Are you caught in a career "cul de sac"?

You drag yourself into the office each morning and count the minutes till the day is OVER. Should you stay in your job or is time to GO?

How to go-Gracefully
So you've decided to resign; here's how to make the break without being booed out of the office:

1.Don't use your resignation as an opportunity to tell your colleagues what you really think of them. You never know when you may work with, or for them again.

2.Do thank your boss for her/his help and guidance during your at the company. It's a small gesture that she/he will remember when it's time to write your reference.
3.Do volunteer to help find your replacement and to train her/his up before you leave.
4.Don't slack off. Sure, your heart may not be in it, but you're still getting paid to do the best job possible. What a better way to leave a position lasting impression?
5.Don't suddenly come down with a mysterious illness during your last few days on the job.
6.Do remember that a bad attitude before your departure can undo years of good work.

Father's care

Involvement, influence, and affection: three keys to father-child relationships. Though they may sometimes find it difficult to express their feelings, most fathers care about their children and families.

In a 1980 Gallup poll, six out of ten fathers said their families were "the most important element of my life at this time." Only 8 percent said their families were unimportant to them. When asked what they found most satisfying about their families, fathers rated "children," "closeness," and "being together" as personally important. [1]

This hearty endorsement of family life contradicts some of the traditional roles or popular images of fathers in our society:

The Wallet: This father is preoccupied with providing financial support for his family. He may work long hours to bring home his paycheck and does not take an active part in caring for the children. Making money provides this father with a distraction from family involvement.

The Rock: This is a "tough" father - strict on discipline and in charge of the family. He may also believe that a good father remains emotionally distant from his children, so expressions of affection are taboo.


The Dagwood Bumstead: This father tries to be a "real pal" to his children, but his efforts are often clumsy or extreme. He doesn't understand his children and feels confused about what to do. He may also feel that he is not respected within the family.These traditional stereotypes are now clashing with another image of a father:

The Caregiver: This father tries to combine toughness with tenderness. He enjoys his children but is not afraid to set firm but fair limits. He and his wife may cooperate in childrearing and homemaking.

This type of father has always been around. But the number of men who choose this role is increasing. Many fathers today recognize that family life can be rewarding and that their children need their involvement.

This shift in roles is influenced by two major social changes: the increase in the number of women working and the rising divorce rate. As more and more mothers join the work force, fathers are being asked to take on more responsibilities at home. In 1979, 40 percent of the mothers of children under age 3 were employed.[2] Instead of remaining on the fringe of family life, many fathers are helping more with child care and housekeeping.
Fathers are also profoundly influenced by the escalating divorce rate.[3] For every two marriages there is now one divorce - a tripling of the divorce rate between 1960 and 1980. If they are not directly involved in a divorce, most men have friends who are. They witness the loss their friends have experienced and reexamine the importance of their own family relationships. Remarriage and stepfathering are also creating new challenges for many fathers.

Because of these changes in our society, many men are being forced to develop family relationships that are quite different from those they had with their own fathers. They cannot easily fall back on their own childhood experiences for guidance. What worked very well for their fathers 20 or 30 years ago may not work at all with the kinds of challenges fathers face today.

These changes in social attitudes mean that men have more options for meeting their obligations as fathers and husbands. Some men will express their feelings more openly, while others will be more reserved; some will enjoy the companionship and play of very young children, while others will prefer involvement with older sons and daughters. Fathers do not have to try to fit a certain stereotyped pattern.

According to sociologist Lewis Yablonsky, a man's fathering style is influenced by some or all of the following forces: his enthusiasm for being a father, his own father's behavior, the images of how to be a father projected by the mass media, his occupation, his temperament, the way family members relate to each other, and the number of children he has.[4] No single style of fathering or mothering, no matter how ideal it appears, is right for everyone.

Regardless of their personal style, most fathers are interested in having a satisfying relationship with their children. Although they might not be able to put it into words, most fathers know they are important to their children. According to psychotherapist Will Schutz, a good relationship needs three things: involvement, respect and influence, and affection.[5]

Involvement: The Foundation of a Relationship

The first step in any relationship is the feeling by both persons that the other is interested in them and wants to be with them.
Many fathers begin to prepare for this kind of relationship before their child is even born. A father who seeks involvement is interested in his wife's pregnancy and makes preparations for the child's birth. When the child is born he is eager to hold the infant. In countless small ways, this father demonstrates involvement - he may gently touch and play with his children, hold and talk to them. By doing these things he sends a clear and emphatic message:

I want to be your father. I am interested in you. I enjoy being with you. You and I have a relationship that is important to me.

