Buffed-Up Buffalo Cauliflower

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This is a tasty snack that also more protein than you’d think, because of the garbanzo bean flour. It also has plenty of health-giving spices, as well as blood-sugar-balancing vinegar, no added sugar, and very little salt.

You will need

  • 1 medium head of cauliflower, cut into florets
  • ½ cup garbanzo bean flour
  • ½ cup water
  • ⅓ cup hot sauce (we recommend a low-sugar kind; Nando’s hot sauce is good for this if available where you are, as it has no added sugar and its main ingredient by volume is vinegar, which is good for balancing blood sugars)
  • 2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil, plus more for the pan
  • 2 tsp garlic powder
  • 2 tsp nutritional yeast
  • 2 tsp black pepper, freshly ground
  • 1 tsp smoked paprika
  • ½ tsp MSG, or 1 tsp low sodium salt

For the ranch sauce:

  • ½ cup raw sunflower seeds
  • ⅓ cup water
  • ⅓ cup milk (plant milk being healthiest if you choose one that’s unsweetened)
  • 2 tbsp apple cider vinegar
  • 2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
  • 1 tsp onion powder
  • 1 tsp dried thyme
  • 1 tsp dried oregano
  • 1 tsp dried dill
  • ½ tsp MSG, or 1 tsp low sodium salt

Method

(we suggest you read everything at least once before doing anything)

1) Preheat the oven to 400℉/200℃.

2) Blend the ranch sauce ingredients until smooth, and set aside.

3) Mix the buffalo cauliflower ingredients except for the cauliflower, in a big bowl.

4) Add the cauliflower to the big bowl, mixing well to coat evenly.

5) Bake the buffalo cauliflower florets on a baking tray lined with baking paper, for about 25 minutes, turning gently if it seems they are at risk of cooking unevenly.

6) Serve hot, with the sunflower ranch on the side!

Enjoy!

Want to learn more?

For those interested in some of the science of what we have going on today:

Take care!

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  • The Five Pillars Of Longevity

    10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.

    The Five Pillars Of Longevity

    This is Dr. Mark Hyman. He’s a medical doctor, and he’s the board president of clinical affairs of the Institute for Functional Medicine. He’s also the founder and medical director of the UltraWellness Center!

    What he’d like you to know about is what he calls the “Five Pillars of Longevity”.

    Now, here at 10almonds, we often talk about certain things that science finds to be good for almost any health condition, and have made a habit of referencing what we call “The Usual Five Things™” (not really a trademark, by the way—just a figure of speech), which are:

    1. Have a good diet
    2. Get good exercise
    3. Get good sleep
    4. Reduce (or eliminate) alcohol consumption
    5. Don’t smoke

    …and when we’re talking about a specific health consideration, we usually provide sources as to why each of them are particularly relevant, and pointers as to the what/how associated with them (ie what diet is good, how to get good sleep, etc).

    Dr. Hyman’s “Five Pillars of Longevity” are based on observations from the world’s “Blue Zones”, the popular name for areas with an unusually high concentration of supercentenarians—Sardinia and Okinawa being famous examples, with a particular village in each being especially exemplary.

    These Five Pillars of Longevity partially overlap with ours for three out of five, and they are:

    1. Good nutrition
    2. Optimized workouts
    3. Reduce stress
    4. Get quality sleep
    5. Find (and live) your purpose

    We won’t argue against those! But what does he have to say, for each of them?

    Good nutrition

    Dr. Hyman advocates for a diet he calls “pegan”, which he considers to combine the paleo and vegan diets. Here at 10almonds, we generally advocate for the Mediterranean Diet because of the mountains of evidence for it, but his approach may be similar in some ways, since it looks to consume a majority plant diet, with some unprocessed meats/fish, limited dairy, and no grains.

    By the science, honestly, we stand by the Mediterranean (which includes whole grains), but if for example your body may have issues of some kind with grains, his approach may be a worthy consideration.

    Optimized workouts

    For Dr. Hyman, this means getting in three kinds of exercise regularly:

    • Aerobic/cardio, to look after your heart health
    • Resistance training (e.g. weights or bodyweight strength-training) to look after your skeletal and muscular health
    • Yoga or similar suppleness training, to look after your joint health

    Can’t argue with that, and it can be all too easy to fall into the trap of thinking “I’m healthy because I do x” while forgetting y and/or z! Thus, a three-pronged approach definitely has its merits.

