For parents with small children: what is their health and fitness like right now, and what is it going to be like going forward? Developments in measuring techniques seem to be telling us that our children now are less healthy than our parent’s children.
Fitness? Well that’s almost a no brainer. Everyone is less fit than the kids in our parent’s generation. Not so smug now, are we?
Yes, it’s true the life-span is longer because we’ve made humongous strides in medical treatment and inventions; but truly, our lifestyle is doing us in.
This curation of posts are those which try to explain why and what to do about it: Children’s Health and Fitness.
3 Posts in "Children's Fitness" Series
- Children's Health-N-Fitness: Intro/Index – 12 Sep 2017
By recently developed methods of measurement, children's health in the U.S. is poorer than it has been in former years. In addition, they are less fit. Some reasons are completely obvious to anyone whose lives have spanned more than 20 years or so, some are not. Posts in this series try to explain why.
- Children's Health: Less Healthy Than 50 Years Ago – 13 Sep 2017
Your kids are taller, better fed and wealthier than your grandparents; so, why are today’s children LESS healthy than 50 years ago? Children’s health has actually gotten worse!
- Children's Fitness: The Bleep Test – 17 Sep 2017
A previous article compared children’s health of today with those of 50 years ago and found our kids come up wanting. The fitness of your child can be easily improved by making a game out of “the BLEEP” test, a 20 meter (21.87 yards) running aerobic fitness test done in time to “BLEEPS”—or beeps—on a music player.
I’ve written several other posts over the years on similar topics. If you’d like to know a bit more perhaps you might like some health-related proverbs.
Here we are, in our discussion about immunization, at the ten reasons parents don’t immunize their children as described by a colleague, Greg Barrett at Ohio State University School of Medicine.
He did something that very few pediatricians these days are willing to do: immerse himself in the wasteful false rhetoric in order to understand the dilemma the patients he cared about were in. This article is for those who are truly looking for answers (Vaccine-haters, this is not for you).
Read more →
We’re (by that I mean I and I’m dragging you along with me) trying to make sense of and understand this mess we’re in about immunization; and I’m telling you of how a colleague decided to deliberately immerse himself in the vaccine-hater cottage industry to try and understand how otherwise seemingly rational parents make decisions which are clearly not in the best interest of their children.
Read more →
If you’re like me, all this hysteria about immunizations is a bit hard to comprehend let alone understand. My very early memories concerning health were about friends and classmates becoming crippled and dying of polio and mumps and measles and whooping cough!
I remember taking cans around to collect “pennies by the inch” and news stories about children all over the nation sending dimes to the president and the “children’s March of Dimes.” Why were we so fearful, so troubled, so united, so focused? Were we all stupid? Deluded? Conned? Was it all a myth?
Read more →
One of several “most interesting” aspects of medical school for my graduating class was had in the psychiatry department when they taught us the science behind and techniques for hypnosis; or, as I’ve heard others refer to it: selective relaxation or meditation. This article is not about yoga per-se but about its usefulness in aiding meditation or relaxation.
I’ve been asked about and used clinical hypnosis (markedly different than “stage hypnosis”) on a few selective patients with uniformly favorable results; I’ve taught a whole lot more patients the techniques of selective relaxation.
Read more →
I had a friend post an article on his blog about how to cope with tinnitus. He’s not a medical person but has intimate knowledge of the problem from the standpoint of what actually works, and he discussed how meditation helps him.
I communicated with him a little about it and told him that I’d been working on a post about meditation for this blog for about two years. Actually, it’s been sitting in the “possibles” pen for that long, awaiting a bump into production.
Read more →
The slogan “Back to Sleep” which revolutionized infant sleep methods has been changed to “Safe To Sleep” to broaden its scope and bring other causes of sleep-related infant death “into the fold” for research. Perhaps you already knew that, the slogan has been registered as a trademark of the US Department of Health and Human Services.
Read more →
Is NOT sleeping or TO MUCH sleeping better; or NOT better? It’s that “best of times… worst of times” issue. They’re both bad… and good; depending on the circumstances, time and age.
