Urinary Urgency and Incontinence: Why It’s Not Just Age

Most people chalk urinary incontinence and excessive urgency up to age. We get old, stuff stops working, we wake up to wet sheets. Cue jokes about adult diapers and investing in “Depends” futures. It’s not entirely out of line. Aging matters. There’s just more to it. Like other aspects of “aging,” incontinence and unreasonable urgency don’t just “happen.” Aging may hasten or accompany the decline, but it’s by no means inevitable, unavoidable, or unmitigated.

There are surgical treatments available, many of which involve the implantation of balloons and slings and rings and hammocks. Those are beyond the scope of this post, which will focus on exercises and other less invasive interventions and preventive measures.

What’s the Deal With Urinary Incontinence?

The most well-known type is stress incontinence. When you do anything intense enough to create pressure, such as a sneeze, a particularly boisterous laugh, a trampoline session, a power clean, or a box jump, the pressure escapes through the weakest point of your body—your slack pelvic floor muscles which support and enable bladder function. The result is inadvertent leakage.

The most common type is urgency incontinence. That’s when you can control your bladder well enough, but you feel like you have to go more frequently than you’d like. This can disrupt sleep and place you in uncomfortable situations.

There’s also prostate-related urinary incontinence. If men have incontinence, it’s usually because of prostate issues or prostate surgery altering the normal flow and function of their urinary tract. Today’s post won’t deal with this explicitly, although many of the exercises I’ll discuss that help women treat incontinence can also help men treat prostate-related incontinence. For more info on this, revisit my post on prostate health from a few weeks back.

Both stress incontinence and urgency incontinence usually have the same cause: pelvic floor dysfunction. The pelvic floor acts as a taut, supple sling of muscle and connective tissue running between the pelvis and the sacrum that supports the pelvic apparatus, including organs, joints, sex organs, bladders, bowels, and various sphincters. We use it to control our urination, our bowel movements, even our sexual functions. It’s very important.

What Goes Wrong?

It gets weak and tight and pulls the sacrum inward (the tail gets pulled toward the front of the body), interfering with urination and urinary control.

What causes pelvic floor dysfunction?

Childbirth is one potential cause, but it’s not a foregone conclusion. Women who have vaginal deliveries are more likely to display more pelvic floor dysfunction than women who have cesareans, while a more recent study found that tool-assisted vaginal delivery and episiotomy were the biggest risk factors for vaginal delivery-associated incontinence, not vaginal delivery alone. Allowing passive descent in the second stage of labor, rather than active pushing from the get-go, might also reduce the association.

Muscular atrophy of the pelvic floor muscles. The pelvis is where the magic happens. It’s where we generate power, walk, run, procreate, dance, and move. To keep it happy, healthy, and strong, we have to move. And then keep moving. Through all the various ranges of space and time and possible permutations of limbs and joints. That’s what all our muscles expect from the environment. It’s what they need. When that doesn’t happen, they atrophy—just like the other muscles.

Who Develops Incontinence?

Stress incontinence is more common among women than men. And most women with stress incontinence are older, although childbirth can increase the incidence.

Signs of Poor Pelvic Floor Function

Besides urinary incontinence and urgency incontinence—which are pretty tough to miss—what are some warning signs of poor pelvic floor function?

Low-to-no glute activity when walking. According to expert Katy Bowman, the glutes play a crucial role in pelvic floor function and incontinence prevention.

Lack of lower back curvature. This suggests your pelvis is being pulled inward due to poor glute activity and/or overly tight pelvic floor musculature.

Muscle atrophy elsewhere. If the muscle’s disappearing from your arms and legs, what do you think is happening in other areas?

What Can You Do?

Work On Your Squat

If you can’t sit in a full squat, with shins fairly vertical and heels down on the ground, you need to work on your form.

I suggest reading this old post by Kelly Starrett describing optimal squat form. He focuses on performance and strength training, but the technique applies equally to basic bodyweight squatting for pelvic floor health.

One thing to emphasize: go as low as you can without reaching “butt wink” threshold. The butt wink is when the pelvis begins rotating backward underneath the body. If you’re butt winking all over the place, you’re shortchanging your glutes and preventing them from balancing out the pelvic floor situation. Stop short of the butt wink.

Squat a Lot

You don’t have to load up the bar, although that’s a great way to build glute strength. In fact, I’d refrain from heavy squatting if you’re currently suffering from urinary incontinence, as the stress placed on that region of the body during a heavy squat can make the problem worse and cause, well, leakage.

I’m mainly talking about everyday squatting: while playing with the kids, picking up dog poop, unloading the dishwasher, brushing your teeth, cleaning the house, gardening. If you can incorporate squatting while using the bathroom, perhaps with a Squatty Potty or similar product, that’s even better. Katy Bowman recommends women squat to pee in the shower as an integral part of her therapy for pelvic floor disorder.

Squat To Use the Toilet (or At Least Get Your Feet Up)

I wrote an entire post almost ten years ago exploring the virtues of squatting to poop. Not only does it improve symptoms in hemorrhoid sufferers, reduce straining, and alleviate constipation, but squatting to poop turns out to relieve a lot of excessive pressure on the pelvic floor musculature.

Not everyone’s going to hoist themselves up over the toilet standing on a stack of thick books, or go all out and build a Southeast Asian-style squat toilet in their bathroom, or even get the Squatty Potty. It’s probably the best way to do it—and it’s certainly the most evolutionarily concordant way to poop—but it’s not totally necessary. What matters most is getting those feet up and those knees above your hips. If you can achieve this by placing your feet on a stool (not that kind of stool) as you sit on the toilet, it should do the trick.

Take a Walk and Feel Yourself Up

Next time you walk, rest your palms on the upper swell of your butt cheeks. Every time you step through, you should feel your glutes contract. If they contract, awesome. You’re unconsciously using your glutes to propel yourself forward. If they don’t, you’ll have to train them to contract when you walk.

Do this by going for a ten minute walk (minimum) every single day while feeling your glutes. Consciously contract them enough and feel yourself up enough and the resultant biofeedback will make glute activation a passive behavior, like breathing. Eventually you’ll start doing it without thinking. That’s the goal.

