September 2011

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Getting StartedEXPERIENCE A W3 L!FESTYLE

Apartment Living at it’s Best

David WolfeW3 Lifestyle

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Intuitive Eating for Weight Loss

As an alternative to doomed diet regimens, some weight-loss experts recommend tuning in to our own instincts. But are our bodies’ cravings always a good guide?

It was more than a decade ago, before the obesity epidemic had even peaked, that nutritionists Evelyn

Tribole, MS, RD, and Elyse Resch, MS, RD, FADA, noticed the stream of failed dieters traipsing through their offices, many of them desperate for help.

Aware that dieting pitfalls — from ravenous hunger to outright boredom — might be part of the problem, the nutritionists gave their clients permission to indulge some cravings, but nonetheless kept them on programs that limited food intake. Eager to please, the clients followed the meal plans and initially lost weight.

But, Tribole recalls, “Sometime later we started getting calls from some of these people telling us how much they needed us again. They couldn’t stick to the plan anymore. Maybe they needed someone to monitor them. Maybe they didn’t have enough self-control. Maybe they weren’t any good at this, and definitely, they felt guilty and demoralized.”

Looking around, the two nutritionists saw the writing on the wall — and in the medical journals, too: Something like 95 percent of dieters fail to stick with their weight-loss programs, from Weight Watchers to Atkins to Jenny Craig.

Determined to find a different approach, they first looked to the anti-diet movement, which was just then burgeoning as a backlash to the war against obesity.

“The anti-diet movement proposed a way of eating that allowed for any and all food choices, without regard for nutrition,” Tribole explains. It was a philosophy at loggerheads with literature linking excess pounds to cancer, heart disease, diabetes and more — and it ran counter to Tribole’s and Resch’s own instincts.

“Our initial reactions were highly skeptical,” says Tribole. “How could we, as nutritionists, trained to look at the connections between nutrition and health, sanction a way of eating that seemed to reject the very foundation of our knowledge and philosophy?”

Eventually, Tribole and Resch determined that they could resolve the conflict by hammering out a compromise of sorts. They called it “Intuitive Eating”

— a nutritional strategy that rejected dieting in favor of psychological awareness. In particular, it emphasized the importance of increasing clients’ sensitivity to internal signals of hunger and fullness and helping them develop a greater attunement to the physiological effects of the foods they ate.

Described in their influential book, Intuitive Eating: A Revolutionary Program That Works (St. Martin’s Griffin, 2003), the system taught users to distinguish between physical hunger and emotional need, and to trust that natural urges would deliver better health and balance than any diet could.

The concepts were controversial. Clients in Tribole and Resch’s intuitive eating program were free

to eat as much as they wanted and to indulge their cravings for food. While diets were all about restriction — calorie counting, weigh-ins, denial of pleasure — intuitive eating gave permission to eat anything. A slice of cake? A pizza party? It was all allowed.

But can a system so permissive really keep weight down? To some extent, the jury is still out. Expert opinion has been mixed. Intuitive eating clearly doesn’t work for everyone. Yet, thousands of people report losing weight based on intuitive eating, and in recent years, peer-reviewed studies have supported the claims.

Not only did intuitive eaters in recent studies have lower cholesterol, less diabetes, healthier hearts, better levels of fitness, and lower body mass index (BMI), they achieved all that without the psychological stress and self-loathing that dieting can bring on.

According to Tracy Tylka, PhD, a psychologist at Ohio State University whose research has lent rigor to the field, the women participating in her intuitive-eating study were “more likely to reject the societal stereotype that thinness is their ideal body type” and were “less likely to base their self-worth on being thin.”

These positive results make sense in light of evidence that dietary restrictions disrupt homeostasis, a series of metabolic feedback loops between the gut, liver, brain and the body’s cells that help to maintain internal equilibrium. Intuitive eating has a shot at succeeding where restrictive diets fail, say proponents, because it complements rather than fights the complex biology of hunger. It does so by building conscious awareness of hunger cues honed by evolution over millions of years.

