Stop Overthinking – by Nick Trenton
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This book is exactly what it says on the tin. We are given twenty-three techniques to relieve stress, stop negative spirals, declutter your mind, and focus on the present, in the calm pursuit of good mental health and productivity.
The techniques are things like the RAIN technique above, so if you liked that, you’ll love this. Being a book rather than a newsletter, it also takes the liberty of going into much more detail—hence the 200 pages for 23 techniques. Unlike many books, it’s not packed in fluff either. It’s that perfect combination of “to the point” and “very readable”.
If you’ve read this far into the review and you’re of two minds about whether or not this book could be useful to you, then you just might be overthinking it
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The Exercises That Help Keep Breast Cancer At Bay
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For women, our lifetime risk of being diagnosed with breast cancer is about 1 in 7, before we take into account any added risk or protective factors.
For men, it’s more like 1 in 556, which again, is before taking into account any added risk or protective factors.
Here’s a good place to start on improving those odds: How To Triple Your Breast Cancer Survival Chances
And for that matter, check out: 8 Signs On Your Breast You Shouldn’t Ignore
And for those concerned (or even just curious) about the pros and cons of menopausal HRT when it comes to breast cancer:
The Hormone Therapy That Reduces Breast Cancer Risk & More ← this is actually very important to understand, as otherwise it’s easy to accidentally self-sabotage and increase one’s overall mortality risk
So, what’s this about exercise and breast cancer?
There are two things to focus on
No, not those.
Well, yes, those, but also: aerobic exercise and resistance training.
A research team (Dr. Alice Avancini et al.) analysed data from 22 randomized controlled trials (total n=968 participants) that investigated the effects of exercise on various pro-inflammatory biomarkers (mostly interleukin variants, but also c-reactive proteins) that are known to increase breast cancer reoccurrence risk.
What they found was:
❝Exercise induced small to large significant reductions in IL-6 (SMD = -0.85; 95% CI = -1.68 to -0.02; p = .05) and TNF-α (SMD = -0.40; 95% CI = -0.81 to 0.01; p = .05) and a trend for a decrease in CRP.
When stratifying by exercise mode, trends toward reduction in IL-6 and TNF-α were observed for combined exercise, whilst changes were not generally affected by exercise program duration❞
The “combined exercise” mentioned?
Aerobic exercise and resistance training.
This is important, because as regular 10almonds readers may remember…
What Your Metabolism Says About How Aggressive Breast Cancer Is Likely To Be For You ← this makes a huge difference to survival chances
So, this study’s findings are very consistent with that, because:
- Aerobic training increases cardiovascular fitness, improving metabolism
- Resistance training increases muscle mass, improving metabolism*
*because muscle “costs” calories to maintain, prompting an increase in metabolism, whereas fat prompts our metabolism to slow, to conserve energy to face the obvious food shortage that must be coming
See also: Stop Cancer 20 Years Ago
Want to learn more?
Here’s the best book we’ve read on breast cancer survival:
The Smart Woman’s Guide to Breast Cancer – by Dr. Jenn Simmons
Take care!
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Age Later – by Dr. Nir Barzilai
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Dr. Barzilai discusses why we age, why supercentenarians age more slowly, and even, why it is so often the case that supercentenarians outside of Blue Zones have poor lifestyles (their longevity is because of protective genes that mitigate the harmful effects of those poor lifestyles—the ultimate in “survivorship bias”).
He also talks not just genetics, but also epigenetics, and thus gene expression. Bearing in mind, there’s a scale of modifiability there: with current tech, we can’t easily change a bad gene… But we often can just switch it off (or at least downregulate its expression). This is where studies in supercentenarians are helpful even for those who don’t have such fortunate genes—the supercentenarian studies show us which genes we want on or off, what gene expressions to aim for, etc. Further clinical studies can then show us what lifestyle interventions (exercise, diet, nutraceuticals, etc) can do that for us.
