The fact that the same set of circumstances tend to impact one person so differently from another, and that what should be an obvious and logical conclusion is often rendered redundant is what can trouble experts.

The Obesity Paradox is one such conundrum that we don’t understand about the human body and its intricate systems.

The Obesity Paradox or Reverse epidemiology as it is also termed is a medical hypothesis which holds that obesity and high cholesterol may, contrary to what is commonly understood, be protective and associated with greater survival in certain groups of people, such as very elderly individuals or those with certain chronic diseases.

According to this, it is postulated that normal to low body mass index or normal values of cholesterol may be detrimental and associated with higher mortality in people with no symptoms.

The obesity paradox shows that people who have chronic disease and are obese as well, have a higher chance of survival than do others. This goes against everything that we have been told about high cholesterol and being overweight are bad for us and our health and leading to premature death.

So in fact the very thing that is understood to be the major risk factor in developing cardiovascular diseases includes hypertension, chronic renal failure and coronary heart disease, that is obesity is seen to be actually protective and is associated with better survival rates.

While the findings based on the Obesity Paradox could well impact the way that doctors and medical practitioners offer treatment, it is unlikely that obese people are going to be advised to go off their diets any time soon.

Critics of the Obesity Paradox pooh-pooh these findings as being contrary to what we understand about the workings of the body and also that the studies conducted are not significant enough to be representative of populations at large.

Also it was found that the Obesity Paradox does not apply to the very obese among us; for them, the risk of dying from heart disease again rises.

The obesity paradox is also explained away by some experts as simply being the evidence of better nutrition and nourishment which results in better health and immunity rather than any round about connection between obesity resulting in better survival rates.

• Have a massage; this will help relax your tight muscles.
• Apply liniment lotion to the affected area; the heat absorbed will relieve the pain.
• Apply warm compress for 10 to 15 minutes, this will dilate the blood vessels and increase blood circulation in the area and ease the discomfort and if injury is present this will also promote healing.
• Plan your exercise program so that you have rest days to allow your body and muscles to recover from the strain.
• Deal with your stress by doing stretching if you have a sedentary work, have a weekly relaxing activity like watching a movie, a visit to the spa or simply go out of town to sit down and relax, read your favorite book, paint or take photographs.
• Keep your body well hydrated to maintain the fluids and electrolytes in your body because cramps and muscle pain may sometime signal a body with too much potassium levels due to lack of water.
• If all these do not relieve the pain take your muscle relaxant and if it does not work go visit your doctor.

Many religions put a ritualistic emphasis on fasting and there is the understanding that fasting can not only help the body but can also help a person make certain spiritual gains.

Fasting has been common among most populations of the world from ancient times. According to many modern experts as well, fasting is good for a number of different reasons:

Fasting helps rest the system: Our intake everyday causes our digestive system undergo the process of digestion several times each day.

Fasting for a period is thought to offer some rest and respite for the body’s systems. This is also thought to provide time for the system to heal and rejuvenate itself.

Cleansing and elimination of toxins: Fasting is thought to cleanse the body of toxins and help flush them out. This is particularly true in the case of water fasting, so that the system is flushed and cleansed of toxins and other harmful substances.

Even the mind can get help achieve greater clarity with fasting, it is claimed. According to some experts, fasting helps improve the health of the liver since it detoxifies the liver.

Helping one remain younger: For a long time now, it has been thought that the renewing and refreshing impact of fasting can help slow the aging process. This is probably because of the fact that fasting reduces glucose and insulin in the blood and therefore reduces oxidative stress on the body.

Good for the immune system: Since the intestines are also rested during a fast, this can help to increase the amount of good bacteria that lines the intestines helping to give a boost to the immune system.

Fasting can also increase white blood cell count according to some studies and this can help to destroy harmful bacteria in the body.

Good for weight loss: When you deprive your body of food it is natural to assume that the body will turn to fat stores for energy and start to break that down for use. This, according to some experts is the case and fasting can help you lose weight.

Chemical byproducts called chloramines can form in the water when the chlorine comes into contact with certain other things. If the water itself contains certain chemicals from the source, it could react with the chlorine. In addition, sweat from the body, urine and body waste as well as personal care products to be found in hair and on skin of swimmers could react with the chlorine.