Every child wants to sense this type of involvement from his or her father and mother. Without it, a child feels isolated and rejected. The foundation of the relationship crumbles.

What the Research Shows
Research on father-child involvement demonstrates that [6]:

(1) Fathers are significant for children;

(2) Fathers are sensitive to children;

(3) Fathers play with children differently than mothers do.

These differences in play continue as the child grows older. Fathers may vigorously bounce and lift a 1- or 2-year-old in rough and tumble physical play; mothers may prefer to play conventional games like "peek-a-boo," offer an interesting toy, or read. Fathers' play appears to be more physically stimulating while mothers are more interested in teaching.

As a result, children seem to prefer fathers as play partners, though in a stressful situation they may be more likely to turn to their mothers. This preference could be due to fathers spending a greater proportion of their time playing with their children than mothers. One researcher noted that about 40 percent of a father's time with his young children was spent in play in contrast to about 25 percent of the mother's time. Even though fathers may spend less total time in play than mothers, their type of play and their apparent interest in that type of involvement make them attractive play partners.

There are, of course, exceptions to this pattern. Some men simply do not enjoy playing with children, and some mothers may prefer an arousing, physical form of child play. Also, when both parents work, the additional demands on the family could affect the amount of time one or both parents spend enjoying their children.

Suggestions for Fathers

How can fathers become more involved with their children? First, they can give each of their children exclusive attention as often as possible. During their time together fathers could enjoy their children's company without allowing outside distractions to interfere. As a result, their children would feel noticed and special. There is no single formula for how this might be accomplished. A father and child might play, talk, learn a skill or read together. What is important is that they notice each other and acknowledge a common interest. This type of undistracted attention promotes a sense that each is important to the other.

Fathers might also give their children a glimpse of their work world. Children want to know what life is like outside the home and what their parents do at work. Many farm families and small businesses include their children in the operation at an early age. Parents in other occupations may find it more difficult to give their children a glimpse of their work, but even brief visits or tours will help.

Business and industry are gradually beginning to acknowledge that many workers are parents too, and that adjustment in this role can have a positive effect on work performance. Some industries provide day care centers for children of their employees. Both mothers and fathers are able to visit their children during breaks.

Double Standard

A high school student who has already slept with 10 people enters a new school. What people will say about this person's sexual experiences depends on one factor: gender.
If this person is a male, he will be admired by his fellow males, and perhaps even desired by females. Guys will respect him and girls will be impressed by his experience. He is generally referred to as "the player."

However, if this person is a girl she will most likely be subjected to ridicule and disrespect by her peers. Males will try to use her, hoping that they can get her into bed, and females will despise her out of disgust, or in some cases, jealousy. She is generally referred to as "the slut."
"It's a huge double standard. If you're a guy and you sleep with everyone you're automatically cool. If you're a girl and you sleep with everyone you're automatically a slut," said Bianca Penaloza, a senior at Coral Gables High in South Miami.

This player vs. slut philosophy is familiar to most students, and although no one girl deserves to be treated cheaply, the media repeatedly emits messages that this dangerous double standard is correct and should not be challenged.

"What the media is trying to tell us is that if girls are 'bad' or sexually promiscuous it's OK to punish them," said Kim Walsh-Childers, a professor of journalism at the University of Florida who studies the portrayal of women in the media. "They're saying, 'we have no sympathy for you.' "

Although the media want women to be pure, they also want them to be sexy. Advertisements, television shows and movies often only feature overly thin, impossibly beautiful women to promote their product or program. In a 1986 study by Silverstein, Peterson, Perdue and Kelly, 69 percent of female television characters are thin and only 5 percent are overweight. These contradictory images leave some teenage girls confused about which path is the norm, and how each girl should behave.

Men translate only one message from the media: you are not cool if you don't have sex.
"I cannot think of one male hero or main character who is not sexually active," Walsh-Childers said. "Except if the character is a nerd. They want you to think that the only boys not having sex are the nerds who cannot get anyone to sleep with them."

Therefore, it is no wonder that men are praised for their sexual achievements. "Everybody has a fantasy about having all the girls, so other guys look up to guys who sleep around," said Bill Ferrara, senior at Gulf Breeze High .