    Reduce stress

    Acute stress (say, a cold shower) is can confer some health benefits, but chronic stress is ruinous to our health and it ages us. So, reducing this is critical. Dr. Hyman advocates for the practice of mindfulness and meditation, as well as journaling.

    Get quality sleep

    Quality here, not just quantity. As well as the usual “sleep hygiene” advices, he has some more unorthodox methods, such as the use of binaural beats to increase theta-wave activity in the brain (and thus induce more restful sleep), and the practice of turning off Wi-Fi, on the grounds that Wi-Fi signals interfere with our sleep.

    We were curious about these recommendations, so we checked out what the science had to say! Here’s what we found:

    In short: probably not too much to worry about in those regards. On the other hand, worrying less, unlike those two things, is a well-established way improve sleep!

    (Surprised we disagreed with our featured expert on a piece of advice? Please know: you can always rely on us to stand by what the science says; we pride ourselves on being as reliable as possible!)

    Find (and live!) your purpose

    This one’s an ikigai thing, to borrow a word from Japanese, or finding one’s raison d’être, as we say in English using French, because English is like that. It’s about having purpose.

    Dr. Hyman’s advice here is consistent with what many write on the subject, and it’d be an interesting to have more science on, but meanwhile, it definitely seems consistent with commonalities in the Blue Zone longevity hotspots, where people foster community, have a sense of belonging, know what they are doing for others and keep doing it because they want to, and trying to make the world—or even just their little part of it—better for those who will follow.

    Being bitter, resentful, and self-absorbed is not, it seems a path to longevity. But a life of purpose, or even just random acts of kindness, may well be.

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  • Tomato vs Cucumber – Which is Healthier?

    10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.

    Our Verdict

    When comparing tomato to cucumber, we picked the tomato.

    Why?

    Both are certainly great, but there are some nutritional factors between them:

    In terms of macros, everything is approximately equal except that tomato has more than 2x the fiber, so that’s a win for tomato.

    When it comes to vitamins, tomatoes have more of vitamins A, B1, B3, B6, B9, C, E, and choline, while cucumber has more of vitamins B2, B5, and K. In short, an 8:3 victory for tomatoes.

    In the category of minerals, tomatoes have more copper, potassium, and manganese, while cucumber has more calcium, iron, magnesium, selenium, and zinc. So, a win for cucumber this time.

    Both have useful phytochemical properties, too; tomatoes are rich in lycopene which has many benefits, and cucumbers have powerful anti-inflammatory powers whose mechanism of action is not yet fully understood—see the links below for more details!

    All in all, enjoy either or both (they make a great salad chopped roughly together with some olives, a little garlic, and a drizzle of olive oil and balsamic vinegar with a twist or three of black pepper), but if you have to pick just one (what a cruel world), we say the tomato has the most benefits, on balance.

    Want to learn more?

    You might like to read:

    Take care!

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  • How they did it: STAT reporters expose how ailing seniors suffer when Medicare Advantage plans use algorithms to deny care

    10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.

    In a call with a long-time source, what stood out most to STAT reporters Bob Herman and Casey Ross was just how viscerally frustrated and angry the source was about an algorithm used by insurance companies to decide how long patients should stay in a nursing home or rehab facility before being sent home.­

    The STAT stories had a far-reaching impact:

    • The U.S. Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Government Affairs took a rare step of launching a formal investigation into the use of algorithms by the country’s three largest Medicare Advantage insurers.
    • Thirty-two House members urged the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services to increase the oversight of algorithms that health insurers use to make coverage decisions.
    • In a rare step, CMS launched its own investigation into UnitedHealth. It also stiffened its regulations on the use of proprietary algorithms and introduced plans to audit denials across Medicare Advantage plans in 2024.
    • Based on STAT’s reporting, Medicare Advantage beneficiaries filed two class-action lawsuits against UnitedHealth and its NaviHealth subsidiary, the maker of the algorithm, and against Humana, another major health insurance company that was also using the algorithm. 
    • Amid scrutiny, UnitedHealth renamed NaviHealth.

    The companies never allowed an on-the-record interview with their executives, but they acknowledged that STAT’s reporting was true, according to the news organization.

    Ross and Herman spoke with The Journalist’s Resource about their project and shared the following eight tips.

    1. Search public comments on proposed federal rules to find sources.

    Herman and Ross knew that the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services had put out a request for public comments, asking stakeholders within the Medicare Advantage industry how the system could improve.