With regard to those lifestyle interventions, he does cover many, and that’s where a lot of the practical value of the book comes from. But it’s not just “do this, do that”; understanding the reasons behind why things work the way they do is important, so as to be more likely to do it right, and also to enjoy greater adherence (we tend to do things we understand more readily than things we have just been told to do).
There are areas definitely within the author’s blind spots—for example, when talking about menopausal HRT, he discusses at great length the results of the discredited WHI study, and considers it the only study of relevance. So, this is a reminder to not believe everything said by someone who sounds confident (Dr. Barzilai’s professional background is mostly in treating diabetes).
In terms of style, it is very much narrative; somewhat pop-science, but more “this doctor wants to tell stories”. So many stories. Now, the stories all have informational value, so this isn’t padding, but it is the style, so we mention it as such. As for citations, there aren’t any, so if you want to look up the science he mentions, you’re going to need a bit of digital sleuthery to find the papers from the clues in the stories.
Bottom line: if you’re interested in the science of aging and how that has been progressing for the past decades and where we’re at, this book will give you so many jumping-off points, and is an engaging read.
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Smart Sex – by Dr. Emily Morse
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First, what this isn’t: this isn’t a mere book of sex positions and party tricks, nor is it a book of Cosmo-style “drive your man wild by using hot sauce as lube” advice.
What it offers instead, is a refreshingly mature take on sex, free from the “teehee” titillations and blushes that many books of the genre go for.
Dr. Emily Morse outlines five pillars of sex:
- Embodiment
- Health
- Collaboration
- Self-knowledge
- Self-acceptance
…and talks about each of them in detail, and how we can bring them together. And, of course, how we or our partner(s) could accidentally sabotage ourselves or each other, and the conversations we can (and should!) have, to work past that.
She also, critically, and this is a big source of value in the book, looks at “pleasure thieves”: stress, trauma, and shame. The advice for overcoming these is not “don’t worry; be happy” but rather is actual practical steps one can take.
The style throughout is direct and unpatronizing. Since the advice within pertains to everyone who has and/or wants an active sex life, very little is divided by gender etc.
There is some attention given to anatomy and physiology, complete with clear diagrams. Honestly, most people could benefit from these, because most people’s knowledge of the relevant anatomy stopped with a very basic high school text book diagram that missed a lot out.
Bottom line: this book spends more time on what’s between your ears than what’s between your legs, and yet is very comprehensive in all areas. Everyone has something to gain from this one.
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Codependency Isn’t What Most People Think It Is
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Codependency isn’t what most people think it is
In popular parlance, people are often described as “codependent” when they rely on each other to function normally. That’s interdependent mutualism, and while it too can become a problem if a person is deprived of their “other half” and has no idea how to do laundry and does not remember to take their meds, it’s not codependency.
Codependency finds its origins in the treatment and management of alcoholism, and has been expanded to encompass other forms of relationships with dependence on substances and/or self-destructive behaviors—which can be many things, including the non-physical, for example a pattern of irresponsible impulse-spending, or sabotaging one’s own relationship(s).
We’ll use the simplest example, though:
- Person A is (for example) an alcoholic. They have a dependency.
- Person B, married to A, is not an alcoholic. However, their spouse’s dependency affects them greatly, and they do what they can to manage that, and experience tension between wanting to “save” their spouse, and wanting their spouse to be ok, which latter, superficially, often means them having their alcohol.
Person B is thus said to be “codependent”.
The problem with codependency
The problems of codependency are mainly twofold:
- The dependent partner’s dependency is enabled and thus perpetuated by the codependent partner—they might actually have to address their dependency, if it weren’t for their partner keeping them from too great a harm (be it financially, socially, psychologically, medically, whatever)
- The codependent partner is not having a good time of it either. They have the stress of two lives with the resources (e.g. time) of one. They are stressing about something they cannot control, understandably worrying about their loved one, and, worse: every action they might take to “save” their loved one by reducing the substance use, is an action that makes their partner unhappy, and causes conflict too.
Note: codependency is often a thing in romantic relationships, but it can appear in other relationships too, e.g. parent-child, or even between friends.