Science Weighs In

Until recently, evidence that intuitive eating promoted weight loss was largely testimonial, but a group of studies published in the last few years has lent more credence to the claims.

Especially influential is research from Tylka. Before investigating intuitive eating, Tylka specialized in people with eating disorders, focusing on those who fell along the spectrum of disordered eating without being symptomatic enough to actually be diagnosed. Some 40 percent of Americans qualified for this broader category, she found.

As a group, these people were often unhappy, obsessed with their weight and suffering from body-image problems, whether they were overweight or not.

Those who didn’t fall on the spectrum, she discovered, seemed to be intuitive eaters whose habits resembled those of the people Tribole and Resch had described in their book.

By 2006, Tylka had laid the scientific basis for researching the eating style. She created a scale that defined and then measured the traits of intuitive eaters: Those who qualified could be defined by 21 traits in three broad categories, including unconditional permission to eat, eating from physical rather than emotional cues, and relying on internal hunger and satiety cues.

Tylka used her scale to study more than 1,400 people, determining that intuitive eaters have a higher sense of well-being and lower body weight and do not seem to internalize the “thin ideal.” Later research on 1,260 college women found intuitive eaters shared a series of empowering traits: They were optimistic and resilient, skilled at social problem solving, and had good self-esteem.

A study Tylka published in 2010 showed that parental pressure to restrict eating in childhood translated to higher BMI in adults. The pressure backfired by disconnecting individuals from their natural hunger and satiety cues, she posits. Indeed, her adult participants reported “a lower tendency to eat when physically

hungry and stop eating when full.”

While the studies can’t really prove causality — no one can say whether eating styles are determined by life circumstances and personality traits, or vice versa — Tylka sees the relationship as “bidirectional.” She sums up her findings this way: “Attending to physiological signals of hunger and satiety are uniquely connected to well-being, and to lower body mass.”

Hungry Hormones

No matter where experts stand on intuitive eating, they universally agree that restrictive diets have failed, en masse. Most of the diets we tap today are still rooted in the old “calories in, calories out” model — a straightforward equation in which every morsel of food and every iota of exercise is evaluated on the basis of its caloric value. This mechanistic formula implies that the overweight among us must simply be too lazy, ignorant or lacking in self-control to regulate themselves accordingly, and are thus entirely responsible for their own plight.

But important new research has proven this line of thinking quite wrong, and that’s one reason intuitive eating is getting a second look from experts who might previously have written it off.

What the new research shows, according to George Blackburn,

MD, PhD, director of the Center for the Study of Nutrition Medicine at Harvard Medical School, is that the stomach and other metabolically critical parts of the

body don’t just process foodborne calories. Rather, they are responsible for sending dozens of chemical and hormonal messages to the brain, where what we think of as hunger really resides.

One key hormone in this system is ghrelin, the only biomolecule found to stimulate the hunger center in the hypothalamus of the brain. Ghrelin is released from the stomach in response not only to physiological hunger — triggered when cells are short on energy — but also to pleasure seeking and stress.

Experiments have shown that people injected with ghrelin eat 30 percent more — perhaps because the hormone gravitates to the same brain area responsible for addictive behaviors. Conventional diets based on calorie restriction limit energy to cells, boosting ghrelin and driving hunger that may be almost impossible to resist as time goes on.

Ever wonder why you overeat when stressed out? The stress hormone, cortisol, triggers the body to produce extra ghrelin. That ghrelin works on the brain’s pleasure centers to calm you down, but you pay the price in

“Ever wonder why you

overeat when stressed

out?”

extra weight.

Then there’s leptin, one of a series of “satiety hormones” produced by fat cells that tell the brain it’s time to put your fork down. There was a time when scientists celebrated the discovery of leptin, hoping that supplements would suppress appetite and keep weight under control. But for the overweight, leptin is a dead end; levels are already elevated in the obese, but their cell receptors are resistant, much like diabetics are resistant to insulin.

