Free Republic

Just when you thought it was safe to go back to work. I haven't seen these before, evidently they are a hit in the UK. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cGBwiQeh71c

PAKTIA PROVINCE, Afghanistan, April 7, 2010 – Air Force Maj. Kim Floyd and Air Force Senior Airman Jessica E. Delgado just want to talk. Air Force Maj. Kim Floyd speaks with Army Spc. Autumn L. Gregg at Forward Operating Base Lightning in Afghanistan’s Paktia province, April 1, 2010. U.S. Army photo by Sgt. Andrew A. Reagan  (Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available. Floyd, a psychologist deployed from the 92nd Medical Group at Fairchild Air Force Base, Wash., and Delgado, a mental health technician deployed from the 5th Medical Group at Minot Air Force Base, N.D., make up the Combat Stress...

Snacking under stress can contribute to weight gain, and new research shows the snacking doesn't stop for women when the pressure slacks off. Jennifer Waugh, a clinical nutrition manager at Baltimore's Mercy Medical Center, said stress is a common trigger for snacking, especially eating comfort foods, including sweets, pastries, soft drinks or chips. "It seems like people either want sweet, bland, salty, chocolate, high-fat things that are not healthy and are very much considered junk food," Waugh said. "You can have a bottled water, that's always good, or yogurt or milk because it has protein that can make you feel...

Former President Bill Clinton said Wednesday that he will manage his stress better after undergoing a procedure to unclog a blocked artery, but emphasized that he has no intention of slowing down. It would be a mistake to stop working, Clinton said at an event focusing on childhood obesity. "I've been given this gift of life by my surgery five years ago, the medicine I take, the lifestyle changes I've made," he said. "I don't want to throw it away by being a vegetable. I want to do things with it every day." Clinton said he would make changes...

Risk: Stressed people are twice as likely to have furred arteries Getting stressed really is bad for your heart, according to new research. For years, stress has been linked to heart attacks and other heart complaints but with very little medical evidence to back it up. Now a major trial by doctors at University College London has proved for the first time that people who get stressed are also likely to have heart disease. The study involved 514 men and women, with an average age of 62. None had signs of heart disease...

Worries about the economy and healthcare are pushing people into middle age earlier, making 35 the new 40, according to a new report. While 40 was once widely considered the milestone that defined middle age, this has been lowered to 35, according to research by the Philips Center for Health and Well-Being. "Thirty five is the new 40 as Americans feel the pressures of middle age earlier than ever," the Amsterdam-based centre said in a statement. Katy Hartley, the director of the centre, which aims to improve quality of life, said stress about the economy and healthcare that you would...

Feeling a little stressed over the Christmas holiday season? While it may be the official season to be merry, for many, the holidays are a time of stress, loneliness, anxiety and dysfunction according to ThirdAge.com. Family tensions, financial stress and physical demands are three areas that can trigger holiday stress or depression. So what does one do when it's the season to be jolly, but you're feeling anything but jolly?

Japan's Crown Princess Masako has said she will keep working to fight her stress problems. The 46-year-old royal - who is married to Crown Prince Naruhito - said she has been working with medical professionals to solve her illness.

Enlarge ImageHigh anxiety. Rats "addicted" to sugary food spent less time on the open parts of this maze. Credit: Pietro Cottone If you're constantly starting new diets, then breaking them, you may have more in common with a drug addict than you know. A new study suggests that yo-yo dieters experience the same stressful pangs of withdrawal when they go on a diet that addicts experience when they go cold turkey. The idea that bad food can be addictive is not new. But previous studies have tended to focus on the positive reinforcement side of the equation--for example, the...

No, I'm not referring to marriages between blacks and whites, or Christians and Jews. I'm talking about marriages where one person is liberal and the other is conservative. To be more specific, I'm writing about my own marriage and I invite my esteemed AT readers to offer their advice. My husband and I were liberal Democrats for most of our lives. On occasion we used to talk about couples who were not politically aligned and wondered how they dealt with that in their relationship. Did they argue? Did they just not talk politics? Were they able to have interesting discussions...

