throughoutCork and Kerry during 2012. To find outmore contact the Health PromotionDepartment in Cork at 021-4921641.■ MINDING THE MIND: St John of GodHospital’s popular free public lectureseries Minding the Mind will run from Apr16 to May 28 this year. The series will in-clude talks on physical exercise and theimpact it can have on mood and stresslevels; the importance of sleep, eating dis-orders and adolescent drinking. Next Mon-day’s lecture Psychological Wellbeing:‘Bad’ Emotions are Good for You, will begiven by Dr Colin Gallagher, clinical psy-chologist, Saint John of God Hospital atthe hospital campus on Stillorgan Rd from8 to 9.30pm. More information and direc-tions at www.sjoghosp.ie■ CANCER MARATHON: Three membersof Cork’s primary oncology team will par-ticipate in the 26 mile Marathon De Parison Apr 15 in memory of cancer researchpioneer, the late Professor Gerry O’Sulli-van. The money raised by the team will gotowards a new memorial fund that hasbeen set up in Professor O’ Sullivan’sname, which will finance the creation oftwo fellowships at the Cork CancerResearch Centre.If you wish to support this initiative you

can sponsor Dr Seamus O’Reilly, JodieBattley or Alan O’Shea at www.mychari-ty.ie/event/_marathon_in_memory_of_pro-fessor_gerry_osullivan/ For further informa-tion contact Breakthrough Cancer Re-search on www.breakthroughcancerre-search.ie■ ACTIVE RETIREMENT: A fashion showwhere all the models are aged 55-plus; acookery demo by celebrity chef KevinDundon; and a health section providingfree checks, advice and talks are justsome of what’s on offer at the Trade andTourism Show organised by Active Retire-ment Ireland (ARI). The show will takeplace at the Citywest Hotel, Saggart, CoDublin, on Tuesday, Apr 17 from 12 to6pm, and entry is free. There will be morethan 70 exhibitors, covering tourism andheritage organisations, leisure facilities,the hospitality industry and active ageinggroups. Further information is available atwww.activeirl.ie or by calling 01-8733836.● Items for inclusion in this column canbe sent to [email protected]

Babies fed solely on shop-bought foods may be found lacking insome vital nutrients, Arlene Harris reports

Missing outBABY FIRST:Reportsuggestssome babyfood can beseverelylacking inminerals andvitamins.Picture: ThinkStock

L IFE can be pretty hectic for newparents — the constant scheduleof feeding, changing, bathing and

sleeping can leave even the most organisedpeople feeling flustered.But while many busy parents relish the

convenience of using shop-bought babyfood instead of preparing separate meals fortheir infant, a new report claims that babiesfed solely on this diet are missing out onvital nutrients and minerals.Researchers from the University of

Greenwich analysed a selection of the lead-ing brands and found that many of themeals were severely lacking, with somemeals providing only 3% of the calciumnecessary for a growing baby, and on aver-age the meat-based meals contained lessthan a fifth of the required mineral levels.Quoted in the journal Food Chemistry,

lead researcher, Dr Nazanin Zand said:“Babies have limited capacity to eat,therefore it is crucial that their foods are asnutrient dense as possible”.But Dr Roslyn Tarrant, clinical paediatric

and research dietician at Our Lady’s Chil-dren’s Hospital, Crumlin, says it is impor-tant that not all prepared baby food is tarredwith the same brush.“I don’t agree that ‘all’ commercial baby

foods have a low nutrient value, it dependson the type of product and brand being re-ferred to,” she says. “Many baby foods arefortified with nutrients but it is very brand

and product-specific. Also, an infant ortoddler’s nutrient intake over a 24-hourperiod is based on total food consumptionduring that time — so focusing on thenutrient intake of one particular food is notrepresentative of their total 24-hourlynutrient intake.”“For some parents, particularly for busy

mums, commercially-prepared baby foodsare an easy and convenient way of feedinginfants and provide an additional option ifhome-made meals cannot be prepared.“But complete dependence on

shop-bought foods for infants is not recom-mended for several reasons — it’s alwaysbest to have control over what is going intoa meal, so home-cooking prepares the

toddler for proper family meals, she adds.”Daniel McCartney of INDI (Irish Nutri-

tion and Dietetic Institute) agrees and sayswhile pre-prepared baby food is not alwaysa bad option parents should try to feedchildren with home-made meals if possible.“Obviously not all baby food products are

covered in this study so it wouldn’t be ac-curate to say that it applies to all,” he says.“But while some products are very nutri-tious for babies, in an ideal world it is bet-ter to use home made food where possible.”The meals don’t have to be elaborate or

difficult to prepare, he says.

● For more dietary information visitwww.indi.ie

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FRIDAY, APRIL 13, 2012Feelgood

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THE SHAPE I'M IN Neil Delamere

In profile

Loyalty first

SWEET TOOTH: Neil Delamere has a fondnessfor chocolate.

COMEDIAN Neil Delamere used to be asoftware engineer before he decided to quitand do stand-up. It’s why the Offaly funny

man — best known for presenting Republic of Telly andfor his appearances on RTE’s The Panel and BBC’s TheBlame Game — really appreciates loyalty in friends andfamily.“When I gave up the day job, my family were great.

My brother let me stay with him in Dublin and I didn’thave a car so my mother gave me a loan of hers to go togigs. My friend lives in Nottingham and I used to goover to do gigs. I was only earning a minimal amount ofmoney so I couldn’t afford hotels. I used to sleep on hisfloor and he’d cook me dinner. Neil says he has learnedmost about healthy living from his girlfriend, who hasstudied exercise and physiology, and his sister-in-law,who’s a physiotherapist.● Neil Delamere performs his new show, Restructuring,in Cork Opera House tonight and in The Maritime Ho-tel, Bantry, on Saturday, Apr 28. For further info, visitwww.neildelamere.com.

What shape are you in?I’m in better shape than I’ve been for a while. I just didthe 5k run with Ray D’Arcy and I didn’t lose the liningof my stomach. I’ve been running a bit since Christmas.And I’m finally doing what women do all the time —looking at the back of packets to see what I’m eating.

Do you have any health concerns?There’s nothing genetic to concern me. My aunt anduncle got Type 2 diabetes when they got older so in 30or 40 years I might be looking out for that.

What are your healthiest eating habits?I don’t really snack that much and I’m beginning tocook for myself a bit more than I used to. I don’t eat any-thing if I don’t know what’s in it. I’m trying to increasethe amount of green in my diet, but I’m not one of thosepeople who gets up in the morning and creates a beauti-ful salad — I just buy it for convenience.

What’s your guiltiest pleasure?I love chocolate. If I had to give up chocolate or boozein the morning, I’d give up the alcohol. In that way, Ihave much more in common with my female friends.Raisin and biscuit Yorkie is my tipple of choice.

What would keep you awake at night?The irregularity of the life I lead. I get back late atnight from gigs and, if I have to be up early next morn-ing for a radio interview or photo shoot, I know I haveto get to sleep immediately and I just can’t.

How do you relax?I mostly work weekends, so Mondays are my ‘week-end’. I do nothing but read the papers. I play indoorfootball on Monday nights and I’ve been doing it andmeeting up with the same group of lads for I don’t knowhow many years. That lets me blow off steam.

Who would you invite to your dream dinner party?I’d invite Stephen Fry. He’d be an excellent dinnerguest because he knows everything about everything —he’s very urbane, erudite and sophisticated. I’d ask Gandhibecause he wouldn’t eat a lot so we could probably get anextra few at the table. To balance out Gandhi, I’d inviteElvis because he’d eat Gandhi’s share and be massivelyentertaining. And I’d ask Jesus, Muhammad Ali andEddie Hobbs.

What’s your favourite smell?My dad used to smoke Velvan Plug tobacco. It wouldcome in a square and he’d cut it himself. It was like alittle ritual. It was like cutting cheese and he’d break itdown in his hand. It’d release a wonderful aroma.

What would you change about your appearance?

I’d pick the ability to tan easily. Half my family tans andthe other half doesn’t. Freckles explode when the tempera-ture’s anything above 19 degrees Celsius. On beaches, yousee Grecian gods and goddesses. And then you see the Irish— if they’re sensible — huddled under umbrellas on dayone of their holiday. And if they’re not, you see themwalking around on day two, looking like they’ve beentasered.

When did you last cry?I don’t cry easily. I’m very much a typical repressed Irishmale that way. Last time was probably the weekendPrincess Diana died because that was the same weekendOffaly lost to Mayo in the Senior All-Ireland footballsemi-final. We’d just won the Leinster final for the firsttime in 15 years.

What trait do you least like in others?Disloyalty is a particularly abhorrent trait. When you getto a certain age you rely on friends a great deal and theyrely on you. One of the most important things is to knowthat certain people will be there for you.

What trait do you least like in yourself?I’m far too impatient. I don’t do road rage, but I shout atpeople from my own little bubble. I’m quick to becomeimpatient, but I’m also quick to regain my composure.

Do you pray?No, not really. I think prayer can be very useful for peo-ple though. I’ve read about studies that show repetition ofsomething has a very calming effect, whether you believethe words are really going to the Almighty or not.

What would cheer up your day?I would defy anyone not to be immediately cheered, atleast momentarily, by the unconditional joy and affectionwith which a dog greets you.

Helen O’Callaghan

>

ACT Now IrelandCould help you START LIVINGthe life you really want,NOW!

To book your place call 087 1850411or email [email protected]

For more information visit www.actnowireland.com

ARE YOU FEELING...Stressed? Overwhelmed? Stuck in a rut?

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6 Week from Tues 24th April 6.30pm - 8.30pmEnnismore Retreat Centre, Montenotte, Cork

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HEALTH &LIFESTYLEADVERTISINGTarget more femalesin Munster and Corkthan any otherdaily newspaper.

To reach them,advertise in ‘Feelgood’.

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Feelgood Feelgood

Taking advice

The first step in self-control, say theWillpower authors, Baumeister and Tier-ney, is to set clear, attainable goals. Makea plan, including specifics of time, placeand opportunity, so as to avoid the phe-nomenon of monkey mind — where yourmind, with a dozen things to do, keepsleaping from one to the other. “When youhave several deadlines, make a plan fordealing with each so you don’t get intru-sive thoughts while working on one. Theunconscious mind is shaped to say ‘youhaven’t done this’ — having a plan seemsto satisfy it,” Baumeister tells Feelgood.The authors urge getting active with the

plan. Decide what’s the specific Next Ac-tion (NA) for each project. Instead of jot-ting down a vague ‘do taxes’ or ‘write re-port’, put the NA — ‘call accountant’, ‘getfeedback from particular work colleague’.Baumeister and Tierney refer to Getting

Things Done: The Art Of Stress-Free Pro-ductivity, a book by David Allen, who —when it comes to work — is a fan of thefour Ds: do it, delegate it, defer it or dropit. From Allen, the authors also picked upthe Two-Minute rule — if something willtake less than two minutes don’t put it ona list. Do it and immediately get rid of it.Exercising self-control in one area of life

seems to improve other areas, saysBaumeister, who conducted experimentsthat showed students scored higher onself-control tests after they’d been told —and took on board — to improve theirposture over a two-week period. Andother exercises work just as well, such asusing your non-dominant hand for routinetasks or changing your speech habits byspeaking only in complete sentences orsaying ‘yes’ and ‘no’ instead of ‘yeah’and ‘nah’. Baumeister suggests any ofthese techniques should improve yourwillpower and be a good warm-up fortackling a bigger challenge, such as stick-ing to your work budget, filing that report— and getting to your desk by 8.30am.

Procrastinationcan

occasionally bepositive.