The obese have plenty of leptin, in other words, but it no longer has an effective place to land. The chemistry is complex, but the takeaway message for lifelong dieters is disturbingly simple: Calorie restriction elevates ghrelin, driving the hunger that sparks overeating and weight gain. The situation worsens as the failed diets stack up and the years go by. The resulting obesity renders the brain resistant to leptin, the very hormone that is supposed to help put the brakes on our appetites.

Cultivating Consciousness

Greeting our desire for food with conscious awareness rather than white-knuckled self-control is an essential priority of intuitive eating — in part because most of us have been socially and environmentally programmed to eat without much consciousness at all.

“Food is everywhere in brightly colored packages,” observes Lynn Rossy, PhD, a health psychologist who teaches mindfulness in her intuitive-eating workshops at the T. E. Atkins University of Missouri Wellness Program in Columbia. “But what is in the food, and how are we using it? Are we hungry or full when we decide to eat? Are we eating to disengage from our emotions, or to get pleasure? Are we eating when we are really hungry for something else that we would find by looking to other parts of our lives? We make so many food choices every day, but we’re so busy we’re not paying attention. In order for someone to become an intuitive eater, that has to change.”

Intuitive eaters must tune in to not just hunger and satiety, but also mood. “Emotion can impact the digestive system and mimic the feelings of hunger,” explains Rossy, “but practicing mindfulness can help you tell the difference. It gets easier over time.”

Susan Albers, PsyD, author of Eating Mindfully:

How to End Mindless Eating and Enjoy a Balanced Relationship with Food (New Harbinger, 2003), found that intuitive eaters can often handle cravings just by slowing down. As with other forms of impulse, simply stopping to ponder the source of a craving can help you realize that it isn’t about hunger at all.

Food can be a drug, she explains, in that it stimulates the feel-good neurotransmitter, serotonin. But those mindful enough to grasp that they are eating to boost mood, not appease hunger, can seek the fix through a healthy alternative like exercise, meditation or social connection.

The key, says Albers, is awareness: “If you remove that comfort eating, you must consciously put something back to take its place, be it meditation or massage. The

mindful eater recognizes and respects physiological hunger — if you are really hungry, it is important to respond.”

Nutrition consultant Marc David, MA, author of The Slow Down Diet: Eating for Pleasure, Energy & Weight Loss (Healing Arts, 2005), has his clients focus on the quality of the food itself. His rationale is simple: Higher-quality food — real, fresh, flavorful and organic — is nutrient dense and inherently satisfying.

“Yes, many of us eat too much,” says David, founder and director of the Boulder, Colo.–based Institute for the Psychology of Eating. “But we do so, to a degree, because our food is nutrient deficient. It lacks the vitamins, minerals, enzymes, and all the undiscovered X-factors and energies we require. The

brain senses these deficiencies and wisely responds to this absence of vital chemistry by commanding us to undertake the most sensible survival strategy: Eat more food.”

One key to getting such cravings under control, David asserts, may simply be to upgrade the quality of the food we eat, then notice how we experience it. “Stop and see how you feel following every meal,” he suggests.

Not for Everybody

In the end, only you can intuit which foods are right for you — and whether your cravings are driven by a nutritional need, an emotional one — or, as is often the case, both. To the extent you’re capable of discerning

such things, and motivated to do so, you may have success with intuitive eating as a weight-loss strategy.

Critics of intuitive eating point out, though, that for many, the approach has some very real limitations. For one thing, notes Elson Haas, MD, some people crave the very foods that are making them sick — much like an addict may crave a drug, despite the overall damage that it does. Indulging cravings for those foods could set you up for an inflammatory and immune response that worsens biochemical imbalances rather than ameliorating them. Even nutritious foods like yogurt, nuts and whole grains are not going to produce good results for those folks who have allergies or intolerances to them.

