women’s health

Wednesday Bubble: Exercise and Sexual Health – How you move affects how you groove. Guest post by Alexandra Williams, MA

Posted by Liz on Sep 7, 2011 in aging, exercise, sexual health, women's health | 0 comments

Every now and then I like to shake things up in this space, which is why I asked fitness professional writer, speaker and radio host Alexandra Williams (aka @alexandrafunfit on Twitter) to lend me her expertise for a day. What I didn’t expect, however, was for her to rock the sexual health world with the revelation that exercise, i.e. how you move, affects how you groove. Frankly, if all it takes is exercise, you will find me adding an extra hour or so a day at the gym!

Show Alexandra some love. She’s witty and has been putting the fun back into fitness for for some time now…

Image: http://vectorportal.com

Sexual health is defined by Mosby’s Medical Dictionary. as “a capacity to enjoy and control sexual behavior without fear, shame or guilt.” Sexual dysfunction is broadly defined by the Gale Encyclopedia of Medicine as “disorders that interfere with a full sexual response cycle. These disorders make it difficult for a person to enjoy or to have sexual intercourse.”

The good news, especially for older adults, is that most sexual dysfunctions can be treated or alleviated through exercise. It has been found to increase sexual drive, functioning, activity and satisfaction, due to the physical endurance, muscle tone and body composition derived from exercise. In addition, exercise activates the sympathetic nervous system, which encourages blood flow to the genital regions. Even low levels of physical activity can elevate mood and help keep sex organs and muscles in better working condition. A 2000 study found that after just 20 minutes of vigorous exercise, women became more sexually responsive, while men had increased testosterone levels after short, intense bouts of exercise.

Frequency, level of desire, and enjoyment are also affected positively for those who engage in regular exercise, at any age. In 2004, a study of college-age students a strong correlation was found between fitness levels, self-perception, body image, social meaning, outward appearance and sexual performance and desire. These findings were replicated in studies of people in their forties and sixties. And of course, sexual activity itself counts as exercise!

One really interesting comparison of exercise and sexual activity, looked at heart rate and blood pressure during treadmill exercise and sexual activity (not simultaneously)! Unsurprisingly, participants spent more time in sexual activity than they did on the treadmill, but here’s the intriguing point – the treadmill exercise duration predicted sexual activity duration. For each minute of treadmill time, there was 2.3 minute increase in sexual activity duration!

There are also a number of sexual diseases and dysfunctions that are radically improved through exercise. For example, exercise has a protective effect on Type 2 diabetes, with pelvic floor exercises of specific value. A minimum of approximately 50% of overweight men with Type 2 diabetes have erectile dysfunction, a frustrating condition that is helped enormously by cardiorespiratory fitness.

Urinary incontinence is markedly improved via pelvic floor muscle training, with 100% of women reporting decreased incontinence frequency and duration. And it works for men too – after the strengthening training, incidences of urinary and fecal incontinence decreased, and erectile function increased. Pelvic floor exercises are also an effective modality for primiparous (giving birth only once) women who have vaginal deliveries. Desire and satisfaction go up, and pain goes down for these women.

Breast cancer survivors consistently report an improved quality of life (better physical functioning, reduced fatigue and pain) when they participate in physical activity. In addition, prostate and bladder cancer are positively affected by exercise, including its stress-reducing aspects.

Sexual activity itself has been found to help with cardiovascular disease, with researchers finding that sexual activity corresponds to light to moderate physical exercise and entails no significant risk to the majority of patients with cardiovascular disease (severe angina or chronic heart failure are exceptions).

There’s been a lot of research on the relationship between exercise and erectile dysfunction, which affects over 100 million men. The link between cardiovascular disease, metabolic syndrome and erectile dysfunction is strong, and exercise is a mitigating factor on all three. Doctors who prescribe movement to patients with these three issues have reported high success rates. This is good news, especially considering that exercise is a less invasive treatment than medications, surgery or testosterone replacement therapies.

Sexual functioning and health is something everyone should have at any age. Exercise just may be the magic pill!