    There are two main ways to get Medicare coverage: original Medicare, which is a fee-for-service health plan, and Medicare Advantage, which is a type of Medicare health plan offered by private insurance companies that contract with Medicare. Medicare Advantage plans have increasingly become popular in recent years.

    Under the Social Security Act, the public has the opportunity to submit comments on Medicare’s proposed national coverage determinations. CMS uses public comments to inform its proposed and final decisions. It responds in detail to all public comments when issuing a final decision.

    The reporters began combing through hundreds of public comments attached to a proposed Medicare Advantage rule that was undergoing federal review. NaviHealth, the UnitedHealth subsidiary and the maker of the algorithm, came up in many of the comments, which include the submitters’ information.

    “These are screaming all-caps comments to federal regulators about YOU NEED TO SOMETHING ABOUT THIS BECAUSE IT’S DISGUSTING,” Ross says.

    “The federal government is proposing rules and regulations all the time,” adds Herman, STAT’s business of health care reporter. “If someone’s going to take the time and effort to comment on them, they must have at least some knowledge of what’s going on. It’s just a great tool for any journalist to use to figure out more and who to contact.”

    The reporters also found several attorneys who had complained in the comments. They began reaching out to them, eventually gaining access to confidential documents and intermediaries who put them in touch with patients to show the human impact of the algorithm.

    2. Harness the power of the reader submission box.

    At the suggestion of an editor, the reporters added a reader submission box at the bottom of their first story, asking them to share their own experiences with Medicare Advantage denials.

    The floodgates opened. Hundreds of submissions arrived.

    By the end of their first story, Herman and Ross had confidential records and some patients, but they had no internal sources in the companies they were investigating, including Navihealth. The submission box led them to their first internal source.

    (Screenshot of STAT’s submission box.)

    The journalists also combed through LinkedIn and reached out to former and current employees, but the response rate was much lower than what they received via the submission box.

    The submission box “is just right there,” Herman says. “People who would want to reach out to us can do it right then and there after they read the story and it’s fresh in their minds.”

    3. Mine podcasts relevant to your story.

    The reporters weren’t sure if they could get interviews with some of the key figures in the story, including Tom Scully, the former head of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services who drew up the initial plans for NaviHealth years before UnitedHealth acquired it.

    But Herman and another colleague had written previously about Scully’s private equity firm and they had found a podcast where he talked about his work. So Herman went back to the podcast — where he discovered Scully had also discussed NaviHealth.

    The reporters also used the podcast to get Scully on the phone for an interview.

    “So we knew we had a good jumping off point there to be like, ‘OK, you’ve talked about NaviHealth on a podcast, let’s talk about this,’” Herman says. “I think that helped make him more willing to speak with us.”

    4. When covering AI initiatives, proceed with caution.

    “A source of mine once said to me, ‘AI is not magic,’” Ross says. “People need to just ask questions about it because AI has this aura about it that it’s objective, that it’s accurate, that it’s unquestionable, that it never fails. And that is not true.”

    AI is not a neutral, objective machine, Ross says. “It’s based on data that’s fed into it and people need to ask questions about that data.”

    He suggests several questions to ask about the data behind AI tools:

    • Where does the data come from?
    • Who does it represent?
    • How is this tool being applied?
    • Do the people to whom the tool is being applied match the data on which it was trained? “If racial groups or genders or age of economic situations are not adequately represented in the training set, then there can be an awful lot of bias in the output of the tool and how it’s applied,” Ross says.
    • How is the tool applied within the institution? Are people being forced to forsake their judgment and their own ability to do their jobs to follow the algorithm?

    5. Localize the story.

    More than half of all Medicare beneficiaries have Medicare Advantage and there’s a high likelihood that there are multiple Medicare Advantage plans in every county across the nation.

    “So it’s worth looking to see how Medicare Advantage plans are growing in your area,” Herman says.

    Finding out about AI use will most likely rely on shoe-leather reporting of speaking with providers, nursing homes and rehab facilities, attorneys and patients in your community, he says. Another source is home health agencies, which may be caring for patients who were kicked out of nursing homes and rehab facilities too soon because of a decision by an algorithm.

    The anecdote that opens their first story involves a small regional health insurer in Wisconsin, which was using NaviHealth and a contractor to manage post-acute care services, Ross says.

    “It’s happening to people in small communities who have no idea that this insurer they’ve signed up with is using this tool made by this other company that operates nationally,” Ross says.