Do Kegels—Differently

The classic therapy for pelvic floor disorder is to train the pelvic floor muscles directly using kegels. This is the muscle you contract to stop yourself from peeing midstream. “Doing kegels” means contracting and releasing that muscle for sets and reps. A common recommendation is to hold for ten seconds, release for ten seconds, repeated throughout the day. Waiting in line? Kegels. Eating dinner? Do some kegels. Remember that man at the DMV last week who would randomly tense up and start sweating as you both waited for your number? He was probably doing kegels.

It’s definitely part of the story—studies show kegels work in men, women, and seniors—but it’s not enough.

Consider  Katy Bowman’s take on the subject. She thinks kegels by themselves make the problem worse by creating a tight but ultimately weakened pelvic floor muscle that pulls the sacrum further inward. Combine that with weak or underactive glutes that should be balancing the anterior pull on the sacrum but don’t and you end up with rising pelvic floor dysfunction and incontinence.  She recommends doing kegels while in the squat position to ensure that the glutes are engaged and all the other contributing muscles are in balance.

Do More Than Kegels

The bad news is that we don’t have controlled trials of Katy Bowman’s protocols with deep squats and frequent daily movement and going barefoot over varied surfaces and squat toilets. We mostly just have basic “pelvic floor exercises,” which usually just mean “kegels.” The good news is that even these suboptimal exercise therapies seem to work on anyone with incontinence, whether they’re just coming off a pregnancy, a 70th birthday, or a prostate procedure. Young, old, middle-aged, male, female—exercise works.

Actually, we do have one small study that suggests kegels will work much better if you balance them out with exercises that target the glutes and hips. In the study, women suffering from urinary incontinence were split into two treatment groups. One group did pelvic floor muscle exercises (kegels). The other group did pelvic floor muscle exercises, plus exercises to strengthen the hip adductors, the glute medius, and glute maximus. Both groups improved symptoms, but the group that did the combo exercises had better results.

For hip adduction, you can use that hip adduction machine where you straddle the chair with legs spread and bring your knees together against resistance. Another option is to use resistance bands. Attach one end of the band to a secure structure and the other to your ankle. Stand with legs spread, then bring the banded leg inward toward the unbanded leg; you should feel it in your inner thigh. Do this for both legs.

For glutes, you have many options. Glute bridges, hip thrusts, squats, deadlifts, lunges, resistance band glute kickbacks.

If you want to get deep into this subject and really learn the optimal exercises for pelvic floor dysfunction, I’d pick up a copy of Katy’s Down There For Women.

Get Strong and Stay Strong

One of the strongest predictors of urinary incontinence is physical frailty. The more frail—weak, fragile, prone to falling, unable to handle stairs, unsteady on one’s feet—the man or woman, the more likely they are to suffer from urinary incontinence. This mostly comes down to muscle atrophy; the frail tend to have low muscle mass all over, including the pelvic floor.

Studies show that strength training improves urinary control in both men coming off prostate procedures and women.

The best option is to never get frail in the first place. If you’re younger and in shape, keep training and moving. Don’t lose it. If you’re younger and trending frail, get training and moving. Don’t squander the time you have. It goes quickly. If you’re older and frail, you have to start today. Fixing this doesn’t happen overnight. Being frail makes it harder to do the things necessary to get strong, but that doesn’t absolve you of the responsibility.

The Bottom Line

None of this stuff is a guarantee against incontinence. Guarantees don’t really exist in life. But I’d definitely argue that anyone who employs all the tips and advice mentioned in today’s post will have a better shot at maintaining bladder control than their doppelganger in some parallel universe who never tries anything—the earlier the better.

If you have any experience with urinary incontinence, let us know in the comments down below. What worked? What didn’t? What worked for a while, then stopped?

Thanks for reading—and sharing here. Happy Halloween, everybody.

References:

Bernstein IT. The pelvic floor muscles: muscle thickness in healthy and urinary-incontinent women measured by perineal ultrasonography with reference to the effect of pelvic floor training. Estrogen receptor studies. Neurourol Urodyn. 1997;16(4):237-75.

De araujo CC, Coelho SA, Stahlschmidt P, Juliato CRT. Does vaginal delivery cause more damage to the pelvic floor than cesarean section as determined by 3D ultrasound evaluation? A systematic review. Int Urogynecol J. 2018;29(5):639-645.

Kokabi R, Yazdanpanah D. Effects of delivery mode and sociodemographic factors on postpartum stress urinary incontinency in primipara women: A prospective cohort study. J Chin Med Assoc. 2017;

Handa VL, Harris TA, Ostergard DR. Protecting the pelvic floor: obstetric management to prevent incontinence and pelvic organ prolapse. Obstet Gynecol. 1996;88(3):470-8.

Dokuzlar O, Soysal P, Isik AT. Association between serum vitamin B12 level and frailty in older adults. North Clin Istanb. 2017;4(1):22-28.

The post Urinary Urgency and Incontinence: Why It’s Not Just Age appeared first on Mark's Daily Apple.

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What Being on Your Period Does to Your Hair

by Irma Leticia Garcia

We have all had bad hair days, especially as curly girls. Did you know there is actual science to explain them?

Individuals who experience menstrual cycles can attest to the irksome hormonal changes that occur during that time, such as skin breakouts, moodiness, increased appetite, and fatigue. But, there is another pesky addition to that list that many do not know about, and it affects our hair.

The increased oiliness associated with our periods doesn’t just affect our faces. It also impacts our scalp, sometimes making our hair feel oily or flat.

Continue!>>>

Before your period:

“The levels of estrogen decrease and the levels of progesterone and testosterone increase about a week before your period,” says Dr. Sophia Kogan, an integrative hair loss specialist. Hence the oily skin and hair during those specific days.

The sudden hormonal shifts that occur during this time are a result of your body realizing there isn’t a fertilized egg to care for, so the cozy room it prepared for it will be shred to pieces, causing cramping, mood swings, swollen or tender breasts, breakouts, and an oily scalp to occur. Before your period, the production of oil is not too intense just yet. Therefore, carrying through with your regular hair routine is just fine until your period begins.

During your period:

As bleeding begins, estrogen levels are practically at zero, and testosterone levels increase, which cause you to feel bloated, cranky, and restless due to cramping. This is when your hair will begin to feel greasy. Increased co-washing may be a good alternative to a full wash day during the week of your period.