About the author…

Alexandra Williams, MA, has been in the fitness industry for over 25 years. She is the co-owner of funandfit.org. Together with her twin sister, she writes, teaches and speaks on fitness-related topics, using wit and research! For more, be sure to write to Alexandra and Kymberly at info@funandfit.org.And if you are the sort of person who likes to put a voice to an image, be sure to check Alexandra and Kymberly out on their radio program ‘Fun and Fit.’

An age-old problem: public relations as science. Guest post by Dr. Brian Hughes

Posted by Liz on Jul 8, 2011 in aging, women's health | 2 comments

When I saw this post by Dr. Brian Hughes, an academic psychologist at the National University of Ireland in Galway, I knew that I needed to run it on Flashfree. In it, Brian discusses how ageism has become the advocacy project of the month, a hook to attract attention to a specific cause by feeding into the fears and anxiety that often accompany aging. Not only are women a primary target for these campaigns, but by couching the propaganda within a scientific context, it can be difficult to discern truth from fiction.

Although this post is a bit more verbose than what I typically run, I felt it was important to include it in its entirety. I hope that you’ll show Brian some love and spread the word, not only about the post but also his work on The Science Bit Blog. Many thanks Brian, for lending me your prose this week.

There is no doubt that in our increasingly image-conscious and superficially focused times, age discrimination presents a creeping civil rights problem. The tendency to judge the professional and social worth of a person on the basis of his or her apparent age can present artificial barriers to employment and respect. Moreover, age discrimination can dramatically compound sex discrimination, as such problems are often felt more acutely by older women. Therefore, it is no surprise to see recurring campaigns to promote positive attitudes towards people right across the age-spectrum, run by charitable organizations such as Age UK as well as by publications such as Mature Times.

As with any advocacy campaign, new research that provides insights into age discrimination must be seen as important. Scientifically gathered empirical evidence can be crucial in debunking negative stereotypes and in bolstering positive claims. But, alas, not all research is the same – some is little more than advertising propaganda promulgated by capitalists who see vulnerable social groups as lucrative target markets, whose concerns about social exclusion simply make them more likely to spend their money on a solution.

Unfortunately, it appears that advocacy groups are often ill-equipped to identify the difference.

Have a look at this recent lead story on the Mature Times website: “Women feel ‘invisible’ at the age of 46, a study has revealed“. The story describes new research conducted in the UK that pinpoints 46 as the age when women’s confidence begins to “plummet“. According to the research, this is how women begin to feel after they reach that age:

…two thirds beginning to hate what they see in the mirror – most blaming the fact that they now start to have grey hair, feel uncomfortable in their clothes and have to wear numerous pairs of glasses…

…more than a quarter of women feel embarrassed at having to pull out their reading glasses in restaurants and supermarkets as they feel it’s a clear sign they are older, knocking their confidence, and adding to their ‘invisibility’…

The survey also revealed that men no longer hold doors open for four in ten, and two thirds say that they never get offered a seat in public transport. A third of women surveyed said their partners were ageing better than they were which annoyed them.

According to the Daily Mail, which covered the study in their Femail section, the research was based data gathered from more than 2,000 British women aged 40 or older. By any standards this is a very large sample. The Mail were also able to describe more of the findings:

Grey hairs, failing vision and putting on weight all make some women feel increasingly less confident as they grown older…

The researchers found that women in their mid-40s also begin to fret that their views and opinions are no longer valid…by the time they reach their mid-50s, the majority of women say they no longer receive admiring glances from strangers or compliments from the opposite sex…

…This coupled with the steady increase of over 50s requiring glasses for reading, shopping and driving add to that feeling of being older and more “invisible”…

And just in case we were having difficulty visualising a woman over the age of 46, the Mail also provide a photograph of this nice lady to illustrate what they are talking about:

Hmmm. So what’s the problem with all of this then? Surely such findings can be seen as a reasonable depiction of the experiences of British women, given that over 2,000 of them were surveyed for the study? And do they not convey many of the subtle ways in which women (and presumably men also) can become ostracized by mainstream society once they reach a certain age?