Women still cannot win. With two pictures of how a woman should behave -- seductive or chaste - teenage girls are set up to feel shameful no matter which image they choose to mimic.
For example, Bill, the same teenager that just related that guys look up to the "player" figure in school, said, "Every guy wants a girl who's pure."

Kim Davis, a junior at Gulf Breeze High, said, "In school, people look down on girls who are considered trashy. But girls also get ragged on for being too much of a prude. Guys will say, 'Oh, why can't you just loosen up and have a little fun.'"

The 1996 slasher film parody, Scream, is a prime example of the attitudes towards women that people deem "slutty." Tatum, the provocative and sexually promiscuous best-friend character, is one of the first to be murdered by a pair of psychotic teenage killers.

As Randy, another Scream character points out, to survive a typical slasher movie a girl should never have sex. Only the virgin survives. This theme is also carried out through other horror movies like Halloween.

Meanwhile, the supposed Scream "good girl" survivor and virgin, Sidney, is a model of beauty and sexiness. Her dress is at times revealing and she fits the American beauty standard. She keeps her boyfriend in sexual frustration while never actually giving up her virginity.
Ironically, the same purity that women are expected to posses is also what potentially makes them unattractive and boring.

James Bond films also illustrate the difference between sexually active men and sexually active women. The plot of many Bond films center around the fact that he sleeps with six or seven different women throughout the film. "He is rewarded for this behavior, not punished," Walsh-Childers said.

The media also sends other double standards into the minds of women. When one pictures the physical appearance of the so-called perfect woman, there are not a great deal of physical characteristics to choose from, Walsh-Childers said. The media only sends women one type of woman to aspire to look like. They send the supermodel image; tall, thin, with flawless skin and hair.

Men, on the other hand, can look any number of ways and still fit into the male beauty standard because the media does not send audiences only one type of man, Walsh-Childers said. "There is a broader range of what is accepted to be a sex symbol as a male. You can be older, heavier, or bald."

Many young women believe older men such as Robert Redford, Sean Connery, and Richard Gere are viable sex symbols. It is not as common for men to find sexual appeal in older women.
Music videos are a very common place where women are objectified while men are heroes. In music videos by male artists, they depict a story which is commonly a male fantasy. In the video, the singer always gets the girl. Moreover, the women are not presented as much more than sexual objects. They are always willing and interested in sex, and that is the only function they serve. They never reject the male, "no matter how unattractive they are, no matter how much of a jerk they are," said Walsh-Childers.

Television has an enormous influence on men and women perceptions in society. In soap operas, the seductive women are often also the villains. The audience is drawn to be attracted to her, but at the same time, hate her for her enticing qualities. Other studies show that there are more employed male personas on television than there are women. The thoughts and ideas transmitted through television, movies, music videos and advertisements are designed to be easily soaked up by the minds of Americans everywhere, especially teens. Walsh-Childers said these double standards -- which have been blamed for damaging female self-esteem and self-image -- did not originate in the media, but the media reinforces them.

"Women are no longer going to have any self-esteem, which could lead to things like drugs and suicide. Girls may end up having sex for all the wrong reasons," said junior Krista Cole of Bloomingdale High School in Valrico.

Tips for a Good Husband and Wife Relationship

Human nature tends to let down it’s guard and act it’s worst around those who we are most familiar with. How you really are is the way you act towards others that you know the best - which are typically those of your own home.

The following are tips for husbands and wives that I have been working on in my own home, and I hope you find them helpful.

1. Always say please and thank you.

2. Never demand anything one of another, but ask kindly with respect - like you would from anyone else out side the home.

3. Husbands, you don’t own your wife, so don’t act like it. Don’t be bossy and overbearing and order them around like a slave. Support them as the physically weaker vessel (1Pet 3:7) and love them and give yourself for them like Christ gave himself for the church (Eph 5:25). Wives submit to your own husband in temporal matters as it is fitting in the Lord (Col 3:18), however, in spiritual matters Christ is your head not your husband. Men are not the head of women but husbands are the head of their wives (the relationship denotes the headship is concerning temporal matters). Christ is head of the Church (the relationship denotes Christ is the head of women concerning spiritual matters) and in Christ Jesus there is neither male or female (Gal 3:28).