After your period:

Testosterone begins to decrease and estrogen increases, causing less oil production and more positive moods. The downside of producing less oil is the possibility of a dry scalp. Therefore, consider deep conditioning and using natural oils to balance the pH levels, if this occurs.

PHOTO COURTESY OF @JMAYOXO

Pregnancy:

When your menstrual cycle is interrupted by pregnancy, you do not shed hair as often; your hair remains in the growth phase. Consequently, your hair appears much fuller. After the pregnancy, shedding occurs, and at first glance it may seem like an overwhelming amount of hair loss. This is only because the amount of hair you would have lost throughout the entirety of the pregnancy gets shed all at once.

Bad hair days can be caused by many things — not just excess oil production — including humidity, pollution, smoke, precipitation, incorrect products, over-washing, under-washing, etc. It is important to figure out the cause of your bad hair days so you can take steps to address it.

Do you find that you have more “bad hair days” when on your period?

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Should I Comb my Natural Hair in the Shower?

Photo Courtesy of The Tiny Closet

Naturallycurly.com

A thorough hair care routine can seem exhausting when you are in hurry. With so many of us running short on time and trying to find ways to multitask, performing two tasks at once may seem like a good idea.

However, there are often unintended consequences such as the way you might think you are saving time by brushing your teeth in the shower, but you are also introducing new bacteria into your mouth. When it comes to brushing your hair in the shower to save time and work through tangles, it is a similar scenario. While it may seem easier to comb your hair in the shower, it doesn’t mean it is a good idea. There are pros and cons to detangling both wet and dry, it depends on your hair type and the condition of your hair as to which one will work best for you.

Here are a few considerations to keep in mind when combing in the shower.
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Hair is more vulnerable
Hair is more vulnerable when it is wet. Hair that is damaged, already fragile, or in a compromised state becomes even more prone to breakage when wet. Even hair that is relatively healthy can take on damage from combing hair in the shower. Combing through tangles in the shower can lead to more hair shed than what is considered normal or healthy.

Hair tangles more easily
Part of the problem with combing your hair in the shower is that wet hair tangles more easily than dry or damp hair. This is a double whammy because while you may think brushing in the shower is getting knots out easier, it is actually contributing to more hair loss. Essentially, you are creating additional tangles.

Hair clogs your shower drain
When you wash your hair, you may naturally lose a few strands. Comb your hair in the shower and you are looking at twice the strands lost. Where do those strands usually end up? In your shower drain creating clogs and costly plumbing issues.

How to detangle in the shower
Despite this, many curlies do find that their hair benefits from the slip of detangling hair when it is wet. If you prefer to detangle in the shower, here are a few tips to help save your strands. Note that these will not fully protect your hair from the damage caused by wet brushing.

1. USE A WIDE-TOOTHED COMB OR YOUR FINGERS
Your fingers are the gentlest detangling tool, but a wide tooth comb is the next best option if you want to save time. These can help work through tangles to help eliminate some of the strand breakage.

2. DO NOT COMB HAIR WHILE UNDER RUNNING WATER
This will add to your tangles and breakage. Instead, turn off the faucet while you thoroughly detangle.

3. APPLY CONDITIONER FIRST
To help your fingers or wide tooth comb slide through any knots or tangles, generously apply conditioner to your strands first. Be sure to purchase a conditioner that provides plenty of slip.

Do you comb your hair in the shower?

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After An Evening Of Back And Forth On Social Media, Nicki Minaj & Cardi B. Agree To Keep It Positive

Getty

by Veronica Wells via MadameNoire

I knew yesterday when Nicki hopped on Queen Radio to declare that the knot on Cardi’s head was caused by her friend Rah Ali, I knew that Cardi was going to have a response. One because it was in direct contrast to what Cardi and all witnesses had said about the incident and there was no footage to corroborate that.

Continue!>>>

Not to mention, Nicki claimed that Rah hit her 8-9 times in the face. But if you can recall Cardi’s face as she walked out of the venue, you remember that her makeup wasn’t even smudged. There was just the single knot.

Either way, after Nicki’s radio show, Cardi got on her Instagram page and posted a series of videos not only denying Nicki’s claims but clearing up a few other rumors associated with the two women.

Continue reading, HERE.

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A Walton Halloween : 2018 Edition

Dear Mark: Oxidative Priority Followup

Last week, Craig Emmerich graced us with a great post on the oxidative priority of various dietary fuel sources, namely fats, carbohydrates, and protein.

If you haven’t had the chance to read through Craig’s post, definitely do. The visuals really drive home the point of fuel priority. Visuals appeal to me. They have a way of sticking with you, and there’s a power in recalling them when you’re making daily choices.

Today, I’m going through and answering some of the questions you folks had in the comment board.

I’m actually answering a great series of questions from Gerard.

I’ve seen this analysis before, and always had the question – can we really lump “carbohydrates” together like this?

No, we can’t. Craig gave a great overview, a useful 30,000 foot view that’s sufficient for most people who just want to eat and metabolize their fuel better, but there are differences between different carbohydrates. I know he’d say as much, and he may have time to weigh in here, too. If his schedule allows, I’ll include his response later today. But back to the differences in carbohydrates…. I’ll save fructose versus glucose for my answers to Gerard’s next questions. What about others?

Think of fiber. Fiber the monolith is already different from more digestible carbohydrates like glucose and fructose in that we can’t extract very much (or even any) caloric energy from it. But you can go even further and look at the individual metabolic fates of the different types of fiber.

Fermentable fibers like inulin and resistant starch are fermented into short chain fatty acids like butyrate and propionate. These provide important cell signaling and are worth about 2 calories per gram, give or take. Others forms of fiber are not fermented and provide colonic bulk but not calories.

Certain carbohydrates are treated differently in different people. Lactose tolerance allows people to digest lactose with lactase and use it for fuel. Lactose intolerance prevents people from digesting lactose, instead diverting it to gut bacteria to ferment and cause terrible digestive distress. FODMAP intolerance is similar. Those with FODMAP intolerance ferment carbs like sugar, lactose, and others in the gut, producing gas but not calories; those without it digest the carbs, producing useable energy.

Are fructose and glucose metabolized differently for this purpose?

There are definitely differences. For one, glucose stimulates insulin production, while fructose does not. But the differences may not be as stark as we often think.