If something istempting youfrom getting

down to work,like the zanyphotos your

friends has justposted on

Facebook, use apostponement

strategy

YOUR intentions for today weregood – a grand plan to be at thedesk at 8.30am because of a

looming deadline. Instead, you hit snoozefour times, bypass the porridge for the coco-pops, postpone your shower ’til lunch-time(you work from home) and finally show upin the office half an hour later than planned.With your willpower floundering on the

floor, you decide to ease into the day bychecking Facebook, responding to emails andgoogling the new series of Mad Men. Anhour later you’vedone nothing toappease that dead-line.It could be dif-

ferent, say RoyBaumeister andJohn Tierney,authors of Willpow-er, RediscoveringOur GreatestStrength. Baumeis-ter – head of thePsychology pro-gramme at FloridaState University –and Tierney, whowrites a sciencecolumn for TheNew York Times,believe willpoweris like a musclethat can be strengthened and that it requiresand uses up energy.One of the proofs for this, says Baumeister,

comes from a lab experiment he conductedinvolving students, a plate of chocolate chipcookies and a bowl of radishes. The group ofstudents allowed to eat cookies — whotherefore didn’t have to use any willpower toresist temptation — afterwards worked for 20minutes on a set of impossibly difficult geom-etry puzzles, whereas the group who’d beenoffered only radishes (and had to exert lots ofwillpower to avoid being tempted by thecookies their colleagues were eating) workedfor just eight minutes on the same puzzles.“They’d successfully resisted the temptation

of the cookies but the effort left them withless energy to tackle the puzzles,” say the au-thors, who argue that your body sends yousigns when it’s not primed for self-control.“If you’d like some advance warning of

trouble, look out for an overall change in theintensity of your feelings,” they say. Changessuch as finding yourself “especially botheredby frustrating events or saddened by unpleas-ant thoughts or even happier about goodnews”. With your brain’s circuits not control-ling emotion as well as usual, willpower is di-minished, they argue. Maybe not a good timefor that tête-à-tête with a difficult colleagueabout the project you’re both working on.Baumeister and Tierney also say that

self-control has a physical basis and is dramat-ically affected by everyday things, like eatingand sleeping, to the point where a life-chang-ing decision may go in a different directiondepending on whether it’s made before or af-ter lunch. To maintain steady self-control andgood willpower, they advise eating foods thatconvert slowly into glucose in the body (low

glycaemic), such as vegetables, nuts (peanuts,cashews), raw fruits (apple, blueberry, pear),cheese, fish, meat, olive oil and other ‘good’fats. Baumeister points out that it takes 15 to20 minutes after eating for energy to revive –so it’s best to schedule that budget meetingwith your boss for half an hour post lunch.Nor is it a good idea to tough it out and

go to work when you’re battling flu or other-wise unwell. Driving with a bad cold hasbeen found to be even more dangerous thandriving when mildly intoxicated, saysBaumeister. “Your immune system is using so

much of your glucose to fight the cold thatthere’s not enough left for the brain. If you’retoo glucose-deprived to do something as sim-ple as driving a car, how much use are yougoing to be in the office? If you simply can’tmiss a meeting at work, try to avoid any top-ics that will strain your self-control. If there’sa make-or-break project under your supervi-sion, don’t make any irrevocable decisions.“If you start to feel sick, the most efficient

thing is often to go to bed for 24 hours andlet your immune system work rather thankeeping going and working at an impaired

level.”Pointing out that adults routinely short-

change themselves on sleep — resulting intheir having less self-control at their disposal— Baumeister cites a study that found work-ers who weren’t getting enough sleep weremore prone to engage in unethical conducton the job.The radish and chocolate chip experiment

put the kybosh on the notion that we useone reservoir of self-control for work, anoth-er for dieting and another for being nice toour family, says Baumeister. “Two unrelated

activities — resisting chocolate and workingon geometry puzzles — drew on the samesource of energy. You use the same supplyof willpower to deal with frustrating traffic,annoying colleagues, demanding bosses andpouting children. Resisting dessert at lunchleaves you with less willpower to praise yourboss’s awful haircut.”

● Willpower, Rediscovering Our GreatestStrength by Roy Baumeister and John Tier-ney, €27.20.

WILLPOWER GURU:Roy Baumeister:self-control is affectedby everyday things.

Just get down and do it!Helen O’Callaghandiscovers your willpower islike a muscle that uses upenergy and that you canstrengthen it with practice

Here are some tips for increasing willpowerat work, courtesy of authors Roy Baumeisterand John Tierney:■ If making a to-do list sounds off-putting,think of it as a to-don’t list — things youdon’t have to worry about because you’vewritten them down. You can’t banish unfin-ished tasks from your mind by putting offdoing them or by willing yourself to forgetthem but making a specific plan will pacifyyour unconscious. Remember to plan thespecific Next Action (NA): what to do, whoto contact, how to do it (in person, byphone or email?)■ Environmental cues can boost or erodewillpower. Use some of your willpower mak-ing your surroundings neat and orderly.People exert less self-control after seeing amessy rather than a clean desk or room, orwhen using a sloppy rather than a neat,well-organised website.■ Avoid making binding decisions whenwillpower’s depleted and energy’s down —you’ll tend to go for options with short-termgains and delayed costs. To avoid giving in-to irrational biases and lazy shortcuts, artic-ulate your reasons for your decision andthink about whether they make sense.■ When budgeting your time don’t givedrudgery more than its necessary share.Work expands to fit time available, so set afirm time limit for tedious tasks.■ Procrastinators rarely sit doing nothing atall. They typically avoid the task they’remeant to be doing by doing something else.Beat this by using the Nothing Alternativetool — set aside time to do one thing andone thing only.■ Resolve to start your day with an hour de-voted to your most important goal. You havetwo choices: to get stuck into this most im-portant goal or to do nothing at all. With thelatter option, boredom sets in and you’ll turnto your priority goal.■ Procrastination can occasionally be posi-tive. If something’s distracting you from get-ting down to work — like the zany photosyour friends has just posted on Facebook —use a postponement strategy. Say ‘I’ll lookat those in half an hour, after I’ve got startedon the work project’. You may discover onceyou get started that the work absorbs youuntil well past the half hour. “Vice delayedmay turn out to be vice denied,” sayBaumeister and Tierney.

People exert less self-controlafter seeing a messy rather

than a clean desk or room or whenusing a sloppy rather than a neat,

well-organised website

Picture: Getty ImagesPicture: iStock images

Reachyourgoals atwork

Tips tostay ontop of it all


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Feelgood Feelgood

Taking advice

The first step in self-control, say theWillpower authors, Baumeister and Tier-ney, is to set clear, attainable goals. Makea plan, including specifics of time, placeand opportunity, so as to avoid the phe-nomenon of monkey mind — where yourmind, with a dozen things to do, keepsleaping from one to the other. “When youhave several deadlines, make a plan fordealing with each so you don’t get intru-sive thoughts while working on one. Theunconscious mind is shaped to say ‘youhaven’t done this’ — having a plan seemsto satisfy it,” Baumeister tells Feelgood.The authors urge getting active with the

plan. Decide what’s the specific Next Ac-tion (NA) for each project. Instead of jot-ting down a vague ‘do taxes’ or ‘write re-port’, put the NA — ‘call accountant’, ‘getfeedback from particular work colleague’.Baumeister and Tierney refer to Getting

Things Done: The Art Of Stress-Free Pro-ductivity, a book by David Allen, who —when it comes to work — is a fan of thefour Ds: do it, delegate it, defer it or dropit. From Allen, the authors also picked upthe Two-Minute rule — if something willtake less than two minutes don’t put it ona list. Do it and immediately get rid of it.Exercising self-control in one area of life

seems to improve other areas, saysBaumeister, who conducted experimentsthat showed students scored higher onself-control tests after they’d been told —and took on board — to improve theirposture over a two-week period. Andother exercises work just as well, such asusing your non-dominant hand for routinetasks or changing your speech habits byspeaking only in complete sentences orsaying ‘yes’ and ‘no’ instead of ‘yeah’and ‘nah’. Baumeister suggests any ofthese techniques should improve yourwillpower and be a good warm-up fortackling a bigger challenge, such as stick-ing to your work budget, filing that report— and getting to your desk by 8.30am.

Procrastinationcan

occasionally bepositive.

If something istempting youfrom getting

down to work,like the zanyphotos your

friends has justposted on

Facebook, use apostponement

strategy

YOUR intentions for today weregood – a grand plan to be at thedesk at 8.30am because of a

looming deadline. Instead, you hit snoozefour times, bypass the porridge for the coco-pops, postpone your shower ’til lunch-time(you work from home) and finally show upin the office half an hour later than planned.With your willpower floundering on the

floor, you decide to ease into the day bychecking Facebook, responding to emails andgoogling the new series of Mad Men. Anhour later you’vedone nothing toappease that dead-line.It could be dif-

ferent, say RoyBaumeister andJohn Tierney,authors of Willpow-er, RediscoveringOur GreatestStrength. Baumeis-ter – head of thePsychology pro-gramme at FloridaState University –and Tierney, whowrites a sciencecolumn for TheNew York Times,believe willpoweris like a musclethat can be strengthened and that it requiresand uses up energy.One of the proofs for this, says Baumeister,

comes from a lab experiment he conductedinvolving students, a plate of chocolate chipcookies and a bowl of radishes. The group ofstudents allowed to eat cookies — whotherefore didn’t have to use any willpower toresist temptation — afterwards worked for 20minutes on a set of impossibly difficult geom-etry puzzles, whereas the group who’d beenoffered only radishes (and had to exert lots ofwillpower to avoid being tempted by thecookies their colleagues were eating) workedfor just eight minutes on the same puzzles.“They’d successfully resisted the temptation

of the cookies but the effort left them withless energy to tackle the puzzles,” say the au-thors, who argue that your body sends yousigns when it’s not primed for self-control.“If you’d like some advance warning of

trouble, look out for an overall change in theintensity of your feelings,” they say. Changessuch as finding yourself “especially botheredby frustrating events or saddened by unpleas-ant thoughts or even happier about goodnews”. With your brain’s circuits not control-ling emotion as well as usual, willpower is di-minished, they argue. Maybe not a good timefor that tête-à-tête with a difficult colleagueabout the project you’re both working on.Baumeister and Tierney also say that

self-control has a physical basis and is dramat-ically affected by everyday things, like eatingand sleeping, to the point where a life-chang-ing decision may go in a different directiondepending on whether it’s made before or af-ter lunch. To maintain steady self-control andgood willpower, they advise eating foods thatconvert slowly into glucose in the body (low

glycaemic), such as vegetables, nuts (peanuts,cashews), raw fruits (apple, blueberry, pear),cheese, fish, meat, olive oil and other ‘good’fats. Baumeister points out that it takes 15 to20 minutes after eating for energy to revive –so it’s best to schedule that budget meetingwith your boss for half an hour post lunch.Nor is it a good idea to tough it out and

go to work when you’re battling flu or other-wise unwell. Driving with a bad cold hasbeen found to be even more dangerous thandriving when mildly intoxicated, saysBaumeister. “Your immune system is using so

much of your glucose to fight the cold thatthere’s not enough left for the brain. If you’retoo glucose-deprived to do something as sim-ple as driving a car, how much use are yougoing to be in the office? If you simply can’tmiss a meeting at work, try to avoid any top-ics that will strain your self-control. If there’sa make-or-break project under your supervi-sion, don’t make any irrevocable decisions.“If you start to feel sick, the most efficient

thing is often to go to bed for 24 hours andlet your immune system work rather thankeeping going and working at an impaired

level.”Pointing out that adults routinely short-

change themselves on sleep — resulting intheir having less self-control at their disposal— Baumeister cites a study that found work-ers who weren’t getting enough sleep weremore prone to engage in unethical conducton the job.The radish and chocolate chip experiment

put the kybosh on the notion that we useone reservoir of self-control for work, anoth-er for dieting and another for being nice toour family, says Baumeister. “Two unrelated

activities — resisting chocolate and workingon geometry puzzles — drew on the samesource of energy. You use the same supplyof willpower to deal with frustrating traffic,annoying colleagues, demanding bosses andpouting children. Resisting dessert at lunchleaves you with less willpower to praise yourboss’s awful haircut.”

● Willpower, Rediscovering Our GreatestStrength by Roy Baumeister and John Tier-ney, €27.20.