The big problem is that this is not an orthodox research study. It was not presented for publication in the scientific literature, or — as far as we can reasonably surmise — peer-reviewed prior to dissemination by independent editors (or even by a research ethics review committee). In fact, this is nothing more than market research, which means its findings are likely to be skewed by the motivations of its sponsors. And in this case, the group who commissioned the research – Clarivu – have a hugely conspicuous conflict of interest.

Clarivu are a commercial company that specialize in vision correction. They perform refractive lens exchange procedures in which the eye’s natural lens is replaced with a synthetic alternative in order to improve failing vision. Their method offers an alternative to laser eye surgery, and is effective for both short- or long-sightedness. In other words, Clarivu are in the business of offering people an alternative to wearing glasses. Yes, glasses! Those things that are repeatedly described by British women as part of the reason they feel “invisible“. And guess what — Clarivu’s services are aimed specifically at people over the age of 50. Just the age at which women begin to realise the extent to which wearing glasses is ruining their lives!

Of course, Clarivu are not a charitable organization — they do all this in return for cash. In fact, in return for UK£3,395 (around US$5,400). And that’s just forone eye. Assuming you’d like to be able to see out of both eyes rather than just the one, the full treatment will set you back the bones of £7,000/$11,000.

One amusing feature of how these results were promulgated in the media can be inferred from Clarivu’s own website. Have a look at the testimonialpresented on their website’s front page:

Look! It’s the SAME LADY as was in the Daily Mail! So, in other words, not only did Clarivu’s PR department circulate copy for publication in newspapers such as the Daily Mail, but they also provided the illustrative photographs. And, by all appearances, the Mail just transferred the lot into their own newspaper without much questioning or analysis.

What we have here is a clear case of a conflict of interest. Can we rely on the media to be an effective gatekeeper in promoting objective reporting on newly claimed research findings? Can we really rely on these findings from Clarivuthat the aging process is an emotionally negative psychological experience? Is it merely a coincidence that this large-scale survey confirms Clarivu’s marketing stance that women over 46 should seek alternatives to wearing glasses? Unfortunately, given that Clarivu have a financial interest in particular research outcomes, we simply cannot rule out the possibility of bias in their execution, analysis, or reporting of these results.

This isn’t to say that we cannot rely on Clarivu to display impeccable moral integrity. We have no evidence that they are anything other than honest in their activities. It’s just that human nature itself will create the possibility of bias whenever conflicts of interest arise. This is why the scientific method promotes principles like objectivity and replication, as well as associated practices, such as blinding and peer-review.

It is disappointing that the study was reported as actual news in the mainstream media. It is particularly ironic that it was reported as news in outlets that would ordinarily see themselves as championing the cause of, on the one hand, older adults, and on the other hand, women. This is because these so-called research findings do little to advance the cause of marginalized groups. In fact, they help maintain the social exclusion of older adults, and older women in particular, by perpetuating negative stereotypes about the aging process.

So when Mature Times report this as news, they are essentially promoting age-discrimination; and when the Daily Mail’s Femail section do so, they are encouraging readers to judge the value of women based on superficialattributes, such as whether they wear glasses after they turn 46.

Age-old problems indeed…

Women’s health: “it’s a spiral, not a bulls-eye.”

Posted by Liz on Jun 6, 2011 in Inspiration, women's health | 3 comments

“A spiral is the path; it is the journey.  I walk it with you, and do not do it to you.  It represents life.  It represents women…”

My friend and colleague Regina Holliday wrote these words about a jacket that she has painted on my behalf, a jacket that represents women’s struggles to overcome the restrictions that challenge their right to adequate healthcare and a jacket that I will be honoured and privileged to wear this coming Tuesday during The Walking Gallery. She has depicted this struggle within the framework of a triskelion symbol, three interlocked spirals that is used to depict three reproductive cycles in a woman’s life  (maiden, mother, crone). In the Celtic belief system, the three-legged triskelion represents:

• personal growth
• human development
• spiritual expansion

as well as the phases of the moon, i.e. waxing, waning and full. I relate to this concept mostly because of its fluidity and the creative way in which Regina has characterized a woman’s struggle throughout her lifetime.