That’s why I’ve begun curating the several posts I’ve written over the years explaining the many and varied aspects of the issue. And, with the benefits of the computer programming, whenever I write a new post this index post is automatically updated so is always the most up-to-date.
So… here’s all about sleep in children, teens and young adults:
6 Posts in "Children's Sleep" Series
- Children's Sleep series: Intro/Index – 19 Jan 2016
I've noticed the large number of questions from parents which have "sleep" as the core issue. This series is all about sleep, how it works, how much is needed; and… "what's the matter with this kid?"
- How much sleep – 20 Jan 2016
No really! How does sleep work? You think you know… until things change, and you realize you don't know anymore. You've got babies who wake you up at all hours and you've got teens who don't seem to ever get out of bed? What gives?
- Sleep In Teenagers – 28 Jan 2016
Right from birth it seems that tired children can crash to sleep anywhere, anytime they are tired. That's all over in "teenhood" however, partly because all of the nervous system changes occurring with puberty.
- Sleep Expectations and Training, Infants – 6 Mar 2016
Frankly, the topic of infant sleep is probably the most frequently asked group of questions from new parents and in the “top 3” for all parents; but still…. there's a lot of "wives tails" lurking about in the topic.
- More sleep training and tips, Infants - Part 2 – 11 Mar 2016
NOT sleeping through the night is no accident; sleeping THROUGH the night is no accident either; and, good sleep begins with deciding and defining. Infant sleep habits are varied but there are some tips.
- Sleep in Toddlers, Older Children – 28 Feb 2023
A good synopsis of this post might be "sleep through the ages." It does change you know, based on the growth of the child AND his/her environment that YOU provide based on family and house "rules." That means: here's what might be making (enabling) the problem that your child might be having and what you can do about it.
Quite a bunch, no? All inform about just a little bit different aspect.
Obesity, it’s the “genes” you want to believe; but, really I’ve never known a “gene” to force-feed anyone, and the calories have got to come from somewhere.
And there’s that pesky research that showed a high link between obesity and the number of fast-food establishments around your house and on the way to work.
And how about twins living apart who are not both obese? And… and… and….
Is it really all genes, leaving us no hope; or is it environment and advertising? Let’s find out:
5 Posts in "Obesity" Series
- Obesity Series: Intro/Index – 15 Jan 2016
Obesity and how to avoid it, explaining "genes," tips for kids, fun videos and a great new skill to learn.
- Fast Food – 16 Jan 2016
Believe it or not, the more fast food outlets there are on your way to work the fatter you will be—genes or not!
- 10 Ways To Ditch Obesity – 24 Jan 2016
Have you taught your kids that all of us 2/3rds of US adults who are overweight or obese came from people JUST LIKE THEM! How can kids ditch obesity, I'll tell you.
- Teens - Treadmill Dance – 1 Feb 2016
Ok, in this series we've talked about the Obesity epidemic from various viewpoints. First, there was a great new research article describing a "smoking gun" of obesity: fast food. Then there was a great list for teens who'd like to kick obesity. Now a great way of loosing weight, if only some of us still had the ability.
- Where does the fat go? – 9 Feb 2016
In his TEDx talk, Ruben Meerman answers the question: When you lose weight… where does it go? Does fat evaporate, come out in urine or other body waste or get burned up? You'll know after watching this short and highly entertaining (there be vapors and smoke and test tubes) talk.
I’m not sure how to write about some new research on infant circumcision because I am aware that the subject has seemed to develop sort of a cult of non-believers not dissimilar to that of the non-immunizers.
Read more→
Here is a link to an article for teens about sexual attraction and orientation and it’s printable. A good read for parents as well. It’s tremendously important that each teen finds a “confidant.”
[ http://kidshealth.org/PageManager.jsp?dn=KidsHealth&lic=1&ps=207&cat_id=20016&article_set=50685 ]
“Am I ready to have sex?” That’s a question only a rare parent will ever be asked by their teen. But, they might read an article on it – like this one.
[ http://www.healthychildren.org/English/ages-stages/teen/dating-sex/Pages/Deciding%20to%20Wait.aspx ]
:
