January 24, 2020 at 02:00PM by CWC A teeny, tiny “I told you so” secretly sparked within me when I heard that there are studies showing that visible light—the kind you see flooding out of fluorescent office fixtures or LED bulbs—could be damaging your skin. After years of welcoming guests to lounge areas illuminated almost exclusively by candles and nights spent at dinner parties searching for dimmers to take down the too-bright overheads, I felt like a subconscious instinct had been validated. And while the research is preliminary, it’s a good time to start tuning in—and turning off—whenever possible. “New evidence has been published that [shows] high-energy visible light (HEVL), which is emitted from energy-efficient fluorescent bulbs and LED lights, can cause ROS-mediated photoaging and inflammation in the skin,” says dermatologist Bradley Bloom, MD, of Laser & Skin Surgery Center of New York. For those unfamiliar with the term ROS (most everyone?), it stands for “reactive oxygen species,” which we’ve known for years are responsible for creating free-radical damage within the skin when it’s exposed to UV light from the sun. Free-radical damage, or oxidative damage, can create problems within the skin that are wide-ranging, including acne, pigmentation, eczema, collagen degradation… the list goes on. These burgeoning studies from dermatologist David McDaniel, MD, indicate that the light from bulbs (which is necessary to simply see) could also be responsible for “atmospheric skin aging,” or compromising the health and integrity of our complexions. This research is finally gaining attention, says Dr.
Year: 2020
I’m an RD, and these are the most common questions I get asked about plant-based eating
January 24, 2020 at 01:00PM by CWC If you’re thinking about going plant-based, you probably have a lot of questions. Like, where do you even start? Well, registered dietitians certainly know the struggle. Their clients ask them the same questions all the time, and that’s good news for you. There’s no need to go down a rabbit hole on Google looking for answers to all your plant-based eating questions. You can get the most common ones answered right here, right now, by the registered dietitians who address them every single day. The most common questions dietitians get asked about plant-based eating 1. Am I meeting my protein needs with plant based foods? Most people still think of protein as meat, eggs, fish, and nothing else. But it’s super easy to get enough when you’re plant-based, too. “One of the biggest fallacies is that you can’t meet your protein needs on a plant-based diet,” says Brittany Modell, MS, RD, CDN, founder of Brittany Modell Nutrition and Wellness. “There are so many plant foods that are rich in protein, such as nuts, seeds, legumes, tofu, tempeh, and soybeans.” 2. Do I need to take any supplements? While you can get all the protein you need from plants, Whitney English, RDN, of Plant-Based Juniors, recommends adding some supplements into the mix to make sure you’re hitting all your other nutritional needs. These needs (aside from B12) are simply due to environmental factors affecting all diets—not because plants are poor sources of nutrients, she
How to do wheel pose the right way, straight from a yoga pro
January 24, 2020 at 12:00PM by CWC [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4F4lTh09Z5E] Form is everything in yoga (technically, form is everything in any workout, but that goes double for the centuries-old postures). Misplacing a limb (even slightly) on your yoga mat, especially with repetition, can really work against you over time. And that’s exactly why we tapped yogi Andrea Russell to set us straight (or, properly arched?) about how to execute one of the most deceivingly simple poses properly (wheel pose, we’re looking at you). In the latest episode of the Well+Good video series The Right Way, Russell explains that this pose can be trickier for yogis than it looks. “My students are struggling, they’re trying to come straight up, their hips are going all sorts of ways—it doesn’t feel too great,” she says. The most common mistakes in wheel pose To help remedy the situation, Russel calls out the four most common mistakes that she sees: 1. The feet are too far apart from one another. 2. The knees are spread too wide. 3. The hands, placed back by the ears, are either too wide or too narrow. 4. The elbows are splayed. With any or all of the above positioning, wheel pose can be problematic, and Russell also notes that if proper technique is not achievable, you might want to hold off on wheel pose altogether and opt for something simpler instead. “If your palms aren’t completely flat, maybe you’re not quite ready,” she say. “Pay attention to how your body’s