4. Wives don’t nag your husbands. If they have been too busy to get something done that is important to you, and you have already asked them a number of times, try asking them after you have done something nice for them. Or ask if there is anything you can do to help them get started on their project. You will find this goes over much better then telling them “I have been asking for two months now to fix the leaking tap. When are you ever going to get this done? It is so hard to get you to do anything around here!”

5. Husband, thank your wife for each meal, when laundry is done and for how well your clothes have been folded, and when the home is cleaned and what a clean house she keeps. Wives, when you husband fixes something around the home thank him, and when he brings home his check tell him what a good provider he is.

6. Each day ask the other if there is anything you can do for them.

7. You both need to be patient with eachother’s weaknesses and faults. You should not make a practice of pointing out eachothers faults over and over. Remember that love will cover a multitude of faults. Deal with the other’s faults the way you want them to deal with yours.

8. Be always seeking what you can put into the marriage - not what you can get out of it. 9. Make a practice of trying to give into eachother when there are differences. That way when you really feel strong about something, your spouse will not have such a hard time giving into you.

10. Pray daily for each other and carry a burden for eachother’s spiritual welfare.

11. Have family devotions together each morning - even if it is only 5 or 10 minutes.

12. Keep a list of the things your spouse asks you to do on the cork board. When you spouse asks you to do something make sure you put it on your list and put a date beside it so you know how long it has been there. Cross off the items on the list as you do them. It is okay to offer to do something on your list if your spouse will do something on their list.

13. Never discuss each others past faults and mistakes in front of other people. While your spouse may laugh along with you and not say anything about it later, you may have hurt them deep down.

14. Don’t allow a disagreement to escalate into an argument and certainly not in public or in front of your children.

15. If you get into a charged disagreement with your spouse that digresses to a point where you are bringing up each others faults and failures, it is best to end the conversation with prayer and set a time to discuss the issue the following day. Before you enter into discussion you should lay some guidelines for resolving conflicts. You should also pray apart to make sure you have grace and then pray together before you start the discussion and ask God to give you both grace to conduct the discussion in a godly manner.

Baby's Little Smiles: Building a Relationship with Mom

23-10-08_1418
by chitot (He is my lovely son)

It’s probably not surprising that mothers excel at recognizing and interpreting the moods and emotions of their infants. Although infants can’t speak, mothers seem to know what their babies are thinking: they smile when their baby smiles and they frown when their baby is upset. Research suggests that the mother’s ability to understand the needs of her infant is very important for establishing a secure mother-infant relationship. However, the neural mechanisms that underlie these behaviors are poorly understood. Such knowledge is crucial for understanding normal as well as abusive and neglectful mothering.

Maternal Rewards
In recent years, several studies have been carried out using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to better understand how a mother’s brain responds to her own child’s cues. The most recent, led by neuroscientist Lane Strathearn and colleagues at Baylor College of Medicine, investigated what happens inside the brain of a mother when she looks at the facial expressions of her own infant. In the study, 28 first-time mothers were shown pictures of their seven-month old child that they had never seen before. (The pictures were taken when the mother was not present.) The pictures spanned a wide range of human emotion and included images of the child making happy, sad or neutral faces. These pictures were then matched with images of an unknown infant. The central finding was that seeing the happy face of the mother’s own infant activated all of the key areas in the brain associated with reward processing. These regions include the ventral tegmental area, substantia nigra and the striatum. This finding suggests that for mothers the sight of their smiling baby is a potent reward and represents a uniquely pleasurable experience. Furthermore, this neural response was graded, so that happy faces led to more activation than neutral faces. Sad faces generated the least activation. In other words, the response of mothers in their reward areas seemed to directly mirror the emotions the infant displayed. The argument put forth by Strathearn and colleagues is that maternal behavior is fundamentally rooted in these reward areas. Positive sensory cues from infants, such as a smiling facial expression, stimulate dopamine release and thus promote responsive maternal care. However, many questions remain. In their paper, Strathearn et al. do not discuss the significance of the orbitofrontal cortex, although its activity was clearly influenced in the experiment by seeing one’s own infant’s compared with an unknown infant. The importance of the orbitofrontal cortex shouldn’t be too surprising, as this brain area is believed to receive ascending dopamine projections from reward areas and is critical in representing the “value” of a reward. Other studies have also demonstrated that the orbitofrontal cortex is correlated with the positive feelings of the mother, suggesting that it plays a key role in modulating maternal behavior.