The jacket that I will wear is dedicated to all of my readers and to women everywhere who are under attack strictly because of their gender and their ability to reproduce. It seems sort of ridiculous doesn’t it? And yet, as I wrote last year in Disruptive Women in Healthcare, the other side of the aisle is not a political party but rather, women, gender bias and reproductive rights biases.

If you are local, I hope that you will come out and support the event (there are free tickets available), a wake up call that the patient struggle is very real and affects all of us. Regina describes this as follows:

If you can’t make it, I do hope that you’ll start paying attention to Regina because she is a patient advocate of the first degree and her generosity of spirit and pureness of heart is virtually unsurpassed. Trust me; she is someone you want fighting for you when the healthcare chips are down.

Thank you Regina…from my heart. I can’t wait to represent!

Three’s a crowd

Posted by Liz on Mar 25, 2011 in women's health | 0 comments

Last year I introduced the concept of crowdsourcing menopause, a concept, while foreign to some readers, may be very familiar to others. Afterall, three’s a crowd, right?

Well, not quite, at least when it comes to women’s health. I am ready to shake things up a bit and am suggesting that we start to take our healthcare back into our own hands. This idea is not a new one and the burgeoning epatient movement is a primary example of how white noise is actually translating into a new language.

Yesterday, I sat in a room of people and watched this idea actually take hold. I saw the lightbulb go off in the heads of representatives of some major players in the healthcare arena. And while I can’t provide the ‘whats, hows or where,” I can tell you that changes are underfoot and soon, three won’t be enough of a crowd.

Do yourselves a favour: keep talking, sharing, demanding and acting. That change is gonna come…

Wednesday Bubble: celebrating Women…a reprise of my conversation with chef/author Mollie Katzen

Posted by Liz on Mar 9, 2011 in women's health | 0 comments

I know that yesterday was International Women’s Day. So I’m one day late reprising this post from last year. And ever so grateful for the women whose company I keep. So far as I am concerned, every day is women’s day. So here’s to all you ladies I know and love. And to you, my dear readers, without whom, this blog would not exist.

Cheers!

It’s International Women’s Day. A day to celebrate women of all ages, races, ethnicity and religion, to celebrate women as essential and relevant beings. Yet, as I write today in a post onWomen Grow Business, although women are more engaged and successful than ever, the woman in the mirror might not have much to say about the fact that her image is likely disappearing right before her eyes — just as she’s reaching the pinnacle of her career.  In fact, in a ‘visual culture’ like ours’, where youth and beauty are often valued more than experience and ‘foundation,’ many women find that they eventually cease to exist.

The Woman Grow Business post primarily focuses on how ageism affects our careers and the steps we can take to overcome inherent societal challenges. My friend, chef/author Mollie Katzen,played an important role in shaping that post.  In fact, it evolved out of an initial conversation that we had when we were discussing women, food and aging.

However, I’d like to share some additional insights that Mollie lends to concept of the disappearing woman. Let’s face it: although we live in a society that is “no country for old women,” [Credit for tag – Sadhbh Walshe, guardian.co.uk] perhaps we can shift the societal gaze to within and not without. Like Mollie, I know a number of middle-aged women who feel the need to adjust their physical appearance in order to compete. The gambit runs from hair color and botox to face lifts and labiaplasty. The question is, are these things taking time and focus away from our work (or who we are)? Granted, I color my hair and have been doing so for decades. I am not ready to embrace my gray. Does this mean that I am not ready to embrace myself or that I am somehow exacerbating my disappearing act?

Mollie is fortunate in that her chosen career is one of the few where, she says, “women are not only allowed to age but that [age] is seen as an enhancement to credibility.” However, she suggests that the more women are out there looking their age, the likelier it is for older women to do so.

However, here’s the rub: What does your age look like?