WILLPOWER GURU:Roy Baumeister:self-control is affectedby everyday things.

Just get down and do it!Helen O’Callaghandiscovers your willpower islike a muscle that uses upenergy and that you canstrengthen it with practice

Here are some tips for increasing willpowerat work, courtesy of authors Roy Baumeisterand John Tierney:■ If making a to-do list sounds off-putting,think of it as a to-don’t list — things youdon’t have to worry about because you’vewritten them down. You can’t banish unfin-ished tasks from your mind by putting offdoing them or by willing yourself to forgetthem but making a specific plan will pacifyyour unconscious. Remember to plan thespecific Next Action (NA): what to do, whoto contact, how to do it (in person, byphone or email?)■ Environmental cues can boost or erodewillpower. Use some of your willpower mak-ing your surroundings neat and orderly.People exert less self-control after seeing amessy rather than a clean desk or room, orwhen using a sloppy rather than a neat,well-organised website.■ Avoid making binding decisions whenwillpower’s depleted and energy’s down —you’ll tend to go for options with short-termgains and delayed costs. To avoid giving in-to irrational biases and lazy shortcuts, artic-ulate your reasons for your decision andthink about whether they make sense.■ When budgeting your time don’t givedrudgery more than its necessary share.Work expands to fit time available, so set afirm time limit for tedious tasks.■ Procrastinators rarely sit doing nothing atall. They typically avoid the task they’remeant to be doing by doing something else.Beat this by using the Nothing Alternativetool — set aside time to do one thing andone thing only.■ Resolve to start your day with an hour de-voted to your most important goal. You havetwo choices: to get stuck into this most im-portant goal or to do nothing at all. With thelatter option, boredom sets in and you’ll turnto your priority goal.■ Procrastination can occasionally be posi-tive. If something’s distracting you from get-ting down to work — like the zany photosyour friends has just posted on Facebook —use a postponement strategy. Say ‘I’ll lookat those in half an hour, after I’ve got startedon the work project’. You may discover onceyou get started that the work absorbs youuntil well past the half hour. “Vice delayedmay turn out to be vice denied,” sayBaumeister and Tierney.

People exert less self-controlafter seeing a messy rather

than a clean desk or room or whenusing a sloppy rather than a neat,

well-organised website

Picture: Getty ImagesPicture: iStock images

Reachyourgoals atwork

Tips tostay ontop of it all


6


XH - V1

Feelgood

The sounds we make normallyare socially conditioned by

family, school, religion and so on. Wehave to go deeper to find another

sound, which is unconditioned

Time out

Workshops: Attending a Naked Voiceworkshop is a great introduction to voicework. You are guided throughout and thereis a collective energy, which is good fun.

One-to-one sessions: Naked Voice facilita-tors will do individual sessions, which offerone-to-one attention and greater privacy, if itmakes you more comfortable

CDs: Chloe Goodchild, who came up withthe concept of the Naked Voice, has a num-ber of CDs which you can ‘sound’ alongwith at home or in the car. www.thenaked-voice.com.

Sounding off: When you get used to thepractice, it is easy to ‘sound’ on your ownanywhere that you’re not disturbing thepeace.The beach is particularly good — offering

noisy waves and wind to bash your soundagainst.

How to get started

A unique workshop which allows people make noise without inhibition and discovertheir true voice left Cleo Murphy feeling joyous and energised

Express yourself

ALL OUT: At the singing workshop Naked Voice, at Faha, Killarney, were Margot Boerma(instructor), with Helen O’Sullivan, Máiréad O’Sullivan and Mary O’Sullivan. Picture: Eamonn Keogh

M AKING sounds in public isscary. If asked to participate inany kind of healing work,

most of us would be happier to write downour thoughts or paint our emotions, butmaking loud noises in a room full of peoplewould have us scurrying for the hills.Naked Voice is a concept developed by

British singer Chloe Goodchild for self-dis-covery and communication. It has nothingwhatsoever to do with singing and everythingto do with making noise. In other words, it isopen to all. Goodchild now has 10 trainedfacilitators delivering workshops all over theworld and one of them is Margot Boermawho works from a healing and creative artscentre called Saob’s Orchard just outside Kil-larney, Co Kerry.Margot first attended Goodchild’s work-

shops in 1996 and became a facilitator in2007.“Why do we do it? Because it is deeply

nourishing and nurturing from the insideout,” she says. “The sounds we make normal-ly are socially conditioned by family, school,religion and so on. We have to go deeper tofind another sound, which is unconditioned.“Once we work through the conditioned

sound and release it, we get to the secondphase, which is ecstasy, where you lose yourfears and inhibitions and get to a place of joy.You are not singing — you are being sung.”Margot, originally from the Netherlands, is

the daughter of a speech therapist and is agreat lover of music and song. “Singing andmusic can touch on very raw emotions butthis is something different. When we aresounding, it is a deep, intense experiencewhere people feel a sense of their ownvoice,” she says. She uses the verb ‘sound’ asa shorthand for ‘making sound’ — an activityrather than an impression on a listener.“When I started, I used Chloe’s tapes in

the car and sounded along with her. She’smarvellous. She really opens up her throatand sounds like a shaman wailing.”A Naked Voice workshop begins with a

physical ‘shaking off ’ of the tensions of theday followed by a guided meditation. Afterthat it is simply a matter of playing withsound — loud yawns, sighs, growls, yelps,laughter, holding a note. After a while yourinhibitions melt away and you become partof the collective vibration. There are drums,tambourines, sound bowls and a harmoniumto help you along the way. Ultimately it isfun and releasing.I went along to one of Margot’s sessions,

arriving exhausted, slightly fraught from try-ing to get there on time and mildly uncom-fortable. The group of around eight — madeup of women in their 30s to their 50s — wasalready getting into it. Some were regular at-tendees. A few, like myself, were first-timers.After calming down during the meditation Ijoined in easily. On the drive home I madenoise all the way, delighted with the freedomand privacy to do so. Next morning I wasbuzzing with energy.Yet while it feels simple and impromptu

doing it, Margot is at all times listening tothe group and guiding it. “Deep listening isimportant to find out where the sound iscoming from,” she says. “I sense where I canmove a group or individual on to a different

level.” She keeps her groups small and worksto create a safe environment in which peoplecan express themselves.“Sometimes we have frozen histories in us

that we don’t really know are there. Some-times they come undone and dissolve duringa session,” she says. “People can release a lot.”The healing Margot speaks of is not neces-

sarily a physical healing and she makes noclaims about curing illness through the

Naked Voice work. “But when you find in-ner peace you are bound to feel better.Naked Voice work will have an effect on theendocrine system. It’s all about joy, fun andlaughter. It raises levels of awareness and thatcan only be good.”

● For more information log on towww.thenakedvoice.com or www.feel-well.ie/margot-boerma


7


XH - V1 Psychology

Tony Humphreys

The recession’s toll on the health of ordinarypeople has been neglected. Kindness costs little

More humanity isneeded during crisis

HEAVY TOLL:The recession istaking its toll oneveryone andwe need to bemore humane inour response.

R ECENTLY, in a coffee shop, Ihad a conversation with a fellowmale customer. He told me he

was unemployed, had high blood pressure,high cholesterol, was depressed and was expe-riencing insomnia. His GP had prescribedmedications for the high blood pressure andhigh cholesterol and had also put him on an-ti-depressants and sleeping tablets.He had previously worked for an accoun-

tancy firm, but, due to the recession, hadbeen laid off with no future prospects of be-ing re-employed. He said he was strugglingfinancially and did not have the cash to go tohis GP for monitoring of his medication. Heis awaiting a medical card and has been toldthat it will take months for his application tobe processed.He is not able to afford his medications so

has decided to stop taking them for the highblood pressure and high cholesterol; he alsostopped taking his anti-depressants, but main-tained the sleeping tablets as these relieved hisoverwhelming anxiety and sense of helpless-ness and hopelessness.I expressed concern about his physical

well-being and the need to maintain themedications for his physical symptoms.I also enquired as to whether there was

anybody from whom he could seek financialsupport, but asking for help would be abridge too far for him to cross. This phe-nomenon of men having difficulty in reach-ing out for help and support is common and,sadly, puts them at high medical and psy-cho-social risk.Many men believe that asking for help is an

act of dependence, but the contrary is thetruth — not asking for help is an act of de-pendence.Making a request is an act of independence

and acknowledges one’s worthiness to seeksupport and also acknowledges the worthinessof the person asked to provide support, butonly if he or she is in a position to do so.Clearly, that person may or may not be in a

position to respond to the request at that par-ticular time and when that is honoured byboth parties great progress can happen in re-lationships.Giving and receiving are part of human re-

lationships and it is important that a personfeels both worthy to give and to receive —and this is a two-way street.During the following days, the plight of the

man I had met stayed with me and I won-dered how many other individuals are experi-encing lives of quiet desperation in the reces-

sion. I also wondered how we, as a people,can respond in affective and effective ways tothe challenges.A faceless bureaucratic system that is not

finding ways to respond kindly and quickly toan urgent application for a medical card (orany other medical, welfare and housingneeds) must be addressed.The media could also help by highlighting

the struggles that individuals, couples andfamilies are undergoing.Too much coverage is given to fiscal recti-

tude and not remotely enough to emotionaland social rectitude. It does not take extramoney to be more humane in our responsesto individuals in distress, but, sometimes, itdoes take a degree of soul searching to makeavailable the milk of human kindness. Indeed,frequently, active listening can be enough.While I agree that policies and associated

structures and strong decisions are required toresolve the ongoing economic and psy-cho-social crisis, I fail to see a humanity inmany of the corrective strategies being devel-oped.For example, when Taoiseach Enda Kenny,

during his trip to China, said, in an authori-tarian way, that the Irish people had to obeythe law and pay up for the new private hous-ing tax, he failed to acknowledge that thereare personal, marital and family fall-outs fromthe recession, of which he needs to have anempathic awareness.It seems strange, on the one hand, that

government ministers have acknowledgedthat there are thousands of people strugglingto find money to meet their monthly mort-gage repayments, and, yet, on the other hand,they ask these very same people to dig intheir already empty pockets for €100. Giventhat reality, a more humane approach wouldhave been to consider each person’s circum-stances.I wonder what Enda Kenny would say to

the man who has no money to pay for hismedication or to visit his GP. Would he ig-nore this man’s health problems, depressionand unemployment status and insist he obeythe law?I hope not, because we are in dire need of

leaders that operate from both head andheart.

● Dr Tony Humphreys is a consultant clini-cal psychologist, author and speaker.His book Leadership with Consciousness isrelevant to today’s column.His website is www.tonyhumphreys.ie

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Call Lori FraserTel: 021 [email protected]


8


9XH - V1

Feelgood

Catherine Hakim, sociologist, author andexpert on women’s employment, has

suggested that professional women shouldconsciously use their erotic capital to get

ahead by exploiting assets like beauty, sexappeal, charm, dress sense, liveliness and

physical fitness

Ireland and to a woman they are hard-working and good-humoured with agood work ethic.“I’ve never come across this and I work

with some of the most beautiful womenin Ireland, London and Shanghai. Evenwith people who make their living out oftheir beauty, I’ve never heard them say itcauses difficulties in their relationships tothe depth she’s describing.“I have never heard them say ‘everyone

hates me because I am so beautiful’ —maybe’ they’re just fortunate not to havethat experience!”” I think it’s sad that for Brick her

beauty has marred her relationship withother women. It’s a pity.”Solidarity is not a hallmark of the

working sisterhood, however — that’saccording to Rowan Manahan, author,career management expert and managingdirector of Fortify Services.

“In terms of sisterhood, I don’t seewomen support other women in theworkplace and in my experience womendo not delight in other women’s successand don’t acknowledge it without quali-fying it.“In men there’s a kind of simplistic

competitiveness which allows for ahead-bowed acknowledgement of anoth-er man’s superiority in certain areas.They will quietly acknowledge it.