Is the Smile Enough?
This study also raises a more fundamental question: is the infant smile the most important element for motivating maternal behavior? It goes without saying that the smiling face of one’s own baby is highly rewarding and encourages maternal care. On the other hand, babies aren’t always smiling and mothers must also learn to respond to infants in distress. In fact, a human mother’s response to an infant in distress is a good indicator of how responsive she is to other infant cues. Studies also show that abusive and neglectful mothers show less empathy and more aversive feelings towards a crying infant when compared with nurturing mothers, suggesting that how a mother reacts to a baby when it’s upset and not smiling is a crucial test of maternal behavior.

According to our own recent work, the orbitofrontal cortex and striatum were more activated in the brain of a mother when she looked at her own infant compared with other infants regardless of the infant’s situation or mood. These brain areas also showed a greater activation when mothers were viewing their infant when he or she was crying (the distressed condition) as opposed to when he or she was happy (the play situation). This discovery makes sense, as a distressed baby might require more effort and thought as the mother must quickly identify the source of the distress and respond appropriately. Another reason to highlight the importance of the orbitofrontal cortex in guiding maternal behavior is that, in our experiment, the activity of this brain area showed a positive correlation not only with pleasurable feelings but also the anxious feelings experienced by the mother. Of course, these anxious feelings are important for maternal care, as anxiety and worry can be powerful motivators. Taken together, these findings suggest that maternal behavior is guided by elaborate and complex neural mechanisms. Although reward processing is clearly an important part of this mental process—it seems to mediate maternal love and feelings of joy—other mechanisms are required in order to explain the full range of the mother-infant relationship.

In conclusion, a smiling face of a mother’s own infant is certainly rewarding and it motivates maternal care, but this is not the only motivator. We hope that in the future other aspects of maternal behavior—such as the maternal desire to protect her infant, which is a biologically essential mechanism for preservation of the species—will get investigated and explored.

SOURCE: Scientific American

Faithfulness – the bedrock of marriage

I GET very perturbed by my friends who betray their spouse by getting involved in extramarital affairs.

Such a thing as having a fling is seldom heard of in the closely-knit rural communities in Sarawak. In Kuching city and large towns though, extramarital affairs are top on the topics of private conversations, especially when they involve prominent personalities.

Although I know some married women also engage in some extracurricular activities outside their marriage for various reasons, it seems to me that there are more men cheating on their wives than women on their husbands.

I have been observing this phenomenon in Kuching city coldly from the sideline of the social scene for years.

Usually, successful married businessmen in their approaching middle age are most susceptible to the seduction of wily younger women. Perhaps they just want to make up for the indulgences of their youth which they had denied themselves in their struggle in the business world. Perhaps, having a mistress is a status symbol. Many will use the excuse that their wife does not treat them well at home.

One day quite a few years ago, I was taken aback when the girl nicknamed Adif told me about her latest boyfriend, a married man who went by the initial MK. Adif was 24, plump, and apparently attractive to a lot of men with roving eyes. After she failed Form Five, she had never held down a steady job. Yet she was a constant guest at many of the entertainment outlets in Kuching city. How she managed to live the good life was anybody’s guess.

This new boyfriend was very nice to her, setting up a small business for her, buying her a set of new furniture for her house in Petra Jaya, and a new car even for her pleasure.

In the two years of their clandestine relationship that I knew of, they had vicious fights like all couples. Inevitably, the man would pine for her, and begged for her forgiveness. Then, they would make up with him buying her more gifts and taking her out to posh entertainment places.

One Hari Raya day, this man invited all his friends in a group to his open house for a festive visit. Adif and I were present too.

It was a large house in Petra Jaya, with a front yard that could accommodate 10 cars at least. The lady of the house came to welcome the guests, and served them food and drink, and entertained them with small talk.

It was the first time that I met our hostess. She was still very attractive, and although she had had 3 or 4 children, she still had the figure that was the envy of many women. She was well educated, had a professional job of her own, and could speak good English. Her social grace and good breeding exuded in the way she received her visitors.

She was obviously not aware that the competitor for her husband’s love was present, even when Adif was very uncomfortable and fidgeted with her mobile phone all the time like a sulking teenager.

The surreal cruelty of the mundane Hari Raya scene suddenly struck at a deep chord in my heart.