Mollie says that throughout her life, she’s been greatly helped by Gloria Steinem’s famous quote when told she didn’t look 40: “this is what 40 looks like,” said Steinem. “That phrase has been my mantra,” explains Mollie; “this is what I look like.”

For me personally, this gives me permission to dress in ways that make me feel good about myself, and perhaps even color my hair to reinforce that feeling. Mollie concurs:  “instead of hoping to look 35, try looking your best for who you are. Emphasizing that she dislikes and tries to avoid platitudes at all costs, Mollie agreed to share a few strategies that she and her friends have created. “They seem like small things,” says Mollie, “but they make a huge difference in how you come across:”

• Posture! The first sign of “older” is often stooped shoulders. Standing tall conveys confidence and strength. “Anyone who is not attracted to that is someone you don’t need in your life.”
• Keep a focused gaze. “Looking sharp sharpens, Mollie explains. “Glazing over glazes you over.”
• “A smile is the best and cheapest face lift. Especially when it is genuine; your smile, not theirs.”
• Breathe deeply. Then speak. “When you do speak, let your voice come from your abdomen and be fueled by that deep breath.” (This isn’t easy, btw.)
• “Don’t ask your sentences unless they are questions.” (Remember Valley Girl by Frank Zappa?)
• “Try to find the love in all situations.” (I need work on this!). Mollie explains that in most cases, this needs to come from within. “Recognize that sometimes that love can take the form of putting up a boundary. Recognize also, that putting up that boundary can be cloaked in warmth and humor, even while you are being assertive.”  She adds that “true personal power can be a warming and loving representation.”

Additionally, perhaps we need focus more on playing up our strengths and working on self-acceptance.  “Develop your own style of centering and use it to solidify,” advises Mollie. “Change or leave bad relationships.” (This could also refer to bad business relationships.) Seek support.

Platitudes or reality? As middle-aged women, can’t we create (or redefine) our reality. Most successful revolutions start with small steps. Our evolution as women depends on it.

Mindful living: learning to ask for help

Posted by Liz on Feb 28, 2011 in women's health | 4 comments

How often do you ask for help? Better yet, how easily do you ask for and receive help?

Reading Karen Rosenthal Hilsberg’s “Lessons in Living” and her struggle to make sense of a life unraveled as her husband dies, I can’t help but reflect on a close friend who is ill. Despite a ‘take no prisoners’ attitude, he has had trouble acknowledging the seriousness of his condition and even more trouble asking for support. Quite honestly, he doesn’t do too well in that department and neither do I. However, like him, I readily offer assistance to those I love and care about, whenever I can.

So, why the divide between offering and taking?

Hilsberg writes that “what I learned during this intense time of life was profound. I learned to ask for help from others.” Utilizing the mindfulness practice of the Zen Master, Buddhist monk and scholar Thich Nhat Hanh and the Buddhist Master Thich Phuoc Tinh, she says that she discovered that asking for help really wasn’t much different than providing it, that the helper and ‘helpee’ were intertwined, unable to exist without the other.  By allowing assistance, she was able to provide others who cared about her and her family an opportunity to “be of service and to practice generosity” and in doing so, make a shift away trying to do everything on her own. Most importantly, by reflecting on how much she personally enjoyed being of service when loved ones needed her, she was able to accept how appropriate and okay it was to actually ask for help from others — to allow them to “do” as much as she did. The result? Her “wellbeing improved as [she] felt [her] burden shared by many hands.”

As caretakers, many women often do not adapt well to being on the “receiving end.” And yet,  most of us are aware of the importance of social ties, friendships and support to our health and wellbeing, particularly as we age. So why do we find it so difficult to ask for and receive help? How do we acknowledge that be cared for does not equate to losing power or control but actually improves outlook, wellbeing, and ability to deal with any challenges that we might be facing, that allowing others to “do” empowers and does not ‘de-power?’ Is it fear of refusal? Or fear of letting go?

Mastering the art of asking for help is difficult. However, it behooves us to do so, not only for our wellbeing but for the wellbeing of those around us who wish to help.

My friend deserves the kind of care that he has provided to others in his life for most of his life.

Guess what?

So do you.