Cover story Women in the workplace

Samantha’s Brick’s controversialcomments that her self-professedbeauty and intelligence alienatedother females in the workplace arechallenged by some Irish bosses,Áilín Quinlan reports

I ’M beautiful, don’t hate me — itwas an appeal which turned anobscure freelance journalist into a

household name, catapulting her toinstant celebrity status and kick-starting aworldwide internet storm.Most of us — and many a set of statis-

tics would bear this up — would consid-er beauty to be a blessing.But not Samantha Brick, pictured be-

low right.Her good looks may have prompted

random gifts and compliments from men,but, she complained last week, they havealso attracted an avalanche of catty com-ments and hostilityfrom jealous femalebosses and friends.Public reaction

to Brick’s confes-sion, far from be-ing sympatheticwas contemptuous;spoof Twitteraccounts and anoutpouring of tit-ters and sneersabout her appear-ance as well as —depending whoyou read or talkedto — a backlash ofirritation, indigna-tion and scornover Brick’s per-ceived vanity andarrogance.The irritation is

to some extent jus-tifiable — moun-tains of researchpoint to the factthat, in fact, goodlooks can not onlysmooth yourprogress throughlife in general, butcan have such an impact in the work-place that they’ve been dubbed ” thebeauty premium.”Catherine Hakim, sociologist, author

and expert on women’s employment, haseven suggested that professional womenshould consciously use their erotic capitalto get ahead by exploiting assets likebeauty, sex appeal, charm, dress senseliveliness and physical fitness.She believes an attractive person is

more likely to land a job in the firstplace, and then be promoted more easily.Research has also shown that indi-

viduals tend to find attractive peoplemore intelligent, friendly andcompetent than less attractivepeople.A University of British

Columbia study showed we actually havea positive bias toward attractive people —so that if we consider a woman to bebeautiful, and she is also known to be or-ganised and generous, we will uncon-sciously over-emphasise those good traits.On top of all of that it seems beauty

can actually increase your earnings — re-search found, for instance, that goodlooking lawyers earned up to 12% morethan their plainer colleagues.However, there are two sides to every

coin, and while many women wouldpoint to such studies as justification thatSamantha Brick has been talking through

her pretty hat,could she per-haps have apoint aboutwomen nottrusting theirgood-lookingsisters? Takethe interestingfindings of apair of Israeliresearcherswho investigat-ed what hap-pens when jobhunters in-cluded photoswith their ap-plications.The pair

sent fictionalCVs to over2,500 real-lifejob vacancies.For each job,they sent twovery similarapplications,one includinga photo, andone without.They found

that attractive women were less likely tobe offered an interview if they included aphotograph.The study concluded that, as human

resources departments tend to be staffedmostly by women, it was plain old-fash-ioned jealousy — or beauty discrimina-tion — which led the women to dis-criminate against pretty candidates.Good-looking males, on the other

hand, were more likely to be called foran interview if they included a photo,while less attractive men were better off

not including one.This seems to suggest womendiscriminate against their prettysisters, albeit unconsciously.However, for publishing mag-nate and entrepreneur NorahCasey, appearance is not an is-sue.

When she sits on an in-terview panel, applicants’looks don’t even register– what she looks for isability: “A lot of veryglamorous women tend

towards the fashion and beauty sector butI always appoint on merit. Looks don’tcome into it. Having good looks doesn’tmean you’ll be better at your job,” de-clares Casey, CEO of Harmonia, Ireland’slargest magazine publishing company.The businesswoman, who became a

household name after she appeared asone of the ‘Dragons’ on the popularDragon’s Den series, says she’s neverencountered the kind of looks-based os-

tracism as reported by Samantha Brick:“I work with women who are verygood-looking, clever, with nice and goodpersonalities,” she says: “I find it extraor-dinary that someone’s beauty would elicitthe kind of thing that Samantha Brick istalking about. It requires an amount ofsupposition to suppose that people don’tlike you because of your beauty!”“In my line of work we deal with

some of the most beautiful women in

“Women by contrast will admit thatsomeone will give a great performance –but there’s always a ‘but’.”However, says Manahan, it’s not neces-

sarily about looks.While women are definitely judged on

their appearance much more so than men— and while, he says “women are muchmore prone to judging other womenthan men” — he has yet to encounter afemale boss who is jealous of a prettiersubordinate: “I’ve come across situationswhere a young woman with youth, ener-gy and ability is outshining the olderfemale boss, but the older woman willnot target her on the fact that theyounger girl has a better figure! I don’tthink the root cause of a female boss’s in-security will be much to do with a sub-ordinate’s looks, unless she’s beingfawned over by male bosses in a silly way.“I’ve never once heard a female client

of mine anxious about her position men-tion anything other than ability andeffectiveness — not about looks.“In my firm we talk to high-echelon

women and men all the time. This com-petition amongst women is not remotelylinked to looks.“I think this woman has queered the

pitch in a puerile nonsensical way interms of pointing the conversation atsomething that is irrelevant.”Instead, he says, we should be looking

at why there are still so few women atthe top levels of corporate life.Casey too has little time for the report-

ed woes of Brick: “As a former nurse, Idealt with people who had terriblydisfiguring burns and facial blemishesfrom cancer and the difficulties shereports is nothing compared to whatconfronted them, ” she says firmly.What we see on the surface is very

important to people, she says, adding thatsometimes the superficial can have astrong initial impact: “Having a facialdeformity is a million times worse thananything beauty brings to bear.”In a society where the so-called ‘beauty

premium’ is an acknowledged factor atwork, we cannot escape from the obvi-ous selection of attractive women in sales,marketing and , the hospitality industry.There’s no doubt that being “easy on

the eye” can be an influencing factorwhen selecting female presenters for TV— after all, when did you last see aheavy, unattractive woman in need ofgetting her roots touched up standing infront of a camera? We’re living inan image-obsessed world — aworld where men are now rou-tinely getting their chestswaxed, where we all, particu-larly women, are expected tomeasure up in terms of skin,hair, nails, teeth, clothes andbody.And it’s getting more de-

manding, especially for wom-en in the workplace, saysTerry Prone, communica-tions expert and author of

GLAMOUR FUSS

Public reactionto Samantha

Brick’s claim shewas too beautiful,

far from beingsympathetic wascontemptuous

What Every Working Woman ShouldKnow... and Do: “There has been a hard-ening against women who believe thatthey should be just taken on their qualifi-cations — there’s an expectation thatwomen should be very well presented.The media is responsible for thisemphasis on looks.“The fact is that the looks thing is

more potent in terms of impact than itshould be,” comments Prone, adding thatin this instance at least, feminism hasfailed.And yet, despite this active discrimina-

tion, women still make up almost half theworkforce — in 2011 46.7% of those inemployment were women. Last yearthere were, in fact, 851,300 women and970,000 men employed in Ireland. Arethese hundreds of thousands of womenreally so obsessed with each other’slooks? No, says Orla O’Connor ActingCEO of the National Women’s Council— women are far more concerned withreduced working hours and fewer jobopportunities as a result of the recessionand with juggling home, work and child-care.“In terms of what women are saying to

us, it’s about cutbacks and about supportaround unpaid maternity leave.”Prone, one of Ireland’s leading commu-

nications experts, doesn’t believe it either.She dismisses Brick’s claims about

women disliking her because she’s pretty:“Women don’t behave like she says theydo,” she declares.“I simply don’t buy into it that women

instantly hate someone who’s good-looking.”Yes, she says, there are differences in

the way women relate to each other andthe way men relate to each other.“But women are often full of admira-

tion for a woman who is beautiful; theysay isn’t she gorgeous.”What annoys Prone is that she believes

it’s unprofessional to bring emotions intothe workplace — and that’s what shefeels Brick’s doing: “Don’t bring yourfeelings into work. In business it’s aboutlistening to the brief and delivering onthe brief. Samantha Brick is bringing heremotions into work and attributingemotions to other women.“I feel that it’s completely irrelevant —

work is about evidence, facts listening toa brief and delivering on it. If you canmake other people happy in the processgreat, but you have no right to expectother people in the workplace to makeyou happy.“What every working woman needsto know is that women are not inher-ently treacherous or underhand. Inbad times they can be your best sup-porter.”

Brains and beautyTOP CLASS:MiriamO’Callaghan, left,Claire Byrne topright, andChristineLagarde areexamples ofwomen who areattractive andgood at theirjobs.

Yes it’s possible to have both beautyand brains — take Claire Byrne, Miri-am O’Callaghan, Carol Vorderman.Take Madonna.Take Christine Lagarde, MD of the

International Monetary Fund, who is,let’s face it, elegance personified andlucky enough to combine brains, quali-fications, beauty and success — livingproof that you can have it all.Sociologist Catherine Hakim makes

no bones about urging professionalwomen to use their ‘erotic capital’ toclimb the corporate ladder. Beautydoesn’t have to be seen as superficial,she believes, it can also be used to getahead.If you’re a woman blessed with

charm, beauty, and grace, and moresocial intelligence than your malecolleagues, you should be using it togain promotion, Hakim believes.And there’s no need to be embar-

rassed about doing it, either. After all,most men have little compunction

about using every asset in their ar-moury to get ahead in their careers,and have no embarrassment about ex-ploiting those assets.At the end of the day, however, it’s

important to remember that it’s alsoabout knowing the culture at play in

your work environment — and howto manipulate it.Flaunting the sex card in one office

culture could be misinterpreted as sex-ually aggressive career-killing be-haviour in another.Be careful out there.

TALENT SCOUT:Publishing magnateand entrepreneurNorah Casey, saysshe judges abilitynot appearances.

LOOKS COUNT:Communications expertTerry Prone says asidefrom ability, image is nowmore valued due to theinfluence of the media.

Picture: ThinkStock


8


9XH - V1

Feelgood

Catherine Hakim, sociologist, author andexpert on women’s employment, has

suggested that professional women shouldconsciously use their erotic capital to get

ahead by exploiting assets like beauty, sexappeal, charm, dress sense, liveliness and

physical fitness

Ireland and to a woman they are hard-working and good-humoured with agood work ethic.“I’ve never come across this and I work

with some of the most beautiful womenin Ireland, London and Shanghai. Evenwith people who make their living out oftheir beauty, I’ve never heard them say itcauses difficulties in their relationships tothe depth she’s describing.“I have never heard them say ‘everyone

hates me because I am so beautiful’ —maybe’ they’re just fortunate not to havethat experience!”” I think it’s sad that for Brick her

beauty has marred her relationship withother women. It’s a pity.”Solidarity is not a hallmark of the

working sisterhood, however — that’saccording to Rowan Manahan, author,career management expert and managingdirector of Fortify Services.

“In terms of sisterhood, I don’t seewomen support other women in theworkplace and in my experience womendo not delight in other women’s successand don’t acknowledge it without quali-fying it.“In men there’s a kind of simplistic

competitiveness which allows for ahead-bowed acknowledgement of anoth-er man’s superiority in certain areas.They will quietly acknowledge it.