Also, cravings for sugar, dairy products and caffeine do not typically abate with indulgence, Haas notes, but instead tend to drive inflammation, water retention, brain fog — and still more craving.

The only way out of that rut, says Haas, author of The False Fat Diet: The Revolutionary 21-Day Program for Losing the Weight You Think Is Fat (Ballantine Books, 2001), is to heal and re-regulate the body’s disrupted biochemistry. This necessarily involves a certain amount of self-control in the short term, he notes, but for a totally different and arguably better reason than controlling calories. The goal here is to clear your system of the biochemical factors that are confounding it — and your weight-loss efforts.

Even without an allergy or food addiction, though, intuitive eating may be hard to master for the

obese, many of whom may struggle with imbalances in blood sugar and brain chemistry that have become entrenched by years of dysfunctional eating. Such imbalances can effectively compromise the body-based intuition that individuals require to put intuitive eating techniques to work.

That was part of the message when the Society for the Study of Ingestive Behavior held its annual meeting in Pittsburgh this July. University of Illinois researchers reported that a diet consistently high in fat restricted the neurotransmitter dopamine in the striatum (the part of the brain associated with reward). The upshot was that rats on high-fat fare had to eat more than their brethren on a low-fat diet for the same sense of reward.

University of Pennsylvania researchers reported that leptin — the fullness hormone — activates the hippocampus, and this process may be impaired by obesity, making it harder for obese individuals to muster self-control.

And Yale scientists scanned the brains of human subjects exposed to the smell and taste of food: The brains of normal-weight participants reacted differently, depending on their level of hunger. But

obese participants’ brains reacted to taste and smell no matter what the status of their hunger, driving them to eat long after getting full.

So, is intuitive eating for you? Only you can decide. If you’re out to maintain your weight or drop a few pounds, intuitive eating may be an ideal strategy. If you’ve experienced little luck with restrictive dieting in the past, intuitive eating may help you rethink your whole approach to food. But if you are obese or dealing with disrupted biochemistry as the result of food intolerances, you may want to seek some professional nutrition counseling to rebalance your body and brain before you give intuitive eating a try.

Either way, keep in mind that intuitive eating is a package deal — the practices of conscious attention can’t be separated from the “eat what you like” philosophy. You can’t just cave in to cravings without being willing to question them first.

Nor can intuitive eating be practiced effectively in a vacuum devoid of sensible food practices. For example, Haas notes, “Planning ahead with a good menu enables you to have healthy foods available when you need them” — something that may be tough to pull off if you always eat on the spur of the moment.

All of us, though, could probably benefit from tuning in to our bodies more often. “The body has spectacular wisdom,” says Marc David. “We just have to listen to access it.”

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Crispy Smoked Mozzarella with Honey and FigsProvided by: foodnetwork.com

Ingredients6 sheets phyllo dough6 ounces smoked mozzarella, cut into 6 equal piecesVegetable oil, for frying8 ounces dried figs, stemmed and quartered3/4 cup honey, plus more for drizzling3 teaspoons black sesame seeds

DirectionsIn a large pot, heat the vegetable oil over medium heat to 350 degrees F.

Place 1 sheet of phyllo on a dry work surface. Place one slice of cheese about 5 inches from the top of the narrow end of the sheet. Fold the top of the narrow end over the cheese, leaving 1 inch between the fold and the cheese. Next fold over 1 of the long sides then the other, again leaving 1-inch between the folds and the cheese. Then fold the cheese over, again leaving 1-inch between the fold and the cheese. Continue folding to make a package about 3 1/2 by 4-inches. Continue with the remaining pieces of cheese and phyllo.

Fry the phyllo and cheese packages, 2 or 3 at a time, in the oil until golden, about 2 minutes per side. Drain on a baking sheet lined with paper towels.

Meanwhile, heat the figs and honey in a small saucepan over low heat until the honey is warm. Set aside until the cheese packages have finished frying.