When scientists attached isotopes to fructose, had healthy sedentary people eat it, then tracked the metabolic fate of the fructose molecules, they found:

• 50% ended up as glucose, converted by the liver to be used elsewhere in the body.
• 25% ended up as lactate, converted by the liver.
• 17% ended up as liver glycogen.
• 2-3% was converted to fat in the liver via de novo lipogenesis.
• The rest was oxidized and expelled as CO2.

According to the study authors, this is quite similar to the metabolic fate of glucose. Even if you’re talking about de novo lipogenesis, often considered the sole province of fructose overfeeding, research shows that overfeeding with glucose also provokes the creation of new fat.

As far as burning/oxidizing of ingested glucose and fructose, there are differences. At rest, people tend to burn fructose faster than glucose. During exercise, people tend to oxidize glucose faster than fructose. However, when you give someone both fructose and glucose together, they burn them faster than either fuel source alone. In one study, subjects were either given 100 grams of fructose, glucose, or fructose+glucose. The fructose group burned through 43.8% of their dose, the glucose group burned through 48.1% of theirs, while the fructose+glucose group burned through 73.6% of their dose.

Is the storage capacity for energy from fructose and glucose equivalent (i.e., liver vs muscle glycogen)?

There’s actually a misconception about fructose and glycogen repletion. Here’s the story you may have heard: Fructose can only contribute to liver glycogen, while glucose only contributes to muscle glycogen.

It’s not quite accurate. I believed it for awhile, too, until I actually checked it out. It turns out that both fructose and glucose are able to contribute toward both liver and muscle glycogen. Fructose is about half as efficient as glucose at replenishing muscle glycogen, as it first must be converted into glucose in the liver before being sent out, but it will eventually get the job done.

One big difference is that there’s a lot more room in your muscles than in your liver. The average person can store about 300 grams of glycogen in their muscles but only 90 grams in their liver. Even if the metabolic fates are ultimately pretty similar in a vacuum, in the real world there’s simply less room for liver glycogen, and, thus, less room for fructose in the diet without overstepping the bounds and incurring metabolic dysfunction.

So, if you’re talking about an overweight, sedentary person walking around with full glycogen stores eating a hypercaloric diet, fructose will behave differently than glucose. In the healthy, lean, eucaloric, and active, whole foods-based fructose isn’t a big deal and may not have a drastically different metabolic effect compared to glucose.

At any rate, discussing isolated fructose and isolated glucose may not even be very relevant to real world results. You’re eating fruit, not quaffing cola. You’re enjoying a sweet potato, not a bag of Skittles smothered in agave nectar. You’re eating both glucose and fructose together in the context of a meal, of a whole food. Don’t get too bogged down in the effects of isolated nutrient-poor sugars unless you’re consuming them that way.

To what extent is fructose metabolized in a manner that is more similar to alcohol than carbohydrate?

Fructose is metabolized in the liver. Alcohol is metabolized in the liver.

Fructose gets taken up by the liver without insulin. Alcohol ends up in the liver without insulin rising.

But after that, according to Richard Feinman, the similarities stop. Alcohol is a toxin with known toxic metabolites. There may be some benefit to low level exposure to alcohol, but it remains a toxin. Fructose can be situationally toxic, as in the obese guy with glycogen-replete fatty liver and full-blown diabetes, but we are physiologically capable of handing normal amounts without producing toxic metabolites. Feinman considers it more of a rhetorical device than a statement of facts.

That’s it for today, folks. Thanks for reading and if you have any further questions on the topic, let me know down below and I’ll do my best to get to them.

Take care!

References:

Tappy L, Lê KA. Metabolic effects of fructose and the worldwide increase in obesity. Physiol Rev. 2010;90(1):23-46.

Sun SZ, Empie MW. Fructose metabolism in humans – what isotopic tracer studies tell us. Nutr Metab (Lond). 2012;9(1):89.

Blom PC, Høstmark AT, Vaage O, Kardel KR, Maehlum S. Effect of different post-exercise sugar diets on the rate of muscle glycogen synthesis. Med Sci Sports Exerc. 1987;19(5):491-6.

Mcdevitt RM, Bott SJ, Harding M, Coward WA, Bluck LJ, Prentice AM. De novo lipogenesis during controlled overfeeding with sucrose or glucose in lean and obese women. Am J Clin Nutr. 2001;74(6):737-46.

Rosset R, Lecoultre V, Egli L, et al. Postexercise repletion of muscle energy stores with fructose or glucose in mixed meals. Am J Clin Nutr. 2017;105(3):609-617.

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When What Happens In Vegas Doesn't Stay In Vegas...

via xonecole.com

Kori's Story, as told to Brenda Alexander:

Although I hate to be categorized, if I have to check a box on a US Census form, I would identify as lesbian. I always have.

I've been in long-term committed relationships with women and despite my mother's desire for grandchildren the "natural way" and her loving skepticism regarding my "lifestyle," I've always been confident in my partnerships. And that has been accepted from those who love me.
However, I do not conform to normalities.

Continue!>>>

I consider myself a free spirit. I'm a lover of people and attracted to energy. I'm a user of mood rings and sage, someone who goes with the flow and believes in constant evolution and recreating and/or redefining oneself as one continues their journey of self-discovery. That too is known by all those close to me. It's the reason why when I ended up pregnant after a celebratory week in Vegas for my birthday, my friends did not question how it came to be.

It seemed like a set up from the beginning. I had just gotten out of a dysfunctional relationship with my ex-live-in-girlfriend of several years. It was one of those relationships where one took on the role of teacher, or as my mama would say "a clean up woman," where you work tirelessly to mold and groom your significant other into the person you believe is a true representation of their full potential. But the drama it took to get them there was a complete and utter turn off that left you drained and eager for a spiritual cleanse to get rid of them.

My birthday was approaching and I figured a girls trip to Vegas would be a great way to celebrate being single and ring in my personal New Year. I booked my flights and Airbnb and was determined to take Vegas by storm! We were all flying in from different cities and since I was traveling alone, I figured I deserved the absolute most. When the service attendant asked me if I wanted to upgrade from coach to first class for a small fee upon check-in, I said, "Yes."

With free champagne and a meal, I was off to a good start. And then I saw him.

While walking to my seat, he called my name. "Kori," he yelled.