Cover story Women in the workplace

Samantha’s Brick’s controversialcomments that her self-professedbeauty and intelligence alienatedother females in the workplace arechallenged by some Irish bosses,Áilín Quinlan reports

I ’M beautiful, don’t hate me — itwas an appeal which turned anobscure freelance journalist into a

household name, catapulting her toinstant celebrity status and kick-starting aworldwide internet storm.Most of us — and many a set of statis-

tics would bear this up — would consid-er beauty to be a blessing.But not Samantha Brick, pictured be-

low right.Her good looks may have prompted

random gifts and compliments from men,but, she complained last week, they havealso attracted an avalanche of catty com-ments and hostilityfrom jealous femalebosses and friends.Public reaction

to Brick’s confes-sion, far from be-ing sympatheticwas contemptuous;spoof Twitteraccounts and anoutpouring of tit-ters and sneersabout her appear-ance as well as —depending whoyou read or talkedto — a backlash ofirritation, indigna-tion and scornover Brick’s per-ceived vanity andarrogance.The irritation is

to some extent jus-tifiable — moun-tains of researchpoint to the factthat, in fact, goodlooks can not onlysmooth yourprogress throughlife in general, butcan have such an impact in the work-place that they’ve been dubbed ” thebeauty premium.”Catherine Hakim, sociologist, author

and expert on women’s employment, haseven suggested that professional womenshould consciously use their erotic capitalto get ahead by exploiting assets likebeauty, sex appeal, charm, dress senseliveliness and physical fitness.She believes an attractive person is

more likely to land a job in the firstplace, and then be promoted more easily.Research has also shown that indi-

viduals tend to find attractive peoplemore intelligent, friendly andcompetent than less attractivepeople.A University of British

Columbia study showed we actually havea positive bias toward attractive people —so that if we consider a woman to bebeautiful, and she is also known to be or-ganised and generous, we will uncon-sciously over-emphasise those good traits.On top of all of that it seems beauty

can actually increase your earnings — re-search found, for instance, that goodlooking lawyers earned up to 12% morethan their plainer colleagues.However, there are two sides to every

coin, and while many women wouldpoint to such studies as justification thatSamantha Brick has been talking through

her pretty hat,could she per-haps have apoint aboutwomen nottrusting theirgood-lookingsisters? Takethe interestingfindings of apair of Israeliresearcherswho investigat-ed what hap-pens when jobhunters in-cluded photoswith their ap-plications.The pair

sent fictionalCVs to over2,500 real-lifejob vacancies.For each job,they sent twovery similarapplications,one includinga photo, andone without.They found

that attractive women were less likely tobe offered an interview if they included aphotograph.The study concluded that, as human

resources departments tend to be staffedmostly by women, it was plain old-fash-ioned jealousy — or beauty discrimina-tion — which led the women to dis-criminate against pretty candidates.Good-looking males, on the other

hand, were more likely to be called foran interview if they included a photo,while less attractive men were better off

not including one.This seems to suggest womendiscriminate against their prettysisters, albeit unconsciously.However, for publishing mag-nate and entrepreneur NorahCasey, appearance is not an is-sue.

When she sits on an in-terview panel, applicants’looks don’t even register– what she looks for isability: “A lot of veryglamorous women tend

towards the fashion and beauty sector butI always appoint on merit. Looks don’tcome into it. Having good looks doesn’tmean you’ll be better at your job,” de-clares Casey, CEO of Harmonia, Ireland’slargest magazine publishing company.The businesswoman, who became a

household name after she appeared asone of the ‘Dragons’ on the popularDragon’s Den series, says she’s neverencountered the kind of looks-based os-

tracism as reported by Samantha Brick:“I work with women who are verygood-looking, clever, with nice and goodpersonalities,” she says: “I find it extraor-dinary that someone’s beauty would elicitthe kind of thing that Samantha Brick istalking about. It requires an amount ofsupposition to suppose that people don’tlike you because of your beauty!”“In my line of work we deal with

some of the most beautiful women in

“Women by contrast will admit thatsomeone will give a great performance –but there’s always a ‘but’.”However, says Manahan, it’s not neces-

sarily about looks.While women are definitely judged on

their appearance much more so than men— and while, he says “women are muchmore prone to judging other womenthan men” — he has yet to encounter afemale boss who is jealous of a prettiersubordinate: “I’ve come across situationswhere a young woman with youth, ener-gy and ability is outshining the olderfemale boss, but the older woman willnot target her on the fact that theyounger girl has a better figure! I don’tthink the root cause of a female boss’s in-security will be much to do with a sub-ordinate’s looks, unless she’s beingfawned over by male bosses in a silly way.“I’ve never once heard a female client

of mine anxious about her position men-tion anything other than ability andeffectiveness — not about looks.“In my firm we talk to high-echelon

women and men all the time. This com-petition amongst women is not remotelylinked to looks.“I think this woman has queered the

pitch in a puerile nonsensical way interms of pointing the conversation atsomething that is irrelevant.”Instead, he says, we should be looking

at why there are still so few women atthe top levels of corporate life.Casey too has little time for the report-

ed woes of Brick: “As a former nurse, Idealt with people who had terriblydisfiguring burns and facial blemishesfrom cancer and the difficulties shereports is nothing compared to whatconfronted them, ” she says firmly.What we see on the surface is very

important to people, she says, adding thatsometimes the superficial can have astrong initial impact: “Having a facialdeformity is a million times worse thananything beauty brings to bear.”In a society where the so-called ‘beauty

premium’ is an acknowledged factor atwork, we cannot escape from the obvi-ous selection of attractive women in sales,marketing and , the hospitality industry.There’s no doubt that being “easy on

the eye” can be an influencing factorwhen selecting female presenters for TV— after all, when did you last see aheavy, unattractive woman in need ofgetting her roots touched up standing infront of a camera? We’re living inan image-obsessed world — aworld where men are now rou-tinely getting their chestswaxed, where we all, particu-larly women, are expected tomeasure up in terms of skin,hair, nails, teeth, clothes andbody.And it’s getting more de-

manding, especially for wom-en in the workplace, saysTerry Prone, communica-tions expert and author of

GLAMOUR FUSS

Public reactionto Samantha

Brick’s claim shewas too beautiful,

far from beingsympathetic wascontemptuous

What Every Working Woman ShouldKnow... and Do: “There has been a hard-ening against women who believe thatthey should be just taken on their qualifi-cations — there’s an expectation thatwomen should be very well presented.The media is responsible for thisemphasis on looks.“The fact is that the looks thing is

more potent in terms of impact than itshould be,” comments Prone, adding thatin this instance at least, feminism hasfailed.And yet, despite this active discrimina-

tion, women still make up almost half theworkforce — in 2011 46.7% of those inemployment were women. Last yearthere were, in fact, 851,300 women and970,000 men employed in Ireland. Arethese hundreds of thousands of womenreally so obsessed with each other’slooks? No, says Orla O’Connor ActingCEO of the National Women’s Council— women are far more concerned withreduced working hours and fewer jobopportunities as a result of the recessionand with juggling home, work and child-care.“In terms of what women are saying to

us, it’s about cutbacks and about supportaround unpaid maternity leave.”Prone, one of Ireland’s leading commu-

nications experts, doesn’t believe it either.She dismisses Brick’s claims about

women disliking her because she’s pretty:“Women don’t behave like she says theydo,” she declares.“I simply don’t buy into it that women

instantly hate someone who’s good-looking.”Yes, she says, there are differences in

the way women relate to each other andthe way men relate to each other.“But women are often full of admira-

tion for a woman who is beautiful; theysay isn’t she gorgeous.”What annoys Prone is that she believes

it’s unprofessional to bring emotions intothe workplace — and that’s what shefeels Brick’s doing: “Don’t bring yourfeelings into work. In business it’s aboutlistening to the brief and delivering onthe brief. Samantha Brick is bringing heremotions into work and attributingemotions to other women.“I feel that it’s completely irrelevant —

work is about evidence, facts listening toa brief and delivering on it. If you canmake other people happy in the processgreat, but you have no right to expectother people in the workplace to makeyou happy.“What every working woman needsto know is that women are not inher-ently treacherous or underhand. Inbad times they can be your best sup-porter.”

Brains and beautyTOP CLASS:MiriamO’Callaghan, left,Claire Byrne topright, andChristineLagarde areexamples ofwomen who areattractive andgood at theirjobs.

Yes it’s possible to have both beautyand brains — take Claire Byrne, Miri-am O’Callaghan, Carol Vorderman.Take Madonna.Take Christine Lagarde, MD of the

International Monetary Fund, who is,let’s face it, elegance personified andlucky enough to combine brains, quali-fications, beauty and success — livingproof that you can have it all.Sociologist Catherine Hakim makes

no bones about urging professionalwomen to use their ‘erotic capital’ toclimb the corporate ladder. Beautydoesn’t have to be seen as superficial,she believes, it can also be used to getahead.If you’re a woman blessed with

charm, beauty, and grace, and moresocial intelligence than your malecolleagues, you should be using it togain promotion, Hakim believes.And there’s no need to be embar-

rassed about doing it, either. After all,most men have little compunction

about using every asset in their ar-moury to get ahead in their careers,and have no embarrassment about ex-ploiting those assets.At the end of the day, however, it’s

important to remember that it’s alsoabout knowing the culture at play in

your work environment — and howto manipulate it.Flaunting the sex card in one office

culture could be misinterpreted as sex-ually aggressive career-killing be-haviour in another.Be careful out there.

TALENT SCOUT:Publishing magnateand entrepreneurNorah Casey, saysshe judges abilitynot appearances.

LOOKS COUNT:Communications expertTerry Prone says asidefrom ability, image is nowmore valued due to theinfluence of the media.

Picture: ThinkStock


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Feelgood

NOTE: The information contained in Dr Julius Parker’s column is not a substitute for medical advice. Always consult a doctor first

Dr Julius Parker isa GP with HSFHealth Plan’s free24 GPadvice line.For moreinformation visit www.hsf.ie orlo-call 1890 451 451

NEWSUPDATE

If you have a question about your healthemail it [email protected] send a letter to:FeelgoodIrish ExaminerCity QuarterLapps QuayCork

Medical matters

The arrivalof a third child ups

the ante frombusy to manic.

There is no pointin planning. Thebaby dictates

when, and if, I eat,shower, sleep,dress. All myactions are

reactions. Daysare a haze of

bottles, burpingand washing

CatherineShanahan

MUM’S WORLDMUM’S WORLD

CatherineShanahan

WHEN it comes to running a func-tioning household few could dis-pute the usefulness of toothpaste

or toilet roll. Equally indispensable is thekettle, the Phillips head screwdriver, theflashlamp, the fridge, the microwave, thetoaster and the bottle opener. Each has itsown little role in the modern home.But there is another significant contribu-

tor to harmonious living which does notmake the list of basic essentials. It is thepresence of grandparents at a time whenchaos reigns.The arrival of a third child ups the ante

from busy to manic. There is no point inplanning. The baby dictates when, and if, Ieat, shower, sleep, dress. All my actions arereactions. Days are a haze of bottles, burp-ing and washing; of babygro-laden clotheslines; of desperate attempts to clean up theconstant mess of family living.I have no idea how individual parents

cope alone with three children none ofwhom is old enough to make a responsibledecision. I doubt I would ever get toventure out if my parents were not cur-rently sharing our house while they wait tomove into their own new home. Even fourpairs of adult hands on board barely light-ens the load. We may starve when theymove out because cooking is hard when ababy is screeching for a feed and his

siblings are too young to do the needful.I wonder how, in her day, my mother

coped with three when her husband wasconstantly at work and there was no extrahelp to get her through the bedlam. Un-able to drive, and in any event car-less,she endured her own form of housearrest. At least I have wheels under me,even if the cargo that goes with transport-ing a baby is enough to keep me off theroad indefinitely.I have the greatest of sympathy for

those unfortunate enough not to have anyfamily back-up. I have no idea how theycope. I get to shower every day becausemy mother is at hand to hold the baby. Iam not sleep-deprived because my parentslook after the other kids while I have alie-in. It’s like having two au pairs butwithout the worry of them running offwith the husband, or clocking up massivephone bills while calling the parents inSaskatchewan.Number three is, to date, a very good

baby, which is just as well because numberthree must pretty much rear itself. Gone isthe baby monitor, the constant cradle-sidehovering, the manic sterilising andre-sterilising, the serving of bottles at theperfect room temperature. This time, sur-vival is the most you can hope for andsetting the bar any higher is futile.