WASHINGTON, Nov. 9, 2009 – Readers of Mark Bowden’s “Black Hawk Down” can put the book aside when they’ve had enough of their mind’s reaction of the brutal 1993 battle of Mogadishu, Somalia. But Chaplain (Maj.) Jeff Struecker isn’t that lucky. The decorated Army Ranger was charged with leading the ground assault force on all the targets that the task force hit in Somalia. “I had been shot at and seen many dead warriors [before Mogadishu],” Struecker said. “I never experienced anything like the violence and the overwhelming sense of desperation like I experienced in Somalia. After losing one of...

A study in mice has hinted at the impact that early life trauma and stress can have on genes, and how they can result in behavioural problems. Scientists described the long-term effects of stress on baby mice in the journal Nature Neuroscience. Stressed mice produced hormones that "changed" their genes, affecting their behaviour throughout their lives. This work could provide clues to how stress and trauma in early life can lead to later problems...... The team found that mice that had been "abandoned" during their early lives were then less able to cope with stressful situations throughout their lives. The...

Northwestern research finds drugs aim at wrong target CHICAGO --- More than half the people who take antidepressants for depression never get relief. Why? Because the cause of depression has been oversimplified and drugs designed to treat it aim at the wrong target, according to new research from the Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine. The medications are like arrows shot at the outer rings of a bull's eye instead of the center. A study from the laboratory of long-time depression researcher Eva Redei, presented at the Neuroscience 2009 conference in Chicago this week, appears to topple two strongly held...

Chicago leads list for second year; housing woes weigh on nation.

During the great recession here have been ups and downs, ins and outs, tons of tears and very little rejoicing. At some point we've all been on the wrong side of a trade, seen the damage of broad company layoffs, had our 401k's destroyed, or have harbored deep ill feelings towards at least one (or more) government announcements. At times such as these the emotions connected with our dire and depressing circumstances can become overwhelming. So rather than being held down by circumstances that we cannot possibly control, what can we do about it? When considering this and the oppressive...

The sight was not that unusual, at least not for Mosul, Iraq, on a summer morning: a car parked on the sidewalk, facing opposite traffic, its windows rolled up tight. Two young boys stared out the back window, kindergarten age maybe, their faces leaning together as if to share a whisper. The soldier patrolling closest to the car stopped. It had to be hot in there; it was 120 degrees outside. “Permission to approach, sir, to give them some water,” the soldier said to Sgt. First Class Edward Tierney, who led the nine-man patrol that morning. “I said no —...

"I had a doctor's appointment at the local VA clinic yesterday and found something very interesting I would like to pass along.. While going through triage before seeing the doctor, I was asked at the end of the exam, three questions. 1.) Did I feel stressed? 2.) Did I feel threatened? 3.) Did I feel like doing harm to someone? The nurse then informed me, if I had answered yes to any of the questions, I would have lost my concealed carry permit as it would have gone into my medical records and the VA would have reported it to...

The female brain reacts differently to stressful situations, distress and depression than the male brain. Research in psycho-pharmacology - the study of drug-induced changes in mood and behaviour - however, is primarily done with male lab animals and therefore provides a distorted picture, Dutch researchers say. Gert ter Horst, a professor of neurobiology at the University Medical Centre in Groningen , and his colleagues have examined the way male and female rats deal with stress. They published their findings in the scientific magazine Physiology & Behavior. "Gender differences have become a booming field of research only recently," they write. "We...

WASHINGTON – Stress over grades. Financial worries. Trouble sleeping. Feeling hopeless. So much for those carefree college days. The vast majority of college students are feeling stressed these days, and significant numbers are at risk of depression, according to an Associated Press-mtvU poll Eighty-five percent of the students reported feeling stress in their daily lives in recent months, with worries about grades, school work, money and relationships the big culprits. At the same time, 42 percent said they had felt down, depressed or hopeless several days during the past two weeks, and 13 percent showed signs of being at risk...

A tremendously important story has gone virtually untold by the media, ignored by our political leaders and unknown to the American public. Despite the extraordinarily high price they have paid, America's severely wounded veterans are enduring humiliating financial hardships of epic proportions. Home evictions, utility shutoffs, car repossessions and foreclosures are commonplace. Spouses have to give up their jobs to become caregivers, cutting family incomes by up to 50 percent or more. Most disabled vets receive much less in compensation and benefits than they did while on active duty, reducing incomes even further. Many are too dysfunctional to hold a...