Caught off guard, I turned and gave him a hug when I recognized it was him. We shared a mutual friend who he went to college with. We hung out over the years and he was always into me but I never gave him the time of day. But, that didn't stop his pursuit of me. Whenever I did see him, he'd always remind me, "I know you aren't interested but if you change your mind, I'm here," he'd tell me. Our friends thought we would be perfect together. I thought he was nice looking, a cool and sweet guy but paid him no mind. I NEVER saw him in that way.

We chatted for a moment. He told me he was headed to Vegas on business and ironically knew from our friend's social media that I was headed there for pleasure. "Maybe we can all link up at some point," he said, hopeful. That was the end of our conversation. I went to my seat, sipped on my prosecco, and mellowed out before takeoff.

This wasn't your usual party all day and night Vegas experience. Instead, I wanted to bask in my new freedom with some adult-like excursions. We traded three nights worth of club hopping for a helicopter ride over the Grand Canyon, wine and bourbon tastings, high tea at the Cha Garden, and a host of lunches, brunches and even a four-course dinner. Cocktails flowed consistently and there were many outfit changes accompanied with Instagram postings for my followers to envy.
Then came the night in question.

On our final night, instead of paying a cover charge and waiting in line with 4-inch heels to get into the latest hotspot on The Strip that we would have to Uber to and from, it made more sense to me to throw a kickback-style shindig at our Airbnb, fill up the fridge with some gin and juice, and top it off with bottles of Hennessy X for us to share, which I later learned was the Devil's nectar.

Continue reading, HERE.

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Danielle Brooks Just Did Her First Big Chop!

The Top 18 Curl Creams of 2018- Natural Hair Styling Essentials

by Kim Wong-Shing

There’s nothing like a great curl cream. Silky and moisturizing, these hair products are a staple in many curly girls’ hair routines. They take you from “Hey, cool hair!” to “OMG what do you use for your hair?”

There are a few different types of curl creams – styling creams, curl smoothies, souffles, and puddings all fit into this category. If the color is opaque and it’s thicker than a lotion, but thinner than a butter, it’s safe to say that you’re looking at a curl cream. Some of them are denser than others. They often contain rich butters and oils, like shea, coconut, or jojoba.

Practically all hair types should have a curl cream in their arsenal, but different types are useful for different things. Lightweight creams and curl smoothies are lovely for finishing off your wash-and-gos – the LOC method has a C in it for a reason! Thicker curl creams, souffles, and puddings are ideal for twist-outs, braid-outs, and protective styles.

With so many curl creams on the market, how do you know which one to choose for your hair? We rounded up the 18 top curl creams of 2018. Your curls will thank you!

Continue!>>>


1. Curl Junkie Spiral Lotion Hair Styling Creme
For lightweight moisture and a boost of volume, reach for this curl cream from Curl Junkie. It’s great for wash-and-gos and can also be used to revive second day hair, adding some much-needed definition into your hair. Type 3s especially adore this cream.

2. Maui Moisture Curl Quench + Coconut Oil Curl Smoothie
This Maui Moisture curl smoothie features coconut oil, papaya butter, and plumeria extract. The rich formula is ideal for type 4 hair. It smooths and hydrates, so your curls will end up bouncy, soft, and frizz-free.

3. Obia Naturals Curl Moisture Cream
The Curl Moisture Cream provides deep nourishment without being too heavy or weighing down your hair, making it ideal for type 4 hair. It contains argan oil, burdock root, and grape seed oil to strengthen your hair while adding shine. Oh, and it’s pH balanced,, too!

4. Eden BodyWorks Coconut Shea Curl Defining Cream
This curl cream keeps it simple, yet effective. It features coconut oil, coconut milk, and shea butter, which work together to moisturize and define your hair. It works wonderfully for all hair types. Use it for the LOC method or super-defined wash-and-gos.

5. Aunt Jackie’s Coconut Creme Recipes Butter Creme
Looser curl types adore this cream, which is ideal for hydrating and protecting the ends of your curls as well as any damaged sections. It contains tons of nourishing ingredients, including coconut oil, shea butter, avocado, monoi, and rosemary extract.

6. SheaMoisture Curl Enhancing Smoothie
This OG SheaMoisture product remains a staple in many cabinets. When it comes to styling twist-outs, wash-and-gos, braids, and other styles, this curl-enhancing smoothie is as dependable as it gets. It features shea butter along with silk protein and neem oil, and it’s great for all curl types.

7. Mielle Pomegranate & Honey Twisting Souffle
Looking for the perfect curl cream for twist-outs? This souffle results in a secure hold while also moisturizing your curls, so your hair is defined, but still soft. Bonus: It adds a silky shine to your hair.

8. DevaCurl SuperCream Coconut Curl Styler
Type 2 or 3 curls will love this cream, which also doubles as one of the best stylers out there. Infused with coconut oil, the SuperCream results in gorgeously defined, soft curls. It also adds volume.

9. Design Essentials Almond & Avocado Curling Creme
This curl cream smells divine, but more importantly, it’s full of bomb ingredients like avocado and almond oil to make your curls pop. This formula dries quickly and results in soft, touchable, frizz-free curls. It’s light, but it works well for all hair types and textures.

10. Cantu Curl Activating Cream
Ladies on a budget, this one is for you. Cantu’s Curl Activating Cream is available at most drug stores for under $7, and it delivers consistently great results. It’s chock full nourishing oils like jojoba, sweet almond, argan, and avocado. It’s easy to use and versatile enough for all hair types.

11. Redavid Orchid Oil Dual Therapy
Many curly hair routines involve both cream and oil, so why not combine both into one dual product? Redavid Oil Dual Therapy has two sides – one side dispenses oil, while the other dispenses cream. You can use however much you need of each. Brilliant!

12. Controlled Chaos Curl Creme
Controlled Chaos may be a slightly lesser known brand, but this curl cream could be your new secret weapon. It’s wonderful for firmly defining your curls while also delivering a healthy dose of nutrients, including rosemary exact, green tea, aloe, and lavender. Use it for wash-and-gos, finger coils, or to style your second day curls.

13. Briogeo Curl Charisma Rice Amino + Avocado Leave-In Defining Creme
This luscious curl cream is perfect for type 2 and 3 hair. Unlike most curl creams, this one contains rice amino acids, which help seal the hair cuticle to prevent frizz. It also has shea butter, avocado, quinoa extract, and a bunch of other yummy good stuff. This cream is an ideal moisturizer for wash-and-gos.