See also: Development and validation of a revised measure of codependency
How to deal with this
If you find yourself in a codependent position, or are advising someone who is, there are some key things that can help:
- Be a nurturer, not a rescuer. It is natural to want to “rescue” someone we care about, but there are some things we cannot do for them. Instead, we must look for ways to build their strength so that they can take the steps that only they can take to fix the problem.
- Establish boundaries. Practise saying “no”, and also be clear over what things you can and cannot control—and let go of the latter. Communicate this, though. An “I’m not the boss of you” angle can prompt a lot of people to take more personal responsibility.
- Schedule time for yourself. You might take some ideas from our previous tangentially-related article:
How To Avoid Carer Burnout (Without Dropping Care)
Want to read more?
That’s all we have space for today, but here’s a very useful page with a lot of great resources (including questionnaires and checklist and things, in case you’re thinking “is it, or…?”)
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Pistachios vs Brazil Nuts – Which is Healthier?
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Our Verdict
When comparing pistachios to Brazil nuts, we picked the pistachios.
Why?
In terms of macros, pistachios have more protein, carbs, and fiber, while Brazil nuts have more fat. The fats are mostly healthy, although it is worth noting that Brazil nuts have not only more total saturated fat, but also more saturated fat proportionally to total fats. All in all, Brazil nuts’ macro balance isn’t bad, but we say pistachios have it better.
When it comes to vitamins, pistachios have a lot more of vitamins A, B1, B2, B3, B5, B6, B7, B9, and C, while Brazil nuts have more vitamin E. An easy win for pistachios here.
In the category of minerals, it gets interesting: pistachios have more iron and potassium, while Brazil nuts have more calcium, copper, magnesium, phosphorus, selenium, and zinc. Sounds great, but… About that selenium:
- A cup of cashews contains 38% of the RDA of selenium. This will go towards helping your hair be luscious and shiny (also important for energy conversion).
- A cup of Brazil nuts contains 10,456% of the RDA of selenium. This is way past the point of selenium toxicity, and your (luscious, shiny) hair will fall out.
For this reason, it’s recommended to eat no more than 3–4 Brazil nuts per day.
We consider that a point against Brazil nuts.
Adding up the sections gives us an overall win for pistachios. Of course, enjoy Brazil nuts too if you will, but in careful moderation please!
Want to learn more?
You might like to read:
Why You Should Diversify Your Nuts
Take care!
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Eye Drops: Safety & Alternatives
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It’s Q&A Day at 10almonds!
Have a question or a request? You can always hit “reply” to any of our emails, or use the feedback widget at the bottom!
In cases where we’ve already covered something, we might link to what we wrote before, but will always be happy to revisit any of our topics again in the future too—there’s always more to say!
As ever: if the question/request can be answered briefly, we’ll do it here in our Q&A Thursday edition. If not, we’ll make a main feature of it shortly afterwards!
So, no question/request too big or small
❝Before important business meetings my father used to use eye drops to add a “sparkle” to his eyes. I think that is a step too far, but what, short of eye drops, can we do to keep our eyes bright throughout the day?❞
Firstly, we’d indeed not recommend eye drops unless advised to do so by your doctor to treat a specific health condition:
- Infections from over-the-counter artificial tears
- Are my eye drops safe to use?
- More eye drops recalled due to infection danger
Those eye drops that “add sparkle” are often based on astringents such as witch hazel. This means that the capillaries in the eye undergo vasoconstriction, becoming much less visible and the eye thus appears much whiter and thus brighter.
There isn’t a way to do the same thing from the inside, as taking a vasoconstrictor will simply increase your general blood pressure, making the capillaries of your eyes more, rather than less, visible.
However, what you can do is…
- look after your general vasculature (cardiovascular health)
- in particular, reduce hypertension
- that includes limiting salt
- stay away from vasoconstrictors (including caffeine)
- reduce your resting cortisol levels
- that certainly also means reducing alcohol consumption
- maintain good hydration
Take care!
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