Also in the case of indoor pools, there could be poor ventilation and so the chloramines can build up in the air – this can lead to respiratory problems. There could be particular problems with asthma sufferers who are advised to swim – these asthma sufferers are more prone to respiratory problems.

It is therefore advisable to keep pools clean so that fewer chloramines develop – shower before a swim, do not pee in the pool (even though Michael Phelps did it) – this can make pools cleaner and safer by reducing chloramines.

This was a term coined by Sara Bird, British business woman who saw a slim woman in the mirror even though at 5 feet 10 inches and 238 pounds, she was seriously overweight.

As a successful business woman, she had convinced herself that she was slim and in control when in fact the opposite was true.

It happens to most of us. We start out not having any weight issues as a young person. As the years go by, the weight begins to pile on.

It is slow and almost indiscernible process; you are healthy and always had a normal body weight and never had any reason to question that.

It is perhaps a sedentary lifestyle, or unwise food choices or even childbirth that changed the way you used to be, but you didn’t realize when you went from fit to fat.

Step on the scales then and make sure that you are not going the fatorexia way; being overweight but unaware.

1. Exercise makes you fitter and consequently makes you feel sexy. They say the most potent sexual organ is between the ears; i.e. the brain! If you feel sexy you are sexy! It is as simple as that and this is what makes for a better time in bed!
2. Exercise improves sexual performance. Your stamina and endurance get a fillip with regular exercise. Also your strength and physical ability improve, which translates into better sex.
3. Since your energy levels also improve with regular exercise, you will be inclined to do it. More often and for longer durations as well!
4. You become more flexible with exercise. This opens up whole new possibilities for you in the bedroom. Inventive new positions and locations will suggest themselves with improved and greater physical control that is a consequence of exercise.
5. For men, exercise is seen to improve conditions such as erectile dysfunction. Very often erectile dysfunction is because of nothing but poor blood circulation. As exercise improves your blood circulation, so will it improve sexual function.
6. Exercising can keep you sexually young. Research has shown that seniors who exercise have a far better and more active sex life than those who do not. So with exercise, your sexual age can remain lower than your chronological age. Seniors who are more active report having sex as good as people decades younger than themselves.
7. Specific pelvic floor exercises such as Kegel are good for a number of reasons such as preventing incontinence and also for improving sexual performance. For women in particular performing these regularly can help to improve orgasmic responsiveness, and to intensify and strengthen orgasmic capabilities.
8. More exercise can have a positive impact on sex life in some real basic way as well: more exercise means a fitter and more attractive body, which in turn means more sex! It could be as simple as that really!
9. Exercise helps to release endorphins, which is the hormone that elevates mood and pleasure sensations. Associated with “runner’s high” endorphin release enhances your sex drive which means more frequent sex, better arousal and sensation, and more powerful orgasms.

• There are no large studies done on the subject of male anorexia because it is a phenomenon often dismissed due to “statistical infrequency”. However estimates suggest that as many as one fourth of anorexia sufferers may be males.
• Anorexia is thought of as a girl’s disease, so often warning signs of male anorexia may be discounted, ignored or even at times remain unacknowledged because of the stigma of a man having a ‘girl’s disease’. Medical practitioners may also be more skeptical, even dismissive of male anorexia. Because of this and other reasons, male anorexia takes twice as long to diagnose as does female anorexia.
• Anorexic men may sometimes be misdiagnosed as not having anorexia because physically they may not display many of the signs of anorexia such as thinness or emaciation. This is because the physical structure of men may cause them to retain some muscle even with an eating disorder and this may be misguiding in terms of diagnosing their eating disorder.
• Since men are not supposed to have their emotions impact their eating, they may be reluctant to acknowledge their problems and even more reluctant to get help. It would be an acknowledgement of weakness for many.
• Male anorexia is often misdiagnosed because men may not ‘starve’ themselves as women anorexics do and they may not lose weight in drastic amounts the way women may. This may be due to the fact that male anorexics may over exercise with the result that they may appear healthy and muscular even when they have an actual disorder.