14. Oyin Handmade Whipped Pudding
How many curl creams also double as a skin cream?! Whipped Pudding can be used for your hair or for dry skin. It contains shea butter, cocoa butter, and aloe vera gel, and it’s great for achieving super-soft twists and braids. Rub the excess on your elbows, and your entire body will smell like dessert.

15. Taliah Waajid Curly Curl Cream
This affordable hair cream from Taliah Waajid has a short ingredients list, which is always a good sign. It contains shea butter, sage, and protein to strengthen, moisturize, and define your hair. It’s best for type 3 and 4 hair.

16. As I Am Double Butter Cream
As you might guess from the name, this is a very rich cream, containing both cocoa butter and shea butter along with jojoba oil, castor oil, and vitamin B5. It’s ultra-moisturizing, making it ideal for type 4 hair. Although the jar says that it’s a daily moisturizer, it may be too heavy for daily use – a little goes a long way! Use this for twist-outs, wash-and-gos, or refreshing older styles.

17. Curls Creme Brulee Whipped Curl Cream
This curl cream smells divine. It provides deep moisture, but the product itself is lightweight and leaves no build-up. This curl cream contains organic ingredients, like aloe juice, shea butter, and sweet almond oil. It’s great for twists and braids.

18. ORS Curls Unleashed Shea Butter & Honey Curl Defining Creme
This thick, yummy-smelling cream from ORS is lovely for wash-and-gos and twist-outs. It also works well for sealing and re-defining the ends of your hair on the second or third day. It’s perfect for type 3 or 4 hair, especially if you’d like to prevent shrinkage.

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Weekly Link Love — Edition 1

Research of the Week

Keto enhances fat loss without compromising performance in powerlifters and Olympic weightlifters.

Space travel compresses the brain, and the effects linger for months after returning planetside.

The shape and size of birth canals differ by population.

Youngsters with type 1 diabetes tend to have gut biomes that are low in the bacteria that produce short chain fatty acids and ferment human milk oligosaccharides.

APOE4 carriers who want to avoid dementia should consider taking a phospholipid form of DHA (or eat fish eggs or fish, which are natural sources).

Pretty much everyone is pooping out microplastics these days.

Aerobic exercise, especially exercise performed while standing, enhances visual working memory.

New Primal Blueprint Podcasts

Episode 285: Andy Hnilo: Host Elle Russ chats with Andy Hnilo about the near death experience that triggered his creation of cutting-edge natural skincare line.

Each week, select Mark’s Daily Apple blog posts are prepared as Primal Blueprint Podcasts. Need to catch up on reading, but don’t have the time? Prefer to listen to articles while on the go? Check out the new blog post podcasts below, and subscribe to the Primal Blueprint Podcast here so you never miss an episode.

Media, Schmedia

We’ve all got ten minutes.

Reader Question of the Week

‘What is ‘Sundays with Sisson?'” — Dozens of people in the last week or so.

Sundays with Sisson, or SWS, is a new feature of the newsletter that I send out every Sunday. It contains my thoughts that don’t quite belong on the blog or deserve a dedicated post. It’s not going to be as formal or “well-referenced” as my feature posts on the blog, but that means the possibilities are wide open. It’s where I explore new hypotheses, describe new self experiments, and talk about personal things going on in my life that I think people may find interesting or useful. Not everything is health-focused. I also talk about books I’m reading, products I’m loving (or not), movies and TV shows I’m watching. There may be some rants. Perhaps even a rave or two.

To sign up for the newsletter and get SWS every Sunday, scroll down to the bottom, fill in your email address, and hit “JOIN NOW.”

Interesting Blog Posts

Regarding the microdosing of magic mushrooms for creativity.

Strength training to beat depression.

Social Notes

If you’ve ever wanted to see me in normal shoes, check this out.

If you’ve ever wanted to try our Chocolate Hazelnut collagen bars, check this out.

Everything Else

Well, I’ll be: Vaginal jade eggs are not a traditional practice in ancient Chinese medicine?

Rare birds find sanctuary at Polish churches.

Salmon carcasses and guts stimulate tree growth.

A silver bullet for deadly amoebae.

Things I’m Up to and Interested In

In case you needed another reason to avoid grains: Dozens of grain-based foods test positive for Roundup.

Study I found interesting: Nature exposure (even just pictures) linked to reduced impulsivity.

Article I’m pondering: “The Selfish Dataome.”

Concept I support: Muscle mass as vital sign.

News I found interesting: Researcher discovers the oldest spear heads ever found in North America.

Question I’m Asking

Every Monday, I’ll be asking you folks a question.

More than ever, people seem fixated on current events, the 24-hour news cycle, and everything that’s going wrong in the world. How do you stay focused on health, life, love, community and everything else that you can effectively have an impact on?

Answer down below.

Recipe Corner

• The best smoothie I’ve had all year (though I’d recommend adding some ice).
• Don’t eat sticky orange sunflower chicken on a first date, but definitely eat it.

Time Capsule

One year ago (Oct 21– Oct 27)

• How Does the Keto Reset Fit Into the Primal Blueprint?– And vice versa.
• The 10-Week Countdown to 2018– How did the last 10 weeks of 2017 end up for you, and how are you going to spend the last 10 weeks leading up to 2019?

Comment of the Week

“I guess I’ll have to put this device down and go outside and enjoy this beautiful day”

– That’s the spirit, Jack Lea Mason.

The post Weekly Link Love — Edition 1 appeared first on Mark's Daily Apple.

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Where’s Weekend Link Love???

Hey everybody, I know some of you are stopping in this morning for your Sunday dose of salient news—all the latest on epigenetic findings, human oddities, and other Primal worthy items.

No worries. We’re not abandoning Weekend Link Love, but we are rescheduling it—this time to Mondays—and adding to it for good measure. You’ll find all the things you love—latest research, stuff I’m up to and interested in, quote of the week (and more)—on Monday mornings, right when you’re just about ready for that first morning break and second cup of coffee.

Still looking for some Sunday content? Newsletter subscribers now get a Sunday morning note from yours truly. No ads, no promos, just me talking about the latest fitness routines I’m trying, books I’m reading, studies I’m pondering—a casual weekend check-in from me to you. I’ve gotten great feedback, and I appreciate all the emails from readers the last few weeks about it. So, if you haven’t signed up for the newsletter (there’s a sign-up form just below this post and on the home page), this is a great time to do it. I’d love to have you join us.