Obviously, MK’s wife was such a nice wife that would make any man happy. She was many times the better mate than Adif, in looks, in her fashion sense, in carriage, in social stature, and in refinement of character.

Why would her husband betray her?

Then I began to imagine her anguish, her pain, and her disappointment when she eventually found out her husband’s extramarital affair. (The wife always does in the end, one way or another.) My experience with observing this distasteful business is that the wronged wife will lose a great deal of weight in the ensuring fits of dark depression.

Then I also started to imagine the sense of isolation, dejectedness, and resentment to be felt by the children, as their happy universe began to collapse from the constant fights between their parents. A wall would descend between them and their father for life.

Inevitably, there would be an excruciating protracted legal process leading to a divorce. Nobody would come out a winner.

These dark thoughts went through my mind as I sat there in my guilt and misery. My hostess was especially friendly to me, as if she wanted to ask me something. If she asked, I would have told her the truth.

After that day, I distanced myself from any girl like Adif and her illicit beau. It was a bad scene best to be avoided. I have not heard of them since.

To some people, secret extramarital affairs may be exciting and glamorous, because the forbidden fruit is always seductive from the time of Adam and Eve.

But my advice to myself and to all of you ladies and gentlemen out there is

this: Don’t ever do it. It is not worth the pain afterwards. Above all, it hurts too many innocent people whom you really love. Source HERE

Health news in brief: Napping improves memory

TAKING a nap — even a short one — may boost a sophisticated kind of memory that helps us see the big picture and get creative.

The findings, revealed at the Society for Neuroscience conference in the United States, said that interrupting sleep seriously disrupts memory.

Researchers said that our brains can keep on working while we are asleep to solve problems and come up with new ideas.

Researchers noted that more common than insomnia is fragmented sleep — the easy awakening that comes with ageing, or, worse, the sleep apnea that afflicts millions, who quit breathing for 30 seconds or so.

Fragmented sleep, whether from ageing or apnea, can suppress the birth of new brain cells in the hippocampus, where memory-making begins — enough to hinder learning weeks after sleep returns to normal.
Scientists are increasingly focusing less on sleep duration and more on the quality of sleep, what's called sleep intensity, in studying how sleep helps the brain process memories so they stick. Particularly important is "slow-wave sleep", a period of very deep sleep that comes earlier than better-known REM sleep, or dreaming time.

Good sleep is a casualty of our 24/7 world. Surveys suggest few adults attain the recommended seven to eight hours a night. Over time, a chronic lack of sleep can erode the body in ways that leave us more vulnerable to heart disease, diabetes and other illnesses.

Face-to-face buggy is better

BABY buggies which face forwards may stunt children's development and turn them into anxious adults. Infants suffer more stress and sometimes even "trauma" in modern buggies with seats facing away from their parent.

Researchers at Dundee University in Scotland said children found it difficult to get their parents' attention and were spoken to only rarely, at a stage of life when youngsters thrive on interaction.

In contrast, children in traditional parent-facing buggies were more likely to laugh, listen to their mothers talking and to sleep — indicating lower stress levels.

They observed 2,722 parents in Britain and found that parents were more than twice as likely to talk to their child if they used a face-to-face buggy — 25 per cent against 11. The study involved 20 babies being pushed across a town centre, 0.8km facing forwards and 0.8km facing the pusher.

Only one baby laughed during the away-facing journey, while half laughed during the face-to-face journey. The researchers said parent-child interactions are crucial at a time when brain connections are multiplying rapidly.



Ban on fast-food ads may reduce childhood obesity

A BAN on fast-food commercials could put a significant dent in the problem of childhood obesity. It could reduce the number of obese young children by 18 per cent, and the number of obese older kids by 14.

Researchers at City University of New York also suggested that ending an advertising expense tax deduction for fast-food restaurants could mean a slight reduction in childhood obesity.

The new study — published in the Journal of Law & Economics — is based in part on several years of government survey data from the late 1990s that involved in-person interviews with thousands of US families. The researchers used a statistical test that presumes TV ads lead to obesity but made calculations to address other influences such as income and the number of nearby fast-food restaurants.

They also took steps to account for the possibility that some children may already have been overweight and inactive regardless of their TV-watching habits.



Brisk walk reduces choc craving

CHOCOHOLICS looking to curb their chocolate urges may be able to do so simply by taking a brisk 15-minute walk. Chocolate is likely the most commonly and intensely craved food, and chocolate urges are often triggered by boredom, stress or the desire to uplift mood or increase alertness.