To serve, place 1 cheese package on a plate. Spoon some figs and drizzle some honey over the top of each cheese package. Sprinkle with black sesame seeds and serve immediately.

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Super Recycling Idea Turn Office Documents into Toilet Paper

(NaturalNews) A Japanese company known as Oriental has invented a device that recycles office paper into toilet paper onsite.

“All the customers needs to do is put the shredded paper in, take the toilet paper out and supply the machine with water,” said Oriental’s technology manager, Kimihiro Nozawa.

The machine, dubbed White Goat, can turn 40 regular sheets of office paper into a roll of toilet paper in only 30 minutes. According to Oriental, the device removes all staples then shreds the paper, mixes it with water and turns it into pulp, flattens and dries the pulp, then converts into a toilet paper roll. Accounting of operating costs of the machine, it costs only 10 cents to produce a single roll.

The Telegraph notes that this is substantially cheaper than a typical roll of high-quality toilet paper, which retails for approximately 38 pence (59 cents). The quality of the White Goat’s toilet paper is probably closer to that of Tesco Value paper, which retails for 11 pence (17 cents a roll).

Yet while the machine may help offices save on toilet paper and offsite recycling costs, the up-front cost will still be daunting for many. The machine retails for $100,000, meaning that it would need to produce 200,000 rolls of toilet paper in order to pay for itself. This would require running continuously for at least 11 years. In addition, the machine is 6 feet tall and weighs 1,300 pounds.

Nevertheless, the machine received a prize for innovation upon its unveiling at the 2009 Eco-products International Fair in Tokyo, and has attracted a fair amount of attention on the Internet.

“I can think of several people who’d like to flush their workload down the loo, but this takes it to another level,” said James Holland, editor of the web site Electricpig.

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Ten Things To include in Your Will

Name a personal representative or executor.

In an individual will, your parent can name a person or institution to act as

personal representative, called an executor in some states, who will be responsible for making sure that the will is carried out as written and that the property is divvied up and distributed as directed. It’s also wise to name an alternate in case the first choice is unable or

unwilling to act.

Name beneficiaries to get specific property.

Your parent’s will can specify separate gifts of property — called specific bequests — including cash, personal property, or real estate. Likely beneficiaries for such bequests are children and other

relatives, but they may also include friends, business associates, charities, or other organizations.

Specify alternate beneficiaries.

In fashioning their wills, most people assume that the beneficiaries they name will survive to take the property they’ve specified for them. The most thoughtful wills provide for what should happen if those beneficiaries don’t survive — either by naming a backup recipient or indicating that the person’s spouse or children should take the property instead.

Name someone to take all remaining property.

If your parent has opted to make specific bequests of property, a will is also the place to name people or organizations to take whatever property is left over. This property is usually called a “residuary estate.”

Give directions on dividing personal assets.

If your parent wants assets divided among children, charities, or other beneficiaries, the will should note precisely what property is included in that pool. It should also specify whether assets are to go directly to beneficiaries or whether they’re to be sold and the value divided among the beneficiaries, either equally or according to stated percentages.

Give directions for allocating business assets.

Business assets are often separate from personal assets — and most business

owners have very specific ideas about what should be done with them after their deaths. If your parents don’t have a written plan covering the windup of their business, encourage them to see an experienced estate planning attorney to ensure that their wishes are clearly indicated in each of their wills.

Specify how debts, expenses, and taxes should be paid.

The will should spell out your parent’s wishes regarding how to settle debts

and final expenses, such as funeral and probate costs, as well as any estate and inheritance taxes. Usually a specific source, such as a bank account, will be tagged to cover these costs.

Cancel debts others owe.

A nice added touch is that people making wills can use the documents to relieve those who owed them money from the

responsibility of paying that debt — along with any interest that accumulated on it — to them or their survivors.

Indicate special instructions for maintaining real estate.