Norwegian researchers have foundthat for every 2,500 women whoundergo a mammogram, only onewoman’s life will be saved byidentifying breast cancer andremoving it before it spreads.They also found that for every

woman whose life is saved by breastscreening, up to 10 undergounnecessary treatment, includingsurgery and radiotherapy, accordingto another study that casts doubt onmammography.The researchers believe routine

screening results in widespreadover-diagnosis of breast cancer —identifying benign cancers that wouldnever cause symptoms, spread, orresult in death. And they believe theproblem could get worse as screeningtechnology improves, according todoctors writing in the journal Annals ofInternal Medicine.The Norwegian academics, based at

the New Harvard Public School ofHealth in the US, calculated that forevery 2,500 women screened, between26 and 30 would be diagnosed withbreast cancer.However, between six and 10 of those

actually had benign cancers that wouldnever cause problems if left untreated.These figures translated to an

‘over-diagnosis’ rate of 15 to 25%Women with benign cancers would

still go on to have treatment — whichcould include surgery — because it wascurrently impossible to distinguishbetween tumours that would spreadand those which would not.The authors said: “Over-diagnosis

and unnecessary treatment of non-fatalcancer creates a substantial ethical andclinical dilemma and may cast doubtson whether mammography screeningprograms should exist.”At the very least, women “need to be

comprehensively informed about therisk for over-diagnosis”, they advised.

Q I AM about four stone over-weight and rising. I havetried every kind of diet,losing weight only to pile iton again. I feel out of con-

trol most of the time when it comes tofood and am seriously considering gettingmy stomach stapled. I would appreciateyour advice.

A This is a difficult situation. Many peoplegenuinely find it just as hard to maintain ahealthy weight as they do to lose weight inthe first place. There’s no doubt that mostpatients do lose weight after stomach stapling,with about a third reaching a healthy weightwithin two years. Longer term follow-up isless encouraging as following the operationyou still have to stick to a dietary regime.This operation is often described as the

“last resort”. It would normally only be con-sidered after other measures, including diet-ing programmes, exercise, and medicationhave been tried. It’s also a complex opera-tion, with recognised surgical side effects thatare more common in the overweight, andlonger-term complications related to the re-duced stomach size and ability to absorb cer-tain nutrients, such as Iron.I’m sure you’ve seen your GP who will

have arranged screening blood tests, to ruleout any hormonal cause. I would encourageyou to join a dieting group as the encourage-ment of others is a powerful motivator. Exer-cise is also important — you could join agym and it may be worthwhile investing in apersonal trainer for 1:1 advice and support.Feeling “out of control” in relation to your

eating habits suggests your confidence hasbeen undermined. Seeing a counsellor orperhaps a psychologist may be sensible. If youwant to be considered for stomach staplingthe pre-operative process will involve a psy-chological assessment. This is because theoperation isn’t a once-and-for-all solutionand you’ll need to be able to control your di-etary patterns afterwards.I’d encourage you to work through all the

alternatives before thinking about surgery.

Q. I found a small lump on the upper partof my left breast a month ago. I went to awomen’s health clinic and was told it was acyst and there was nothing to worry about.I was initially happy with this news butnow I am worried in case it is more seri-

ous. The lump is still there and seems tohave gotten bigger. Should I get a secondopinion?

A. It’s natural to feel anxious if you’ve founda lump in your breast, but you’ve taken ex-actly the right approach and had it checkedout. Breast cysts are common, and harmless.They usually occur in women who are over35 but who haven’t yet reached themenopause. They can occur near the surfaceof the skin, and feel like soft lumps, as theycontain fluid. If they’re deeper within thebreast tissue, they may feel firmer.Cysts can normally be diagnosed by exami-

nation. If there is any doubt a breast cliniccan perform an ultrasound scan, which out-lines the cyst. Many cysts will gradually dis-

appear on their own, but a month wouldn’tusually be long enough for this to have hap-pened. Breast cysts don’t develop into any-thing more serious, and certainly don’t in-crease your risk of breast cancer. Occasionallycysts can increase in size, and this can causediscomfort as they press on adjacent breasttissue. If this is happening, or the cyst is sim-ply persisting and not going away, I suggestyou attend a breast clinic.In many cases a specialist can drain the

fluid from a cyst, using a fine needle. Thisusually means you’ll no longer be able to feelit. Occasionally a cyst can re-fill, in whichcase it can be drained again.You can get more information about be-

nign breast conditions from the Health Ser-vice Executive website (www.hse.ie).

OVER-DIAGNOSIS RISK: Research hasfound that mammograms may result inunnecessary treatment. Picture: CORBIS


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Male healthMaking change

1. The colour of your eyes depends entirely onyour genetic make-up.2. But only a few “letters’ out of the six billionthat make up our genetic code are responsiblefor the eye colour.3. The amountand type of colourpigment in the irisdefines the colourof your eyes.4. The colour ofthe eye can rangefrom the mostcommon, brown, to the least common, green.5. Most Caucasian babies are born with lightblue eyes and their colour will graduallychange, due to exposure to light, by the ageof one.6. Babies of African or Asian origin will be bornwith grey/brown eyes, they will get darker afterthe first six months.7. In 2008 new research suggested that peo-ple with blue eyes have a single commonancestor, and tracked it down to a geneticmutation.

It’s a colourful world

A new cosmetic procedure promises to permanently remove dark eye pigment,allowing the natural blue colour to emerge, reports Rachel Borrill

For the browned offH AVE you dreamt of being that

blue-eyed boy or girl, or as thesong says ‘changing your brown

eyes to blue?’ You soon can, thanks to anAmerican doctor who has devised a laserprocedure that permanently changes eyecolour in 20 seconds.Dr Gregg Homer, from Stroma Medical in

California, says his Lumineyes technology,which turns brown eyes blue, will be the“next big thing” incosmetic surgery.“The eyes are the

place we are told tolook at when we arecommunicating witheach other. It is oursocial connectionpoint,” he says. “Sopeople are going outand having their breastsdone, their hairbleached and every-thing else, when thebottom line is thatthey should be lookingat your eyes. I dothink brown eyes arestunning, but I thinkpeople always wantwhat they don’t have.”Maybe Dr Homer, 57,has a point. If youGoogle ‘I hate my brown eyes’ it generates200,000 results. People complain that browneyes are ‘boring,’ ‘too dark’ and ‘common.’The advice on the internet is get over it andbe glad they are not blind, or buy blue con-tact lenses.“I suspect people want light eyes because

they like the depth of the light and the factthat brown eyes are opaque and flat meansthat they don’t receive light,” says Dr Homer.The surgery, which will cost €4,000, is

non-invasive, and has little contact with thepatient’s eyes.In 20 seconds per eye, the laser removes the

brown pigment from the top layer, allowingthe natural blue colour to emerge within twoto three weeks. The shade of blue will de-pend upon each person; some may be grey-ish, other’s violet.“In the long-term, I know we will be also

able to change green to blue, that should bepretty easy. But brown to green is far morecomplicated. It will be tricky, but we willgive it a go at some stage,” says Dr Homer.Dr Homer has changed the eye colour of

17 people, from Mexico, without problems.He wants to treat 100 patients, from differentcountries, to test his procedure.Again, volunteers, from all round the

world, including Ireland, have been emailinghim, apparently desperate to change their eyecolour.“We didn’t have to advertise for people, we

have had over 2,000 people emailing us, ask-ing to be involved. And, at the moment, weare only going to turn one of their eyes blue,they will be like David Bowie, which I thinka lot of them believe is cool.“We have even had people from Ireland,

which surprised me, as I thought most Irishhave green eyes. One person wrote, pleading

to be signed up for the trial as their siblinghad been constantly told how beautiful theirblues eyes were ‘yet mine were the colour ofchopped liver’,” he says.None of the volunteers has suffered side

effects and Dr Homer says further testsshould prove there are no issues with glare,double vision or sight.“We have run tests for 20 different safety

examination procedures. We run the tests be-fore and after the treatment and the followingday, and the following weeks and months.We will follow them for a year. So far, wehave no evidence of any side effects,” he says.Arthur Cummings, a consultant ophthal-

mologist at the Wellington Eye Clinic,Sandyford, Dublin, is apprehensive about theprocedure, saying he fears it could cause se-vere eye problems.“This could cause blockages in the eye

which could lead to pigmentary glaucoma.That, to me, is the biggest headache and untilthat is sorted out I would not advise anyoneto do this,” he says.Mr Cummings questions whether there is a

demand for this type of permanent proce-dure. This is a view echoed by a spokesmanfor Optical Express, a leading eye-laser clinic,

who dismissed it as a fad. “I have never hadanyone say to me that they hate the colour oftheir eyes. We do contact-lens fitting heretoo, and I cannot tell you the demand forcolour contact lenses, because it has alwaysbeen very, very low.“Most people only want to change their

eye colour for a special event, not on along-term basis. You can’t change it backagain under this procedure and I think youcould regret it,” says Mr Cummings.Dr Homer is confident his product will be

successful, saying that people were initiallyworried about Botox, and now it is a world-wide multi-million dollar industry.“Our own research suggests that there is a

real demand. Of 2,000 Americans inter-viewed, 17% said they would definitely wantto do it and 35% said they would seriouslyconsider it. And this is even before the prod-uct is available,” he says.Dr Homer says he expects the procedure

to be available on licence outside Americawithin 18 months and inside by 2015.“We are confident that this is going to be

the next big thing, that we are way ahead ofthe market and people will want light eyesbecause they can look so dramatic,” he says.

NEW VISION: DrGregg Homer hasdeveloped theLumineyestechnology tochange eye colour.

BRIGHT EYES: Evonne Owens and Lisa Thornton would never part with their brown eyes. Picture: Maura Hickey.

Lisa Thornton and Evonne Owens areadamant they would never part with theirbeautiful brown eyes.Lisa, 38, a computer analyst, from Leixlip,

County Kildare says: “I would never changemy eye colour in a million years. I havea million and one things I would dobefore I would start thinking about my eyecolour.“People always compliment my daughters

on their gorgeous dark eyes.

“I can’t really imagine anyone wanting tospend €4,000 to change the colour of theireyes. When I look in the mirror I am moreworried about the lines around the eyes,and the wrinkles, but not the colour ofthem.’’Evonne a 40-year-old Montessori teacher,

also from Leixlip, admits she loves havingbrown eyes.“Now and again I would receive compli-

ments about them, especially when I wear a

certain colour. It brings them out more.“I can’t imagine changing them. They

have changed slightly over the years and Iam happy enough with them.“I can’t imagine why people would want to

change their eye colour, it’s not for healthreasons.“It seems strange, especially when you

can buy coloured contact lenses, and youcan put them in for a party, take them outlater and go back to normal.’’


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Feelgood

Food survey

Roz Crowley

THERE’S nothing to beat a fillet of fresh fish for itsprotein and B vitamins. Oily fish has additionalvitamin D and omega fatty acids. A leftover fillet can

go a long way to making a few decent fish cakes.Jamie Oliver has a good recipe in his Jamie’s Great Britain

cookbook: he mixes potatoes with smoked salmon or trout,leeks and breadcrumbs. There’s no frying. He wraps the cakesin streaky bacon and roasts them. Delicious and handy for alarge crowd. Tim Lovejoy, the TV presenter who was acelebrity semi-finalist in Masterchef, made fish cakes fromsmoked haddock and potatoes. See his recipe in MasterChef Ev-eryday (Dorling Kindersley hardback €25).Smoked fish is a good idea and the vacuum-packed mackerel

fillets are handy to have in the fridge. A couple of fillets willstretch to about six people.Add a little ginger, chilli and finely chopped spring onion

for a taste of Thailand.The samples we looked at for today’s page would be greatly

livened up with some tartare sauce, or simply a littlehorseradish sauce and mustard added to your favourite mayon-naise.Processing reduces nutritional value, so don’t think of fish

cakes and fingers as having the same health benefits as freshfish. However, as a convenience food for emergencies and ac-companied by fresh vegetables or salad, we could do worse.We looked at three types of fish fingers to see if they would

make a good alternative to fish cakes. They, too, would benefitfrom something interesting on the side, perhaps a good tomatorelish instead of ketchup, and a green salad or home-madecoleslaw with some grated beetroot included.

Young’s salmon fish cakes 180g,€1.99 (€11.05/kg)

A good crust was tasty and inside agood balance of fish and potatoes. Itseemed like the 31% pink salmon and5% minced Atlantic salmon was an un-derestimation of the fish content asthere was good fleshy texture. Theflavour was a little low and not tastingof any fish in particular, especiallysalmon, but after a few bites it was moreobvious. Recommended to be baked inthe oven for 15 minutes, this is the bestmethod for them. For sale in chillcounters insupermar-kets.