In the meantime, have a great weekend.

The post Where’s Weekend Link Love??? appeared first on Mark's Daily Apple.

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Where’s the Recipe???

Hey all, I know some of you are stopping in this morning wondering where the usual recipe is. Where’s the beef marrow? Where’s the sweet meats? Where’s the roasted veggies.

Fear not. The team and I will be bringing you the same Primal fare as always, but we’re in the midst of adjusting our publishing schedule to reach more folks during the week. Look for more robust recipes and food related articles on Thursdays from here on out. We’ve got some great meal prep ideas and warm autumn dinners coming up—along with a truly Grok-size Thanksgiving menu to come.

In the meantime, see what you may have missed in our recipe archive and on Primal Kitchen’s blog. (They’ve got Keto Donuts and Halloween-themed Deviled Eggs over there this week.) Enjoy your weekend, and I’ll see you back here Monday to unveil the new lineup. Take care.

The post Where’s the Recipe??? appeared first on Mark's Daily Apple.

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5 Top Tricks For Healthy, Colored Natural Hair

by Tabitha Tongoi

Sometimes we just want to switch up our look a little bit. Maybe to signify a new phase in our life, or to simply refresh our look. How to better do this than give your hair a new color?
Changing up your hair color can add an edge to your look. But sometimes this color high may be short-lived, and your hair may start thinning out, get extra dry, and possibly even fall out.

Hair dye works by opening up your hair cuticle to lift off your natural color and, in turn, deposit the new one. This chemical process can leave your hair strands very porous and in need of extra care to prevent breakage.

Here are some tips on caring for and maintaining beautiful and healthy colored hair!

Continue!>>>


1. Examine the state of your hair before the dye application
Before you go in for a dye job, first assess the state of your hair. Is it brittle? Dry? Breaking? Healthy? Shiny?

Remember, applying color to hair is a chemical process, so if your hair is already vulnerable, you wouldn’t want to expose it to the potential damage caused by dyes.

To prepare your hair for a dye job, frequently deep condition, moisturize, and seal your hair in the weeks prior to application. Also, snip off any damaged ends prior to your appointment. This will ensure your hair is at an optimal healthy state going into your color process.

2. Use a color-safe, moisturizing shampoo
Chemicals in hair dyes dry out hair, and using the wrong shampoo can dry it out even more. After coloring your hair, be sure to steer clear of shampoos with sulfates because they’ll do more harm than good for you.

Look for shampoos that are not only sulfate-free but also have some strengthening and color-preserving properties in them. One good one is the Aphogee Shampoo for Damaged Hair. It’s gentle and moisturizing, and it strengthens the hair and keeps your hair color vibrant for longer.

3. Keep up with your deep conditioning treatments
Remember hair dyes make your hair strands more porous. This means that moisture escapes your strands faster than normal. To avoid dry colored hair, you need to ensure that you keep up with your weekly moisturizing deep conditioning sessions and your protein treatments every four weeks.

Protein treatments will help strengthen your hair by temporarily filling in the gaps in each hair strand. Mielle Organics Babassu Oil Mint Deep Conditioner is both a moisturizing and protein deep conditioner, and would be a worthwhile investment.

4. Moisturize your hair daily
Apart from your weekly deep conditioning sessions, moisturize your hair daily to help boost its moisture levels and help it stay elastic and healthy to prevent breakage. Spritzing your hair with a water-based leave-in conditioner and sealing it in with an oil like the Cantu Anti-Fade Color Protecting Oil is one way to go about it. This oil not only seals in moisture, but also protects the hair against damage by UV rays, and restores the vibrancy of your hair color. A good choice of leave-in conditioner for colored hair would be the Eden Bodyworks Citrus Fusion Hair + Body Butter. It’s lightweight, hydrates the hair and is a great styling product.

5. Protect your hair
As your hair is quite weak when chemically altered, it’s important to keep it nicely tucked in protective styles more often than not. Simple protective styles will help preserve your hair and allow it to ‘rest’ from the everyday manipulation.

At night, keep your hair protected by sleeping on a satin pillowcase or bonnet. We spend a good amount of time in bed, and placing your head on cotton material will surely suck out all the moisture from your hair. Get yourself a satin pillowcase or bonnet and enjoy lasting moisture and frizz-free curls.

What are some ways you keep your colored mane looking lively and vibrant? Leave us a note down below, we’d love to know!

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If They Are Truly Sorry, They'll Do These 5 Things

source GETTY IMAGES

by Shelli R Warren via xonecole.com

A wise person once said, "Adulthood is about surviving childhood."

If you stop and really let that sink in, it will make you want to heal from any mistakes your parents made; it'll also make you want to be super-careful in the decisions you make with your own kids, for the sake of their own (future) adulthood.

As for me, I don't have children, so I'm working on Column A. Although I grew up in a house where apologies were in abundance, I also heard it a ton because mistakes (i.e. poor choices) were made over and over (and over and over and over) again. So much to the point that I didn't realize that if someone says, "I'm sorry", (please catch this) there should be a change in their behavior that follows.

Continue!>>>

Because I'm just now really getting this, it's taken me years—decades actually—to learn how to truly forgive someone (please do that; your health and sanity depend on it), and to know what I should require (yes require) of someone who apologizes. Because, as I often tell couples in my marriage life coaching sessions, "If you want to free yourself and be in a good spiritual space, forgive. But in order for a relationship to heal, one person needs to forgive while the other needs to repent."

And if someone is truly remorseful, they are going to do the following five things:

​They Will Offer An Apology

You might've read this point and thought, "duh" but not so fast. I don't know about you, but there have been all sorts of situations—both personally as well as professionally—when someone has harmed or offended me and I had to coax an apology out of them.

I don't mean I had to explain why I was hurt (sometimes that is required). I mean that once we were both on the same page about the "offense", there were explanations and justifications but no "I'm sorry"—or sounded something like, "I'm sorry you feel that way but…" (which comes off as them trying to become the victim in the situation).

When someone gets that what they did was either wrong or that it hurt you (because those two things are not always one and the same), if they value you and the relationship, they'll acknowledge it without you having to "force" them to. Their humility will supersede their pride. "I'm sorry" will flow out of them.

So will my next point.