If your parents name someone to keep their house, they should list any specific

instructions for its care and upkeep in each will.

Provide a caretaker for pets.

Since the law considers pets to be property, the best way for your parents to assure a good home for theirs is to leave the animal to someone named in

each will who has agreed to give it a good home. Many people also leave that person an amount of money to help cover the caretaking expenses.

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Isn’t it amazing how often we raise a board up in the air and freak ourselves out? This is what happens when we think we have to be perfect before we start, or we’re never going to be able to do a task well enough — suddenly that simple, step-by-step exercise seems risky and dangerous. It’s the same board, but our fear of failure just raised it sky high.

The truth is, getting across the board always requires putting one foot in front of the other. It’s only our thoughts that paralyze us — by convincing us that a single faulty step could put us at real risk.

Finally, Fiore expands on the scene by having us imagine that the end of the board we’re standing on is on fire. Now what? Most likely, we’ll do whatever we need to in order get to the other side, or at least get away from the heat!

Unfortunately, that’s how we live our lives at times — procrastinating to the last minute and then making a frantic dash

when we’re really desperate.

So the first thing we need to do when procrastination strikes, says Fiore, is tame our fear through more effective self-talk. This helps lower the board back to the ground, or at least create a virtual safety net so we’re not being controlled by a fear of falling to our death. Then we can get a task going before any fires start!

Embrace Unpleasant ObligationsFiore suggests that one way we can lower the board back to Earth is by embracing our obligations completely, even the ones that make us uncomfortable. This starts by reframing our “I have to” tasks as “I am going to” choices.

“You do have a choice. You don’t have to want to do the task, nor do you have to love it. But if you prefer it to the consequences of not doing it, you can decide to commit to it wholeheartedly.” It really helps, Fiore notes, “to assert positively and powerfully” what you will be doing, such as: “‘I will be at the dentist’s at 3 p.m.’; ‘I am going to traffic court this morning.’” Because every time we say, “I have to” we’re effectively diminishing our power.

Here are a few more ideas from Fiore on how to change the way you talk to yourself:• Replace “I have to” with “I choose to.”• Replace “I must finish” with “When can I start?”

• Replace “This project is so big and important” with “I can take one small step.”• Replace “I must be perfect” with “I can be perfectly human.”• Replace “I don’t have time” with “I must take time.”• Replace “I wish I’d done that” with “What small step can I take now?”

Trade Perfectionism for PersistenceBecause perfectionism is such an important catalyst for procrastination, Fiore emphasizes the importance of reframing potential “mistakes” as opportunities for growth, learning and self-compassion.

“Replace demands for perfect work with acceptance of (not resignation to) your human limits,” he writes. “Accept so-called mistakes (really feedback) as part of a natural learning process. You need self-compassion rather than self-criticism to support your courageous efforts at facing the unavoidable risks of doing real, imperfect work rather than dreaming of the perfect, completed project.”

As you get more comfortable with the possibility of some imperfect early steps on your projects, Fiore notes, “you’ll be better prepared to bounce back because you’ll have a safety net of compassion.”

Get It on PaperHave you ever kept a log of how you spend your time? It’s a really powerful way to bring awareness to your routines. The simple act of logging your behavior dramatically alters it!

You’ll want to check out Fiore’s book for all his Big Ideas on how to leverage this simple yet effective practice of time-logging. For now, though, you might just try doing some mental tracking of your day and see if you can notice the events and feelings that precede negative habits. This alone can be a huge tool in switching to more productive activities and attitudes.

Reprogram your BrainFiore explains how when you change your thoughts, you also change your brain — and begin trading the tendencies of an overwhelmed “put it off” procrastinator to those of an effective “get it done” producer.

“Each time you choose to switch your energy from your procrastination self-talk to the language of the producer,” he explains, “you are wiring in a new track of brain cells — a new neural pathway in your brain. After you switch from the old path to the new several times, the new associations will strengthen, becoming easier to initiate, while the old ones will atrophy.”