    There are also plenty of other companies like NaviHealth that are being used by Medicare Advantage plans, Herman says. “So it’s understanding which Medicare Advantage plans are being sold in your area and then which post-acute management companies they’re using,” he adds.

    Some regional insurers have online documents that show which contractors they use to evaluate post-acute care services.

    6. Get familiar with Medicare’s appeals databases

    Medicare beneficiaries can contest Medicare Advantage denials through a five-stage process, which can last months to years. The appeals can be filed via the Office of Medicare Hearings and Appeals.

    “Between 2020 and 2022, the number of appeals filed to contest Medicare Advantage denials shot up 58%, with nearly 150,000 requests to review a denial filed in 2022, according to a federal database,” Ross and Herman write in their first story. “Federal records show most denials for skilled nursing care are eventually overturned, either by the plan itself or an independent body that adjudicates Medicare appeals.”

    There are several sources to find appeals data. Be mindful that the cases themselves are not public to protect patient privacy, but you can find the number of appeals filed and the rationale for decisions.

    CMS has two quality improvement organizations, or QIOs, Livanta and Kepro, which are required to file free, publicly-available annual reports, about the cases they handle, Ross says.

    Another company, Maximus, a Quality Improvement Contractor, also files reports on prior authorization cases it adjudicates for Medicare. The free annual reports include data on raw numbers of cases and basic information about the percentage denials either overturned or upheld on appeal, Ross explains.

    CMS also maintains its own database on appeals for Medicare Part C (Medicare Advantage plans) and Part D, which covers prescription drugs, although the data is not complete, Ross explains.

    7. Give your editor regular updates.

    “Sprinkle the breadcrumbs in front of your editors,” Ross says.

    “If you wrap your editors in the process, you’re more likely to be able to get to the end of [the story] before they say, ‘That’s it! Give me your copy,’” Ross says.

    8. Get that first story out.

    “You don’t have to know everything before you write that first story,” Ross says. “Because with that first story, if it has credibility and it resonates with people, sources will come forward and sources will continue to come forward.”

    Read the stories

    Denied by AI: How Medicare Advantage plans use algorithms to cut off care for seniors in need

    How UnitedHealth’s acquisition of a popular Medicare Advantage algorithm sparked internal dissent over denied care

    UnitedHealth pushed employees to follow an algorithm to cut off Medicare patients’ rehab care

    UnitedHealth used secret rules to restrict rehab care for seriously ill Medicare Advantage patients

    This article first appeared on The Journalist’s Resource and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

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  • Heavy Metal Detox In A Pill?

    10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.

    We have previous discussed assorted approaches to “detoxing”:

    Detox: What’s Real, What’s Not, What’s Useful, What’s Dangerous?

    Today we’re going to be looking at one we didn’t cover there, which is zeolite.

    What is zeolite?

    Zeolite is a mineral that occurs naturally and can also be synthesized, and it’s famous for absorbing other stuff from around it. Because of this property, it’s used in many things, including:

    • Petrochemical catalysis
    • Water treatment
    • Nuclear waste reprocessing
    • Cat litter
    • Supplements (for detox purposes)

    That’s, uh… An interesting list, isn’t it? So, we were curious as to whether this mineral that’s also used in fish tank filters is, in fact, overpriced gravel being sold to the gullible as a health supplement.

    We had to do some digging on this one

    Our journey didn’t start well, with this very dubious-looking paper being cited by a company selling zeolite supplements:

    MasterPeace™ Zeolite Z™ Pilot Study Found to be Safe and Effective in Removing Nano and Micro Toxic Forever Chemicals, Heavy Metals, Micro Plastics and Graphene and Aluminum Found in the Human Body Cells and Fluids

    This immediately prompted two questions:

    1. Who is eating graphene?!* That stuff does not occur in nature (or at least; it hasn’t ever been found; the universe is a big place so it might exist elsewhere), has only relatively recently been synthesized, is very difficult to produce, is two-dimensional while being hard as diamonds, and exists only in truly tiny lab-made quantities worldwide. It would be orders of magnitude easier to find and eat uranium.
    2. Is this a reputable journal? Which question was easier to answer than the former one, and the answer is “no”; we hadn’t heard of this journal (ACTA Scientific), and neither it seems had most of the Internet, but we did find it on a list of predatory journals, here.