Score: 7

SuperValu cod fish fingers 300g,€2.99 (€9.96/kg)

A good textured crumb and with 60%cod fillets it was nicely meaty inside andsatisfying. The flavour was lacking, butwe were glad not to taste salt whichmight have improved its flavour, espe-cially as fish fingers are often eaten bychildren.

Score: 6.5

Donegal Catch fish fingers 280g €2(€7.14/kg)

Nice texture of this slightly oily fishwhich is coated with breadcumbsflavoured with turmeric which also addscolour. There is added omega 3 in these10 fish fingers, which is just as well asprocessing generally reduces nutrients.60% pollock is high here. Not thefavourite of tasters, but everyone fin-ished their portion.

Score: 7

Tesco 10 cod fishcakes 500g, €2.09(€4.18)

These come frozen in a bag and frozenare quite flat and dense. However, theypuff up beautifully and are nicely crispon the outside with a light fishy taste.With 45% minced cod, they are notover salted, but perhaps a little bland.The potato is reconstituted and dried,but it doesn’t take away from quite anatural taste flavoured with parsley andblack pepper. Don’t count on it for thenutrients we would expect from pota-toes. By farthe cheap-est of theselection.

Score: 7

Birdseye cod cakes, 4 198g, €1.29(€6.61/kg)

Nice texture with crispy outside. Insidenicely creamy and tasting of fresh cod(45%) and potato. Green flecks in thebatter are of parsley. Tasty. In frozenfood cabinets.

Score: 7

Jamie Oliver 2 Crispy Pollock fish-cakes, 180g €2.69 (€14.94/kg)

Nicely crisp on the outside, there is alovely natural chive flavour in the crust.Inside the pollock, a sustainable fish, hasa nicely creamy texture. The 57% pol-lock and 28% potato makes a good bal-ance of both texture and taste. Whitepepper hits the tongue and lasts a fewseconds. In frozen food cabinets.Good fair price.

Score: 8

Marks & Spencer 2 meltingmiddle plaice and asparagusfishcakes 290g, €5.99

(€20.65/kg)

These substantial fish cakes with 27%plaice and 25% potatoes look slightlyloose and appetising as if home made.Cooked they keep their shape and havea centre which oozes a lemon sauce,which adds interest with its citrus finish.We couldn’t find the 6% asparagus. Thefish flavour was lacking but we all want-ed to finish our portions. Deli-cious. In the su-permar-ket chillcabinet.

Score:8.5

Birdseye 10 fish fingers, 280g €2.50(€8.92/kg)

Quite good texture breadcrumb coat-ing encloses a substantial 55% wildpink salmon, which has quite goodflavour, and the best of the fish fingersfor taste. While we think of salmon asdelivering lots of omega 3 oils, theprocessing of it for fish fingers probablyloses its benefit. However, there is stillmerit in them as a source of fish andits other nutrients.

Score: 7.25

Nextbestthing Fish cakes

are a handyoption tothe freshproductespeciallywhen youare cookingfor a crowd


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Deirdre O'Flynn

MOSTLY MEN

DId you know...

Male healthMale health

Brain health4TAKE

Four in 10 amateursinjured playing golfIt’s estimated that four in 10amateur golfers are injuredplaying the sport. The back isthe most common injury, fol-lowed by elbows, shoulders,wrists, knees or hips.“Amateur golfers

get injured becauseof infrequent play,lack of fitness lead-ing to body fatigueby the end of a longwalk over an18-hole golf course,and poor swing con-trol due to a lack ofcoaching, stiffness,

muscle weakness and poorbalance,” says Peter Best, os-teopath at Touchstone Os-teopathy in Blackrock Hallprimary care centre, Black-rock, Cork. “The most im-

portant thing you cando to prevent backinjury is to warm upbefore playing around of golf andwarm down after.Each warm upshould take at least10 minutes.

www.touchstone.ie/black-rockhall/osteopathy

Heavy men aremore likely thannormal-weightpeers to have lowsperm counts or nosperm productionat all(Source: Harvard School of Public Health, US)

Despite CF Ilive a full life

CREATIVE SOLUTION: Artist David Spillane, says managing cystic fibrosis is “second nature”to him. Picture: Mary Browne

D AVID Spillane has never let hiscystic fibrosis (CF) affect his life.“Even as a teenager, I was

running with my local team and playingfootball with my local club,” says David, 23,an artist living in Tralee, Co Kerry. “Mysister, Aishling, has CF as well, but we’reboth fairly lucky because we have lighterstrains of it.”According to the Cystic Fibrosis Associa-

tion of Ireland (CFAI), CF is Ireland’s mostcommon life-threatening inherited disease.CF mainly affects the lungs and the digestivesystem. It causes a thick, sticky mucus to beproduced, blocking the bronchial tubes andmaking patients prone to repeated infections,which can result in hospitalisation. Irelandhas the highest prevalence of CF in theworld.“I have to use a nebuliser and do physio-

therapy for a half hour every morning andevening, but it’s second nature to me as I’vebeen doing it so long,” said David, who isspeaking to highlight the CF National

Awareness Week, which will run from today,until Apr 20.Dubbed ‘65 Roses’ awareness week, mem-

bers of the public will be encouraged to pur-chase a pin for €2 or trolley coin for €3 tosupport the CFAI in its ongoing fight for ad-equate national and local facilities for peoplewith CF.‘65 Roses’ is the way that many children

first learn how to say ‘cystic fibrosis’ andfunds from last year’s ‘65 Roses’ are helping

to provide better support and information toparents whose baby has been diagnosed withCF. The money is also helping build new CFunits in Limerick, Drogheda and Castlebarhospitals.“I’ve been really lucky. I know a lot of oth-

er people with CF who are in hospital quitea lot and who have IV injections a lot,” saysDavid, whose artistic ambitions took offwhen a painting he posted on Facebook at-tracted lots of positive commentary. (Click on

Dave Spillane’s art page on Facebook.)“I’ve only been in hospital twice, once

when I was eight and two years ago. I tookup painting a year ago, after I’d gone througha music phase from when I was 15. I paintabstract pictures and I hope to have an exhi-bition in Dublin in the next few months,”David says.

● For further information on ‘65 Roses’week or CF, visit www.cfireland.ie.

SHARP BRAIN: EskimoBrainsharp is one of the range ofEskimo 3 fish oil supplementsand has been formulated to ad-

dress the needs of the brain. It containsomega 3, 6 and 9 fatty acids with CoQ10,which acts as an antioxidant to supporthealthy brain function, vita-min E and vitamin Dwhich also aids brain cellactivity. Dr Tom Saldeen,Professor of Cardiology atSweden’s Uppsala Universi-ty, developed this supple-ment to provide optimalnourishment for the brain.Eskimo Brainsharp costs€28.99, as a liquid or cap-sules. See www.eskimo3.iefor more information.

UDO’S CHOICE: Udo Erasmus hasbeen studying the benefits of omega 3sfor 30 years and developed Udo’sChoice Ultimate Oil Blend, using oil

derived from flax, sunflower and sesame seeds.Popularly known as Udo’s Oil, it containsomega 3, 6 and 9 fatty acids.If you would like to

find out more about goodnutrition in the run-upto exams, Udo Erasmuswill be in Cork to give atalk on The Fats of Lifeat the GreshamMetropole Hotel, onMonday, Apr 23 at7.30pm, admission €10.Udo’s Oil costs €25.99for 500ml;www.udoschoice.ie

SMART FATS: Oily fish con-tains the omega 3 fatty acidsEPA and DHA which are es-sential for good brain function

and concentration and have many oth-er benefits including heart and jointhealth. MorEPA Smart Fats are de-signed to supportconcentration, moodand a healthy heartand are €29.95 for60.One capsule pro-

vides a daily dose of720mg EPA/DHA.New research hasshown that 89% ofIrish people are notconsuming sufficientoily fish.

EXAM HELP: Eye Q fish oil has beendeveloped for optimal eye and brain func-tion and contains omega 3 and 6 fattyacids. The people at Eye Q recommend

that if you have not taken a fish oil before oryou are looking for a boost around exam time,you can take up to six capsules of Eye Q per daythe equivalent of about two sardines. This dosecan be maintained for up to three months andreduced to two capsules per day thereafter. EyeQ have also produced free ExamNutrition and Stress Buster TipSheets for students and parentswhich are available from [email protected]. The Eye Qrange comes in a variety of liquidand capsule formulas for all ages,starting at €10.99 for 60 capsules;more details onwww.equazen.co.uk.

Migraine needn’t bea headache at workThe Migraine Association ofIreland will hold Ireland’s firstnational conference on ‘mi-graine at work’ on Thursday,Apr 19 from 10am to 3pm atthe Ashling Hotel, Dublin.The day is for employees

with migraine, HRprofessionals, tradeunion officials, occu-pational health staffand anyone else whosuffers from migraineor headache.The conference

will advise attendeeson how to recognise

migraine, create a workplacethat accommodates sufferers,reduce the impact of mi-graine on the business andbecome acquainted with rel-evant legislation.The cost is €20 per dele-

gate — but employ-ees are free when at-tending with humanresources/manage-ment/occupationalhealth staff. MAImembers can also at-tend at no cost.Bookings and pay-ment in advance.

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Feelgood

Beauty

Emily O’Sullivan

The news on...

Take three...

STUFF WE LIKE

This season theeyebrow has a lookall of its own —strong, defining andface-framing

THE spring face is minimalist. Su-per-clean and super-bare. Almostlike a 1990s Calvin Klein ad –

stripped back, androgynous, nude. It’s atough look to nail, but it does feel fresh andyouthful. It’s also very simple, making it ideal‘day wear’. But beyond the fact that you needbeautiful skin to carry it off to perfection, theone essential you’ll find you need are decenteyebrows.The eyebrow is a curious thing. It can alter

your look in a second. Go too thick and youcan edge into Colin Farrell territory (whichon a lady ain’t so hot); go too thin and it allgets a bit Marlene Dietrich. And this seasonthe brow has a look all of its own: it’s strong,defining and face-framing. Think late-1970sMariel Hemmingway, or even 1980s BrookeShields – strong, elemental, directional brows.First off, you have to make sure that the

brow that you’re sporting is the brow that re-ally suits your face. Wear a bad brow andpeople won’t be able to stop staring at it. Iknow this because the cashier girl in my localsupermarket has a brow that mystifies me.And not in a good way. Any time we inter-act, it is the only thing I notice. So how toget the shape that suits you. Well, first offyou should aim to improve on what naturehas given you. Honestly, it’s the best way. Ofcourse if nature has slapped a monobrow onyour forehead, you won’t be feeling toopleased, but unless you want to go the way ofFrieda Kahlo, you can easily tweeze it backto a more socially acceptable growth. Themain thing is not to try and give yourself atotally different shape. Tweeze too thin andyou’ll regret it. Sometimes those babies nevergrow back.If you’re feeling nervous, let a professional

sort it out. Professional shaping (ie, plucking)generally works out well, and if your browhair is slightly thicker, then threading is agreat option. And, of course, if the personabout to do work on your brows has her ownbrows in bad shape, then make your excusesand leave. If she can’t do her own, she’s notgoing to be able to work any magic onyours.You can, of course, aim to tackle them

yourself. To do this, you need to establishyour “natural arch” and shape. A good trick

to work out where they should start naturallyis to hold up a pencil to the side of your faceat the edge of your nose. Your brows shouldline up to the pencil. Twist the pencil out to-wards your iris, and this is where your “natu-ral arch” should be.