In other words, when we consciously practice “producer” thoughts, we begin to rewire the neural circuits that have inclined us to procrastinate in the past. That, in turn, empowers us to regroove our consciousness in powerful ways.

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DUH!

Do you fly off the handle at the slightest provocation, or mount a major defense to even the slightest criticism? Here’s how to ditch the drama -- and manage a more measured response.

WHO’S OVERREACTING???!!!By Jon Spayde

Perhaps it was meant as a helpful suggestion. Maybe it was intended as a straight-up accusation or invitation to argue. Either way, if it sends you into emotional hyperspace, it will probably result in an ugly aftermath — a blowout with your spouse or a nasty encounter with a coworker. The resulting surge of stress hormones can leave everyone feeling shell-shocked. And harsh words spoken in haste can do lasting damage to your relationships. So how do you prevent spontaneous, seemingly uncontrollable overreactions from getting the better of you? According to Judith Siegel, PhD, LCSW, author of Stop Overreacting: Effective Strategies for Calming Your Emotions (New Harbinger, 2010), heeding “early warning signals” from our bodies can give us a chance to dampen emotional fires before they burn out of control.

Barriers to Overcome• The triggering emotions. There are four main triggers for overreaction, says Siegel: envy, rejection, resentment at being criticized and loss of control. Even the most seemingly benign interaction may spark one of these responses, triggering our fight-or-flight response and limiting our ability to react in a rational or constructive way.

• Black-or-white perception. As an emotional overreaction builds, you’re likely to see situations or people as either all good or all bad. “At those moments,” says Siegel, “it’s as if we had a two-drawer filing cabinet in our heads. When the ‘bad’ drawer is open, the ‘good’ one has to be closed. We can’t see any redeeming features in the situation or the other person.”

• Flooding. “In addition to dealing with the challenging moment at hand, you may find that every old and negative emotional memory associated with the situation floods over you,” Siegel explains. That can make the current situation seem bigger and more connected to higher stakes than it really is.

• Feeling entitled. The black-or-white response, intensified by “flooding,” can result in your feeling justified in having an outburst or other extreme reaction.

How to Cope• Notice the body’s signals. “Your neck may get tense, your heart may start to pound,” says Siegel. “Anxiety, which is a bodily response, may encourage

your thoughts to start racing. These are warning signals.” If you’re in tune with your body and recognize these signs, you’ll be better able to shift emotional gears and avoid overreacting.

• Breathe. Conscious breathing will help you interrupt the fight-or-flight response and give you a chance to shift out of overreaction mode. Practice deep breathing whenever you feel your body’s warning signals switch on.

• Assess your state. Feeling tired? Emotionally ragged? Experiencing low blood sugar? If so, Siegel suggests, it may be wise to withdraw from the situation and revisit the issue when you’re feeling more centered and self-composed.

• Name the emotions. Neurologically, overreaction is a loss of access to the left brain. “Naming the feeling that you’re having in the moment — anger, loss of self-esteem — requires reflection and searching the memory, and that’s a left-brain activity,” says Siegel. “It reestablishes the neural networks that connect left brain and right, and restores balance.”

• Recast criticism. “Strive to reframe less-than-positive input as useful information,” advises Siegel. In the face of criticism, ask yourself: What can I learn from this feedback? How can I use this information to improve myself or my situation? By asking constructive questions, you can turn what might have been battleground moments into learning opportunities.

Credit card debt is a common concern for many people who have not managed their finances as well as they could have or who are facing financial hardship due to the loss of a job or an unexpected emergency sapping funds. Credit card debt can be a real worry, but need not lead to bankruptcy. Really, it’s fairly simple to pay off as long as you stick to a plan and gradually reduce your debt.

First off, stop using your credit cards. There’s no need to create more debt for yourself and more you will have to pay off later.

