Blog Posts by Tips on Healthy Living

By Erica Brown
Author of Happier Endings
There is an art to the consolation note, the sympathy card, the letter marking loss and sadness-even if you cannot share in the sadness because the person who died is an absolute stranger. I find that what helps me write such a letter is meditating for a moment before I begin, particularly focusing on the reader's face when he or she opens the letter and skims its few sentences to see if they will capture a memory, share an as-yet untold story, or regurgitate a few unlovable clichés.

What words will somehow bridge the distance or offer a little sliver of solace? Maybe none. Maybe some. Maybe some, but only with time.

It is so hard to write a moving sympathy card, so hard that we often forget to get around to it, mostly because we never wanted to write one in the first place. But I know that many mourners need these cards. They are buoyed by the little postal gifts of love contained in small envelopes around small, heartfelt feelings of loss.

By Marci Nault
Author of The Lake House
"I have nothing left," my girlfriend said with tears in her eyes. The moment before she'd been strong, almost angry in her determination as she explained what she was doing to fight for her daughter in a school system that was failing her. But when I asked her what she was doing to care for herself a look of fear crossed her face.

"Too much," she said. "I'm taking time to figure skate three hours per week, and I know it's selfish so I'm giving it up. My daughter is too important right now."

"You have to take time to give to yourself or there won't be anything left," I said and that's when her determination broke, the tears began, and she confessed that she was already there.

I'm uncertain if it's genetic encoding or a societal pressure passed down through generations that have taught women their needs aren't important. Throughout my childhood I watched my mother put aside personal dreams to care for everyone else. For most of my life, I

By Kristy Ojala

In her book The Immune System Recovery Plan, Dr. Susan Blum, one of the most sought-after experts in the field of functional medicine, shares the four-step program she used to treat her own serious autoimmune condition and help countless patients reverse their symptoms, heal their immune systems, and prevent future illness. I found her quizzes and tips very helpful and I wanted to find out more about how we can live better-and be nicer to our poor, poor guts.

First of all, thank you for your book. If I hadn't picked it up at work, I wouldn't have been able to start taking charge of some major health issues I was not aware of. Your quizzes are very helpful. Why are so many of us in the dark about our diet and the importance of a "healthy gut"?

Dr. Susan Blum: Because we are in the midst of an obesity epidemic, and also a self-image crisis, everyone is very focused on being thin and counting calories. This is just the wrong way to look at food. One of my

By Julie Inzanti
I have been working in "slow fashion" for a couple of years now and am familiar with the consideration and care that goes into designing and producing not only an entire collection, but each individual garment. I work for the small, Brooklyn-based brand Nadia Tarr. We use American-made fabrics and manufacture locally in Brooklyn, which has given me a new insight into the industry and how important each step of the process is. It has also raised my expectations in terms of clothing quality.

Fast-fashion giants like H&M and Zara are perfect for the girl on a budget who wants to look good traipsing around Manhattan. I used to pick up cheap wears in bulk-and some of the far reaches of my closet still house the remnants of my "quantity over quality" phase… otherwise known as my twenties. But at the end of my discount decade, what do I have to show for it? I don't have one fabulous frock that has survived even two washes or trips to the dry-cleaner. The only pieces

By Jennifer Keishin Armstrong
Author of Mary and Lou and Rhoda and Ted
Modern shows feature plenty of young women haplessly trying to navigate dating life. But when you look back at TV's first truly independent single girls in the city,The Mary Tyler Moore Show's Mary Richards and Rhoda Morgenstern,one thing is clear: These '70s ladies took far less crap than the Hannahs and Mindys and Jesses of our time. If you really want to master your dating domain, you need do nothing more than ask, "What would Mary and Rhoda do?" Here, a few answers.

Be the beautiful, funny, smart heroine you've always wanted to be.These women, and the female writers who helped shape their characters, looked to the big-screen dames of the '30s for inspiration: the wise-cracking Carole Lombards and Jean Arthurs who didn't apologize for their humor, intelligence, wit, or sexuality. They figured the men who couldn't handle it were not the men for them. If you know there's always another episode with

Regardless of how men treat us, sometimes we just have to look at ourselves and our actions and realize, "Oh gosh, I'm being the Crazy Girl," says Jessica Massa in her book The Gaggle: How to Find Love in a Post-Dating World. Do any of the following sound familiar?

• You check out the Facebook page of every girl he's added as a friend-and let's not even get started on girls who post on his wall!
• You leave an article of clothing at his house to see if he mentions it without being prompted.
• You secretly check his phone or email to see who else he is talking to.
• You demand that he not hang out with his friends, family, or any girl who comes within a ten-foot radius of him.
• You fight with him in front of other people.
• You trick him into meeting up with you under false pretenses.
• You time how long he takes to text you back and have a set average in your head. More than two hours, and he must be with another girl!
• You count his condoms.
• You respond

By Steph Davis
Author of Learning to Fly

Rafting down the Amazon would undoubtedly be a character-building experience, but most of us are not actually going to do it, for all the obvious reasons. Some people gravitate toward the unknown and shape their lives around that drive, but there are a lot of barriers to breaking out of a normal routine-time, money, commitments and fears of getting hurt, wasting time, failing, getting disappointed or desperately uncomfortable.

Having traveled to a lot of places that made me nervous and done a lot of things that made me nervous, I know that one approach to reasonable anxieties is to just "Go for it!" Most people will agree that stepping outside your comfort zone is something we all should do, and most people think it's kind of like ripping off a band aid-just shut your eyes, grit your teeth and and do it real quick and then you'll be happy you did it.

But I've come to learn that having wild experiences doesn't have to mean

Drinking more than one caffeinated beverage a day can have a negative impact on women who are trying to increase their fertility. Learn more from Jessica Porter of The MILF Diet: Let the Power of Whole Foods Transform Your Body, Mind, and Spirit... Deliciously!

Caffeine messes with fertility. According to a Danish study, drinking even small amounts of coffee affects the ability to conceive. Women in the study who consumed more than the equivalent of one cup of coffee per day were half as likely to become pregnant, per cycle, as women who drank less. The more a woman drank, the lower her chances for becoming pregnant. Studies also show that coffee drinking increases the risk of miscarriage.

Let's examine this: Could it be that the relaxed receptivity that is characteristic of our womanhood flies out the window when we're jacked up on the joe? It's well understood that stress affects our ability to climax, can interrupt our menstrual cycles, and can even stop a labor, so why