    *The citation given in the above paper should by rights answer the question of who is eating graphene, since by rights they must have demonstrated it somehow, but it just doesn’t. Instead, it links to what it claims is a paper titled “Oxygenated Zeolite (Clinoptilite) Efficiently Removes Aluminum & Graphene Oxide”, but is in reality just someone’s blog post with a screenshot of an actual paper entitled “Novel, oxygenated clinoptilolite material efficiently removes aluminium from aluminium chloride-intoxicated rats in vivo”). Looking up this real paper in its real journal, it does not mention graphene.

    All this to say: sometimes, unscrupulous people will just plain lie to you, which is why peer review is important, as is sourcing data from reputable journals. Which is what we do for you so that you don’t have to 🙂

    It does, actually, work though (for heavy metal detox)

    Notwithstanding the aforementioned bunk, we found this from a more reputable publisher:

    ❝In this study, we have presented clinical evidence supporting the use of an activated clinoptilolite (zeolite) suspension to safely and effectively increase the urinary excretion of potentially toxic heavy metals in healthy volunteers without negatively impacting the electrolyte profiles of the participants.

    Significant increases in the urinary excretion of aluminum, antimony, arsenic, bismuth, cadmium, lead, mercury, nickel and tin were observed in the subjects participating in the two study groups as compared to placebo controls.❞

    Source: Clinical evidence supporting the use of an activated clinoptilolite suspension as an agent to increase urinary excretion of toxic heavy metals

    Also good for the gut and against inflammation

    Specifically, it’s good for gut barrier integrity, i.e., against “leaky gut syndrome”:

    ❝Twelve weeks of zeolite supplementation exerted beneficial effects on intestinal wall integrity as indicated via decreased concentrations of the tight junction modulator zonulin.

    This was accompanied by mild anti-inflammatory effects in this cohort of aerobically trained subjects.❞

    Source: Effects of zeolite supplementation on parameters of intestinal barrier integrity, inflammation, redoxbiology and performance in aerobically trained subjects

    May also be good against neurodegenerative diseases

    If it is (which is plausible), it’ll probably because of removing heavy metals and improving gut barrier integrity—in other words, the things we just looked at in the two reputable peer-reviewed studies we examined above.

    But the science is young for this one; here’s the current state of things:

    Zeolite and Neurodegenerative Diseases

    Is it safe?

    Safety reviews have found it to be safe, for example:

    Critical Review on Zeolite Clinoptilolite Safety and Medical Applications in vivo

    However, if you are taking regular medications, we recommend checking with your pharmacist or doctor to ensure that zeolite will not also remove those medications from your system!

    Want to try some?

    We don’t sell it, but here for your convenience is an example product on Amazon 😎

    Enjoy!

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  • How do I handle it if my parent is refusing aged care? 4 things to consider

    10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.

    It’s a shock when we realise our parents aren’t managing well at home.

    Perhaps the house and garden are looking more chaotic, and Mum or Dad are relying more on snacks than nutritious meals. Maybe their grooming or hygiene has declined markedly, they are socially isolated or not doing the things they used to enjoy. They may be losing weight, have had a fall, aren’t managing their medications correctly, and are at risk of getting scammed.

    You’re worried and you want them to be safe and healthy. You’ve tried to talk to them about aged care but been met with swift refusal and an indignant declaration “I don’t need help – everything is fine!” Now what?

    Here are four things to consider.

    1. Start with more help at home

    Getting help and support at home can help keep Mum or Dad well and comfortable without them needing to move.

    Consider drawing up a roster of family and friends visiting to help with shopping, cleaning and outings. You can also use home aged care services – or a combination of both.

    Government subsidised home care services provide from one to 13 hours of care a week. You can get more help if you are a veteran or are able to pay privately. You can take advantage of things like rehabilitation, fall risk-reduction programs, personal alarms, stove automatic switch-offs and other technology aimed at increasing safety.

    Call My Aged Care to discuss your options.

    An older man with a serious expression on his face looks out a window.
    Is Mum or Dad OK at home?
    Nadino/Shutterstock

    2. Be prepared for multiple conversations

    Getting Mum or Dad to accept paid help can be tricky. Many families often have multiple conversations around aged care before a decision is made.

    Ideally, the older person feels supported rather than attacked during these conversations.

    Some families have a meeting, so everyone is coming together to help. In other families, certain family members or friends might be better placed to have these conversations – perhaps the daughter with the health background, or the auntie or GP who Mum trusts more to provide good advice.

    Mum or Dad’s main emotional support person should try to maintain their relationship. It’s OK to get someone else (like the GP, the hospital or an adult child) to play “bad cop”, while a different person (such as the older person’s spouse, or a different adult child) plays “good cop”.