A wise person once said, "Adulthood is about surviving childhood."

If you stop and really let that sink in, it will make you want to heal from any mistakes your parents made; it'll also make you want to be super-careful in the decisions you make with your own kids, for the sake of their own (future) adulthood.

As for me, I don't have children, so I'm working on Column A. Although I grew up in a house where apologies were in abundance, I also heard it a ton because mistakes (i.e. poor choices) were made over and over (and over and over and over) again. So much to the point that I didn't realize that if someone says, "I'm sorry", (please catch this) there should be a change in their behavior that follows.

Because I'm just now really getting this, it's taken me years—decades actually—to learn how to truly forgive someone (please do that; your health and sanity depend on it), and to know what I should require (yes require) of someone who apologizes. Because, as I often tell couples in my marriage life coaching sessions, "If you want to free yourself and be in a good spiritual space, forgive. But in order for a relationship to heal, one person needs to forgive while the other needs to repent."

And if someone is truly remorseful, they are going to do the following five things:

They Will Express What They Regret Doing

This is what I call a "Shellie-ism" but personally, I don't trust people who claim that they don't live with regrets. I actually wonder if the individuals who boldly say that know what the word literally means—"to feel sorrow or remorse for (an act, fault, disappointment, etc.)".
To be remorseful is to have "deep and painful regret for wrongdoing", and if you are bragging about living without it, I can't help but wonder how healthy your relationships are.

All of us are human, all of us have done something that has "wronged" another individual. Hopefully, we feel sorrow or painful regret about that fact. That said, when someone is truly sorry for something they did to you, not only are you going to get an "I'm sorry" (or "I apologize") but it's going to follow with their reasons behind what they are sorry for.

For instance, if you told one of your girls something super-private and she tells someone else, not only is she going to apologize but she's going to follow up with something along the lines of "…for betraying your trust".

Why? It's simple really. An apology doesn't mean much unless the person who's doing it is clear on what they are sorry for in the first place. That's the only way they can be clear on what they did and how to avoid doing it again.

Continue reading, HERE!

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I’ve Transformed My Body and Mind

It’s Friday, everyone! And that means another Primal Blueprint Real Life Story from a Mark’s Daily Apple reader. If you have your own success story and would like to share it with me and the Mark’s Daily Apple community please contact me here. I’ll continue to publish these each Friday as long as they keep coming in. Thank you for reading!

Hello Mark and the Primal Blueprint community! I usually don’t do stuff like this, but like many others who have discovered the Primal Blueprint path, it’s changed my life in such a positive way that it’s hard not to share. Growing up I was always athletic – trim, quick, and agile. I excelled in every physical activity I was into, without much effort. Karate, soccer, skateboarding, snowboarding, surfing, even golf came easy for me. Within my group of friends, I was the guy that was better at everything than everyone else (at least in my mind LOL). It seemed like I could maintain this level of health and physical ability forever.

Then of course life happens. In my late 20s I meet the love of my life. We get married and in short order, our first son is born.  As a parent, you know how life-changing that event is, and being still in our 20’s, my wife and I went into daily survival mode and did our best. I never thought much about eating right or exercising, being one of those people who could (and did) eat anything under the sun and come out (seemingly) unscathed. Fast food, chips, pizza, ice-cream, candy, processed food from boxes, you name it. And it wasn’t just what I ate, it was the time in which I ate it. I never gave much thought to pounding huge meals late at night, or right before bed-time. In fact, it was like I had a “second” dinner every night. And of course, this was all the usual SAD stuff; tons of bread and grains, corn, fried foods, processed sugars, the usual suspects. I ate like this through my 30s.

As I reached my 40s, however, I noticed that I was getting fatter and slower, and had developed a severe case of IBS. I was always fatigued, irritable, and always had a constant feeling of dis-ease and malaise. Though I was still physically active playing soccer and bike commuting religiously, it seemed like I was always pulling a muscle, or getting injured. My reflexes seemed slower. I didn’t sleep well and my head was always in a cloud. I experienced my first panic attack and developed severe anxiety. I was always getting sick, and never had any energy to really play with or interact with my son.

When our second son came along, these symptoms became compounded. I was miserable, and felt ground-down by the pressures of life as a husband, father and sole-breadwinner of our family. I thought what I was feeling was just life happening, and that it was just a part of getting older.

Being now in my early 40s, I was feeling like crap, looking like crap, and had no idea what to do about it. One day I looked at myself in the full-length bathroom mirror (with my IBS, the bathroom was my second home), and I realized I was at a crossroads. Like Tracy Chapman sang, “leave tonight or live and die this way,” I decided it was time to leave my current unhealthy state and go on a new journey; one towards teaching myself how to be a Fat Burning Beast. Through Mark and the ever expanding Primal/Paleo community, I’ve reclaimed my health and fitness. I’ve discovered and use Intermittent Fasting as another tool, and read Mark’s Daily Apple daily for knowledge and inspiration (and dark chocolate recipes).

I’m also being mindful of things like chronic cardio, stress management and finding time to “get wild.” I’m constantly trying to figure out how to implement the Primal philosophy into the choices I make, not only with nutrition, but with life in general. My six-year-old son is now one of my Primal coaches (even though he doesn’t know it). He loves his “Primal” wrestling sessions with daddy, and being used as daddy’s weight lifting equipment. He also likes joining daddy and mommy in our family burpee sessions before dinner.

So, in about a year’s time of living the Primal/Keto life, I’ve transformed my body (and my mind). I’ve cured myself of IBS, and feel great overall. My head is clearer, I sleep better, my energy level has increased. Somehow, I feel more optimistic. My anxiety has lessened enough that I can enjoy coffee again (yay!)

What’s also cool is that through my enthusiasm for this path, my wife is also now onboard the Primal/Keto train (it was hard doing it alone, especially since she does all the cooking for the family). After only a few months, she is looking and feeling great herself, and enjoying more energy than she’s ever had. It hasn’t always been easy of course, but overall, being on the Primal path has been an incredible epiphany in my life. I have co-workers, friends, and family wondering what the heck happened and how I did it.

Thanks Mark for all you’ve done and continue to do. How great it must feel to be helping so many people improve their health and well-being. Congrats on being a game-changer and positive force in the world.

 Sukho V

The post I’ve Transformed My Body and Mind appeared first on Mark's Daily Apple.

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