After that, if you have multiple cards needing to be paid off, look at their interest rates and rank them from highest to lowest. Then, that’s the order you’re going to pay them off. Some people think it’s a good idea to start with the lowest to pay a card off entirely, but really that only makes you spend more money because you’ll continue to pay higher interest rates. Work on cutting down the cards with higher rates first so those lower ones won’t hurt

you as badly while they’re waiting to be paid.

Next, start making payments every other week instead of once a month, giving half of your monthly total with each payment. Getting into the habit of paying regularly helps trim down your debt and evens out your cash flow as most people are paid bi-weekly. Credit card companies charge interest daily, so by trimming off just a little bit of your debt sooner, you save yourself money on interest accumulated.

When deciding how much to pay, don’t go with the minimum. In all likelihood, it’ll take you forever to pay off what you owe and you’ll just end up owing more because of interest. Work out a budget that takes out a reasonable chunk of your debt each month but that works within your earnings and spending needs, and that also sets a reasonable target date for paying off all your debt.

Lastly, don’t be afraid to dip in to your savings account (in a bank, not an IRA or 401K) to help pay off credit card debt.

Do keep some an emergency fund or whatever you’re saving up for, but don’t be fooled that the interest it is earning in a savings account is worth keeping it there for. Credit card debt interest is very high, and anything you can do to accumulate less interest will go a long ways towards erasing debt and minimizing your payments.

How to Pay Credit Card Debt

Our ProcessWe partner with professional residential maid services who are insured and bonded to participate in our foundation. The companies have agreed to take 2 patients at a time and offer four free general cleanings – one a month for four months as a way to give back to their community.

We limit the amount of applications that we accept on a daily basis Monday through Friday. The applications can be filled in online by women with any type of cancer as long as they are currently under cancer treatment. In 2011, the American Cancer Society estimates there will be 750,000 first time diagnosis of cancer in women over the age of 18. We have over 800 maid services participating in our program nationwide, however, resources are limited and we are experiencing huge demand.

The professional residential cleaning companies that participate in our program do not receive payment for their services. These small business owners agree to take a minimum two patients at a time, pay their employees to perform the work, and absorb the cost of materials and supplies. They have a heart for assisting women in cancer treatment and provide this service as a way to give back to their local communities.

Step 1 - Check to see if we have a participating maid service in your geographical area by clicking the locations tab on our main website. Click the state in which you reside on the pink U.S. map or if you reside in Canada, click the Canadian map. This will take you to a list of the cities where we currently have partner maid services affiliated with our foundation. Not all cities are served even though we do add approximately 25 – 35 new partners each month.

Step 2 - If you are a qualified cancer patient fill out the online application under the cancer patient tab on our main website. Fill in the required information. When you submit, the online process will inform you if a maid service covers your area. In large metropolitan areas, some maid services

limit the distance they will travel to the area they normally serve.

Step 3 - If your registration is successful and we have a partner in your area, some additional questions will be asked and you will be prompted to agree to a service waiver.

Step 4 - The final step in the registration process will be to have your doctor fax verification that you are currently in cancer treatment. The fax number is listed on the final page of the application process. We do not need a record of your diagnosis or any specific medical information. A note from your doctor’s office stating your name and that you are under cancer treatment will suffice.

Step 5 - Cleaning For A Reason will contact the maid service in your area on your behalf. The maid service will then contact you directly to schedule your cleanings.

Naturally, as with any non-profit organization, the demand far exceeds our ability to serve but we attempt to match as many patients as possible who go through our application process. Since our maid services are businesses, they schedule you within their normal paying customers. Sometimes our maid services are handling the maximum amount of patients already and we have to inform you that they are full. If this happens, you will have to reapply at a future date.

We hope, as do all our partners, that we are able to serve you. We also hope that during this life crisis situation that you or your loved one fully recovers. We also hope that someday, an organization such as ours has no need to exist. But until then we will attempt to serve you the best way that we can.

Cleaning for a ReasonFree professional housecleaning and maid services

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