Once you’ve determined the shape, it’stime to get to work: start off with combingyour brows through to work out if you’veany stray hairs, and then tweeze out any hairsthat fall below your desired brow shape. Nev-er tweeze from above, always below.If you feel in need of a bit of a ‘fill in’,

then make sure not to go too over the top.This is really where you can make mistakes,aside from the whole plucking debacle. Pen-cils work quite well, in my opinion, butshadows are definitely a good option also. It’smore a case of finding a formulation thatworks with your brow and going with that.Don’t overfill: just go for a very light shad-ing-in effect, so it looks as natural as can be.If you tend to be a bit wayward in the

brow department, then fix them with a littlevaseline. Or, if you use hairspray, then spray asmidge on to your fingers and apply somethat way. It really does work. All day.

Tweezerman Mini Slant Tweezer, €11.99at www.lookfantastic.com. The High Kingof tweezers. Say what you like, I don’t be-

lieve there is anypoint buying any oth-er tweezer product.Maybe I’ve beenburned too manytimes by spendingmoney on dufftweezers, but if I amgoing to put myselfthrough the pain oftweezing my brows,

then I want what I’m using to be effective.The sharp points allow you to target annoy-

ing sprouters and pluck them right out fromthe root... satisfying. They also now come ina mini size — cheaper and cuter. Nice.

Benefit Speed Brow, €18. There’s a verylight tint on this brow product making itgreat for anyone with mid-coloured orblondie brows. I love it because it’s a greatone for using day-to-day when you don’thave the time to faff around with shapingand shading your eyebrows. Nice one.

Max Factor Eyebrow Pencil, €6.49. It’sprobably not very hygienic, but I havebeen using this brow pencil day in, dayout for about two years and it’s still only

about half way down. There is nothing fancyabout this one. No gimmicks. No fuss. Just abasic eyebrow pencil that works really well,and fills in brows with a soft tone.

Mac Brow Fixer, €18. If you find Vaselinetoo greasy and hairspray too stiff, then trythis little waxy mamma — perfect for keep-ing your brows in shape. Makes them lookfinished, groomed and conditioned.

Estee Lauder Automatic Brow Duo,€24.90. It’s got a brush type tool on oneend, and colour at the other. It’s easy to useand quite versatile.

Laura Mercier Blonde Eyebrow Pencil,€18.56. You don’t have to go for theblonde in this, there are other options, but ifyou are quite fair then it can be hard to finda pencil that doesn’t look too harsh. This isit. It’s got a very soft colour that’s very flat-tering and doesn’t look ‘fake’.

Eyelash tint; various; from about €7. Ifyou’ve got very fair brows, and you’re sickof pencils and powders, then you couldalways dye them. It’s worth pointing outthat this can be a risky business: whereasyou leave eyelash dye on lashes for about 10or 15 minutes; brows only need about 30seconds to a minute. Be careful.

Rouge in LoveBalmy lipsticks are quite the thing at

the moment. Yes, lipsticks that are actu-ally comfortable on the lips. I’m addict-ed to a Mac sheer one at the moment,but Lancome has a new one that couldgive Mac’s newbie a run for its money.Rouge in Love has avery light, melty tex-ture and claims togive you up to sixhours hydration. It’savailable in 24 shades.with three categories:Jolie Matins (light,sheer shades); BoudoirTime (punchy, sophis-ticated tones); andTonight is My Night(seductive, magneticand intense colours). Nice. Availablefrom Lancôme counters, €25.

Lovely lip productsI know. Long title. But there’s no oth-

er way to describe these. These are love-ly lip products you probably don’t need,but you’ll definitely be happy you havethem. Can you live without them? Defs.But they will make your life just a littlebit more pleasant, promise.

Clarins Instant Light Natural Lip Per-fector, €16.27. This is a really niceproduct. I’ve yet to really work out thepoint of it, but it makes my lipsfeel lovely and it gives them agorgeous sheen that seems tomake them look plumper. It’s re-ally nice on a nude face to give alittle bit of texture. I like the roseshade, but the peach is good, too.

Chanel Ultra Correction LiftPlumping Anti-Wrinkle Lips &Contour. I have a bad soft spotfor products like this. I can’t getenough of them, mainly becauseI’m paranoid about fine lines andwrinkles around the lips. For methis works both as a moisturisingproduct and as a wrinkle treat-ment. A little pricey and indulgent, yes,but sure why not.

Lush Bubblegum Lip Scrub, €6.75. Alip scrub. Hmmm, in a list of things youdon’t really need, this seems like itwould come tops. After all, you canalways just use an old dry toothbrush toget rid of dead skin on your lips, still Ican’t help liking this one. It has an in-sanely sweet bubblegum scent and a sug-ary exfoliating base. Sweet and addictive.

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Megan puts the spotlight on: Wonderful sesame seeds

Natural health

■ NOTE: The information contained above is not a substitute for medical advice. Always consult a doctor first.

Do you have a question forMegan Sheppard?Email it [email protected] send a letter toFeelgoodIrish ExaminerCity QuarterLapps QuayCork

Megan Sheppard

Q A NUMBER of years agoyou wrote in relation to themenopause that MenoHerbswas a very good product.I dutifully cut out the article

and when I felt the first flushes I tried on-line for it. As you have said, there was aproblem with sourcing it in Britain. I even-tually found it in the US at www.atlastnat-urals.com and it is now called Meno-Herbs2 with Protykin.

A. Thank you so much for taking the time towrite in and let me know. Meno-Herbs 2 is afabulous combination of natural plant oestro-gens from red clover, dong quai and black co-hosh, with wild yam, raspberry leaf, squawvine, nettles, Siberian ginseng, Agnus castus(chaste tree berry), and Protykin. Everythingthe menopausal or peri-menopausal womancould wish for.Meno-Herbs was a great combination in it-

self, but the addition of Protykin gives thisformulation an extra boost by helping tomaintain normal oestrogen activity, reducehot flushes, balance the mood, reduce prema-ture ageing and promote bone density. This iscertainly my top choice for herbal supportthrough the menopausal changes, so it is greatto hear that we can order it in from the US.Many women at this time are faced with

the difficult choice between HRT (HormoneReplacement Therapy) and natural alterna-tives. HRT promises restored libido, improvedcomplexion, and a means to end hot flushes,night sweats, irritability and depression,.However, long-term use of HRT is sur-rounded by controversy due to scientific stud-ies showing a significant increase in the riskof breast cancer and blood clots. While thishas prompted many women to discontinuethe treatment, a number of these womenhave found a significant decrease in bonedensity after stopping HRT.Red Clover, one of the main ingredients in

Meno-Herbs 2, is rich in daidzen — used bythe body to make ipriflavone, one of the sub-stances the body needs to make and keepstrong bones. Red Clover is also high in thebone-building mineral, calcium.If you are specifically battling hot flushes,

then taking additional sage is a fabulous idea.Menosan is a herbal supplement containing100% fresh organic sage extracted into tabletform; take one tablet, twice daily. The tabletsare €12.55 for 60 tablets, available fromwww.hereshealth.ie (021 4278101).

Q. I have a complaint that I cannot talk tomy GP about. It’s about my bowel move-ments that I cannot excrete or clear outproperly without help. I have no pains orsoreness although I have other ailments. Ihave had this trouble for years. I seem tohave no power in the lower bowel. Couldyou please advise me.

A. I’m afraid I am unable to give any specificremedies or recommendations since I wouldneed a complete history in order to under-stand the series of events which may be con-tributing to your condition.If you don’t get the urge to move your

bowels, then there is a chance that there issome nerve damage. This could be for anumber of reasons. The effectiveness of low-er bowel contractions diminish with age, as aresult of medication, from nerve damage (of-ten related to diabetes), inadequate nutrition,muscular disorders, and also from extendedperiods of stretching where the stool isover-bulked through a diet too high in insol-uble fibre.Normally, the bowels should move within

20-30 minutes following a meal. Stoolsshould be soft, easy to pass, and not unusual-ly large — the average weight of a ‘normal’stool is around 100-150g (not that I’m en-couraging you to weigh your movements).Most people move their bowels at least oncedaily, anything less than this leads to larger,heavier, and drier stools which are difficultto move.You mention having other ailments. I will

assume that you refer to haemorrhoids —which often appear alongside conditionswhere natural peristaltic movement of thebowel doesn’t occur. Haemorrhoids place aconsiderable amount of pressure on thenerve receptors in the colon as well. Theseare treated relatively easily with topical med-ications, and dietary changes. Eating lowerfibre foods (avoiding grain-based products,and cooking your vegetables well), gettingenough essential fats in your diet, and drink-ing enough water all helps.I strongly urge that you do see your doc-

tor, even if it is just to ask for a referral to agastroenterologist so that you can rule outthe possibility of a number of serious under-

lying conditions which may have damagedanorectal sensitivity. Let him or her know ofany medications you are taking, as these candamage nerve function or cause constipa-tion.

Q. I am 75 years old and am takingvitamin D. I would like your advice on theright dose.

A. Most adults require at least 4,000 IU ofvitamin D3 via daily supplementation, how-ever it is wise to have your levels tested be-fore taking pot luck with dosages. Havingsaid that I have read research listing any-where from 10,000-35,000IUs daily withoutany signs of overdose! I typically err on theside of caution and suggest 4,000-6,000 forindividuals who require a D3 supplement.Vitamin D deficiency is thought to be sig-

nificant in conditions as wide ranging asalopecia areata, psoriasis, IBS, diabetes, sleeptroubles, asthma, high blood pressure, heartdisease, stroke, gum disease, mood disorders,thyroid imbalance, Multiple Sclerosis (MS),some cancers, and a decrease in bone densityand immune functioning.Vitamin D is actually a hormone and most

people in Ireland have a vitamin D deficien-cy, particularly as they age. Spending 20-30minutes in sunlight during the main part ofthe day without any form of sunscreen willtypically produce around 20,000IU of vita-min D which can be stored by the body tobe used when necessary. Unfortunately, it isnot always practical for people to spend thismuch time in the sun without some form ofprotection, which is why I generally recom-mend supplementation.Biocare’s vitamin D3 2000IU drops are

available from Here’s Health(www.hereshealth.ie; 021 4278101) where15ml costs €12.95.

SEED POWER: A bowl of hummuswhich contains tahini, one ofthe sources of using sesameseeds is a healthy diet option.

SESAME seeds are better known asthe topping on a bread roll thanas a superfood, but these tiny nu-

trient powerhouses really pack a punch!Not only are they an important sourceof high quality protein and edible oil,they contain all of the essential aminoacids, lecithin, vitamin E, and a signifi-cant amount of calcium.They are fabulous eaten raw or toast-

ed, and tahini (also known as sesamepaste) is one of the most versatilespreads you can stock in your kitchen.Choose either hulled or unhulled

organic tahini — the latter has moreroughage — and use in a variety ofboth sweet and savoury dishes to boostyour vitamin, mineral and antioxidant

levels. It forms the base of many Mid-dle-Eastern dips, such as hummus andbaba-ganoush, and is also the mainingredient in the sweet known as Hal-vah.In fact, tahini and sesame seeds are

thought to play an important role inthe physical and mental endurancedisplayed by Turkish aviators duringthe Second World War and the KoreanWar.Sesame oil has a long shelf life, be-

cause the seeds have an impressive an-tioxidant profile. The seeds are easilydigestible because they have a highalkaline mineral content. Because ofthis tahini is an ideal protein source forpeople with weak digestive systems,

and is also an excellent source of ener-gy for active people and athletes.You can even use tahini in place of

milk by combining 1 heaped teaspoonper cup of water in recipes. I even usethis as a base for smoothies andhome-made ice-cream. Health con-scious athletes and bodybuilders canuse this valuable seed to increase theirintake of protein, healthy fats, andcaloric load. As well as using it insweet dishes, you can add it to soups,casseroles, creamy salad dressings (inplace of dairy and egg), and stews. Mychildren developed their own recipeusing tahini and honey spread onsheets of dried nori, sprinkled withsesame seeds and then rolled up.

RIGHT STEP:Many womenduring themenopauseare faced withthe difficultchoicebetween HRT(HormoneReplacementTherapy) andnaturalalternatives.Picture: iStock


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Feelgood 13-04-2012