Symptoms of Male Anorexia to watch out for:

• A sudden or noticeable weight loss or other physical change that may be noticed.
• Boys or men may display signs of compulsive exercising and also over exercising.
• Preoccupation with weight, body shape etc, to the extent of being obsessed with it.
• Self induced starvation and eating alone which however may not have as dramatic physical results as female anorexia.
• Tiredness or fatigue; mood swings or depression.
• Self isolation
• There may also be an implied or expressed fear of being fat or putting on weight.
• Vomiting, use of emetics and/or laxatives and diet pills
• Thinning hair
• Perfectionist behavior

If you are worried about a male who you think may have Male Anorexia, this quiz may help to confirm or allay your suspicions.

We have spoken before about the ways in which we can each of us make the effort to stay healthy at the workplace. Let us also examine how work related stress contributes to making one unhealthy and unfit:

It is more than just the fact that you sit before a computer all day and perhaps eat a lot of unhealthy and fat laden food that makes one likely to become over weight.

It is also the stress, anxiety and worry that are associated with the work place that can cause a person to gain weight.

There are several ways in which stress in the work place is a contributor to making you fat:

Sleep

If you are stressed at work, it is likely that you are stressing about work at home and are having difficulty falling asleep or getting good quality restful sleep.

Also if there is a lot of stress at work, it is likely that you are using caffeine to prop you up during the day and are drinking too much coffee. If so, that will be another contributing factor to getting inadequate sleep; which can impact so many different areas of your life negatively.

Stress and TV viewing

If you are stressed at work, it is very likely that you will come back home and want to unwind by just planting yourself in front of the TV.

You probably have neither an inclination nor the energy to get active and hit the gym or enjoy a brisk walk out doors. So if you are stressed and consequently you are watching too much TV, you are obviously less fit and less healthy.

The hormone cortisol

Stress and stressful situations are not bad per se; small amounts of stress can spur you to do better work and increase productivity. However chronic, recurring stress is bad because it increases production of the hormone cortisol in the body that triggers the fight or flight response in the body.

Cortisol is known to slow down the metabolism and make the body hold on to fat reserves; in particular abdominal fat which is the worst kind of fat. Stressful situations also make you crave food (comfort eating) and can alter blood sugar levels.

Obesity

research has shown that the hormones ghrelin and leptin are responsible for the feeling of fullness or satiety that comes after eating a meal. When the body is sleep deprived, it is likely to unbalance the production of these hormones and consequently one may overeat, leading to the pounds piling on.

Health problems

Fasting glucose impairment or pre-diabetes has been seen to be a problem with those who get less than 6 hours of sleep a night. People who get less sleep than they need are also at increased risk of heart disease and high blood pressure (hypertension).

Impact on the brain

In addition, the brain is also negatively impacted when one is sleep deprived. There is even a link found between sleep deprivation and the plaque accumulation in the brain that leads to Alzheimer’s disease.

Sleep deprivation also increases a person’s risk for certain addictions such as alcohol and drug abuse. One is also more at risk of suffering mood swings, depression and other mental problems due to sleep deprivation.

Impact on the immune system

The immune system itself is negatively impacted when one is sleep deprived making the body more susceptible to infections and to falling ill. Since resistance to disease and immunity is lowered significantly with sleep deprivation, the body is vulnerable to all kinds of illnesses.

Impact on fitness levels

When one has not had adequate sleep at night one is likely to feel listless, lethargic and less energetic during the day.

If you find yourself nodding off at your desk when at work, you are hardly likely to have the vim and vigor to go hit the gym later in the day or to pull yourself out of bed early in the morning to go for that jog.

Since one will be too tired to engage in the requisite activity levels needed for fitness; it becomes a kind of vicious circle: too tired to work out and therefore lower energy and fitness levels, which causes further deterioration in ones general health and fitness. So make the effort and get that sleep.

According to John Richmond, chairman of orthopedics at the New England Baptist Hospital, it is always best to treat an injury with ice.

The reason that ice is better than heat is that it constricts the blood vessels and limits the amount of blood flowing into the site of the injury.

This helps to reduce swelling and therefore pain at the site. Ice also helps by numbing the area and thereby reducing pain.

As to what is the best way to apply ice to the affected area; it is advised that commercial ice packs work effectively as do the kind that rely on a chemical reaction for instant cooling.

Also available are gel packs that you can keep in the freezer and can be reused, which are also very effective. And for those that don’t want to undergo the expense of commercial ice packs, just use the time honored quick fix: A bag of frozen peas!

After some days of ice application, you can start to use heat to help heal the area, it is advised.