    3. Understand the options when help at home isn’t enough

    If you have maximised home support and it’s not enough, or if the hospital won’t discharge Mum or Dad without extensive supports, then you may be considering a nursing home (also known as residential aged care in Australia).

    Every person has a legal right to choose where we live (unless they have lost capacity to make that decision).

    This means families can’t put Mum or Dad into residential aged care against their will. Every person also has the right to choose to take risks. People can choose to continue to live at home, even if it means they might not get help immediately if they fall, or eat poorly. We should respect Mum or Dad’s decisions, even if we disagree with them. Researchers call this “dignity of risk”.

    It’s important to understand Mum or Dad’s point of view. Listen to them. Try to figure out what they are feeling, and what they are worried might happen (which might not be rational).

    Try to understand what’s really important to their quality of life. Is it the dog, having privacy in their safe space, seeing grandchildren and friends, or something else?

    Older people are often understandably concerned about losing independence, losing control, and having strangers in their personal space.

    Sometimes families prioritise physical health over psychological wellbeing. But we need to consider both when considering nursing home admission.

    Research suggests going into a nursing home temporarily increases loneliness, risk of depression and anxiety, and sense of losing control.

    Mum and Dad should be involved in the decision-making process about where they live, and when they might move.

    Some families start looking “just in case” as it often takes some time to find the right nursing home and there can be a wait.

    After you have your top two or three choices, take Mum or Dad to visit them. If this is not possible, take pictures of the rooms, the public areas in the nursing home, the menu and the activities schedule.

    We should give Mum or Dad information about their options and risks so they can make informed (and hopefully better) decisions.

    For instance, if they visit a nursing home and the manager says they can go on outings whenever they want, this might dispel a belief they are “locked up”.

    Having one or two weeks “respite” in a home may let them try it out before making the big decision about staying permanently. And if they find the place unacceptable, they can try another nursing home instead.

    An older Asian woman sits with her daughter.
    You might need to have multiple conversations about aged care.
    CGN089/Shutterstock

    4. Understand the options if a parent has lost capacity to make decisions

    If Mum or Dad have lost capacity to choose where they live, family may be able to make that decision in their best interests.

    If it’s not clear whether a person has capacity to make a particular decision, a medical practitioner can assess for that capacity.

    Mum or Dad may have appointed an enduring guardian to make decisions about their health and lifestyle decisions when they are not able to.

    An enduring guardian can make the decision that the person should live in residential aged care, if the person no longer has the capacity to make that decision themselves.

    If Mum or Dad didn’t appoint an enduring guardian, and have lost capacity, then a court or tribunal can appoint that person a private guardian (usually a family member, close friend or unpaid carer).

    If no such person is available to act as private guardian, a public official may be appointed as public guardian.

    Deal with your own feelings

    Families often feel guilt and grief during the decision-making and transition process.

    Families need to act in the best interest of Mum or Dad, but also balance other caring responsibilities, financial priorities and their own wellbeing.The Conversation

    Lee-Fay Low, Professor in Ageing and Health, University of Sydney

    This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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  • Scattered Minds – by Dr. Gabor Maté

    10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.

    This was not the first book that Dr. Maté sat down to write, by far. But it was the first that he actually completed. Guess why.

    Writing from a position of both personal and professional experience and understanding, Dr. Maté explores the inaptly-named Attention Deficit Disorder (if anything, there’s often a surplus of attention, just, to anything and everything rather than necessarily what would be most productive in the moment), its etiology, its presentation, and its management.

    This is a more enjoyable book than some others by the same author, as while this condition certainly isn’t without its share of woes (often, for example, a cycle of frustration and shame re “why can’t I just do the things; this is ruining my life and it would be so easy if I could just do the things!”), it’s not nearly so bleak as entire books about trauma, addiction, and so forth (worthy as those books also are).

    Dr. Maté frames it specifically as a development disorder, and one whereby with work, we can do the development later that (story of an ADHDer’s life) we should have done earlier but didn’t. In terms of practical advice, he includes a program for effecting this change, including as an adult.

    The style is easy-reading, in small chapters, with ADHD’d-up readers in mind, giving a strong sense of speeding pleasantly through the book.

    Bottom line: when it’s a book by Dr. Gabor Maté, you know it’s going to be good, and this is no exception. Certainly read it if you, anyone you care about, or even anyone you just spend a lot of time around, has ADHD or similar.

    Click here to check out Scattered Minds, and unscatter yours!

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