Previous studies have shown that short bouts of exercise, such as brisk walking, can also improve alertness and mood, and reduce sugar snack urges.

The latest findings by researchers at School of Sport and Health Sciences at the University of Exeter in Britain revealed that exercise also appeared to lessen participants' increase cravings.

They enlisted 20 women and five men (25 years old on average) who reported eating at least two chocolate bars daily to abstain from eating chocolate for three days.

The participants also abstained from caffeine products and exercise for two hours prior to undergoing each of two testing scenarios — either 15 minutes of brisk walking or sitting quietly for 15 minutes. After each scenario, participants completed a mentally arousing task.

Post scenario testing showed being sedentary "did nothing to reduce chocolate cravings, whereas doing a 15-minute walk reduced urges to eat chocolate". — Agencies

I'm every woman: Older, wiser and ... calmer?

ON a clear day, you can see forever, they say. But even when the sky is a calm, clean azure, eternity may still elude you as you’d have been severely blinded by the folly of youth and its tempestuous nature.


Raise a hand, people, if you have in your younger and not necessarily wiser days made decisions or “grand gestures” that you now sorely regret.

I have done this hand over fist and I must admit that not all of my moves of years ago have been slick or smart.

Now that I am convinced I am pretty much mellowed, I often wonder how life would have turned out if I had not done this or made that.

Entertaining these thoughts is probably an exercise in futility because, of course, no one can turn back the clock. Not that I want to but the “what ifs” can be mystifying.
This is the very reason why I cannot quite forget this movie I saw and recommended to friends years ago titled Sliding Doors.

It is about how differently your life might have been played out should you have chosen one path as opposed to the other at the crossroads in your life.

The movie is told in two parallel versions, one which sees the lead character catching her train ride home which led to a hazardous turn of events when she sees her boyfriend with his ex-lover. The other sees her missing the train and coming home much later, oblivious to the tryst between her beau and his paramour. I found the tale disturbing because it suggested many things, among which is the fact what we don’t know won’t hurt.

But given my “let’s face the music right here and now” nature, I’d rather know the worst and the sooner the better, rather than be left in the dark.

But I have digressed, of course. What had started me thinking about Sliding Doors once again was that quite recently, I have seen deep regret etched on the faces of people I know who had, in the heat of the moment long ago, made life-changing decisions.

At the engagement of a friend’s daughter not too long ago, I saw remorse in the eyes of her former husband when he watched with a heavy heart the betrothal of his little girl now grown up.

He was a mere guest in that ceremony when he could have had the role of the beaming host and proud papa, of course. The marriage had broken down when the children were little and who is to know if the union could have been salvaged if the couple had been a decade and a bit older?

I won’t be surprised if the chap was kicking himself hard for the follies of his youth, now that his fine looks had faded away somewhat. Sorry but I’ve always believed that wrinkles and white hair will always bring a person a notch or two down to earth. It applies both ways, by the way.

On another occasion, at the wedding of a relative’s daughter recently, the mother of the bride became tearful when her ex-husband turned up with his wife. She had issued the invitation, of course, for her daughter’s sake, but the sight of that familiar face must have brought back a flood of fond memories.

Interestingly, the chap was just as affected. He hung around all of us and unabashedly admitted that he missed the family as it is close-knit like no other, he said.

Now, if looks could kill, he would have keeled over cold right there as his present wife wasn’t amused at all by this show of affection. But that’s another story altogether!

The thing is, could we and would we give love rats or skirt-chasing cads a second chance if we’d stopped to count sheep instead of sending them straight to the “slaughterhouse”?

I’ve had my share of rows with loved ones and as if it were yesterday, I can still recall the blinding rage and indignance you feel when you know you’ve been wronged.

No, the gamut of emotions one feels in the high noon of our youths and under such circumstances do not always include being forbearing or tolerant.

We would be given to acts of pride, foolishly at times but that’s how it is, fellas. When the executioner sings her song, there may be no turning back.

We might then live to only pine and ponder over what might have been if we had stopped ourselves in our tracks before making crushing decisions but for most women, it is well worth the pain of the aftermath because it is crucial for their self-esteem.

No, many of us may not need a clear day to see forever because we simply believe there is a silver lining behind the clouds...