It’s true, stress can turn your hair gray—and now scientists know why
January 24, 2020 at 02:00AM by CWC The term Marie Antoinette syndrome comes from a particularly grim time in Marie Antoinette’s life; it doesn’t refer to eating macarons soundtracked to Gang of Four as Sofia Coppola might have you believe. See, when Marie Antoinette was awaiting execution, her beautiful strawberry blonde locks gave way to white hair from stress, no powder required. That’s the hearsay, at least. I wasn’t around in 1793, but “getting beheaded” definitely sounds stressful. Marie Antoinette syndrome has always been kind of mysterious and even doubted. But recent research from Harvard University scientists supports that not only is getting white hair from stress legit, but they’ve found the specific correlation. The study, published in Nature, first recognized how stress affects the whole body (which it does in ways you probably never even thought of). That means that researchers needed to target which body system was responsible for connecting stress to hair color. After some trial and error (the stress hormone cortisol was cleared of all charges), a culprit was found: the sympathetic nerve system, the body’s fight-or-flight response. Sympathetic nerves branch out into hair follicles, experiencing stress causes nerves to release the chemical norepinephrine. Why does that matter? Because norepinephrine causes certain stem cells to convert into pigment-producing cells, which prematurely depletes a reservoir of color in a hair follicle. And there you are, a beautiful 29-year-old streaked with gray. The wildest part is you’re not just going to have a rough day at the office, get a skunk
The low-residue diet is super, super low in fiber—so why do doctors prescribe it?
January 24, 2020 at 01:00AM by CWC With probiotics, prebiotics, and bone broth on everyone’s minds these days, it’s no secret that gut health has become one of the biggest focal points of the health and nutrition world. A key player at the center of the good gut conversation: fiber. From helping to ease inflammation to supporting a more vibrant complexion, fiber is pretty much a health unicorn, particularly for your digestive system. It helps move food through your system smoothly and regularly while feeding the good bacteria in your gut. However, in some very, very specific circumstances, fiber may actually do more harm than good. In fact, there’s a diet out there that actually tells you to eat less of the stuff. But…why? (It just seems so wrong!) Don’t panic just yet; here’s what gut health gurus have to say about the low-residue diet. What is a low-residue diet? Seemingly the exact opposite of what current diet advice tells us (all the veggies! All the fiber!), a low-residue diet is all about limiting fiber—and other hard-to-digest foods, like fats—as much as possible, says naturopathic doctor Kasey Nichols, ND. In addition to all-but-eliminating fats, “a low-residue diet aims to keep daily fiber intake to below 10 to 15 grams,” Dr. Nichols says. (That’s less than the fiber you get in a cup of black beans…) That’s roughly half of the usual daily recommended intake of fiber. The goal: To minimize residue—which refers to fiber and other particles that are not
The gross reason a dermatologist wants you to clean your glasses every day
January 24, 2020 at 12:00AM by CWC Every time you experience a breakout, your mind goes into detective-mode, trying to figure out what went wrong and caused the pimple that popped up on your face. Well, while there are always plenty of possibilities, one is pretty straight-forward: You’re not cleaning your glasses. One of our editors recently learned from a facialist at the Miraval Life in Balance Spa at the Park Hyatt St. Kitts that wearing your glasses every day without cleaning them can cause acne on your nose, around your eyes, and elsewhere on your face—basically wherever your glasses have contact with your skin. And, it checks out. According to dermatologist Jaggi Rao, MD, acne expert for Facing Acne, the oil and bacteria on your glasses can easily transfer, clogging your pores and resulting in pimples. Continuing the bad habit will only make things worse over time. “While touching your glasses and transferring germs to your face will initially create a few pimples, these will never really get a chance to heal if you keep touching your glasses and getting them dirtier each time,” says Dr. Rao. “You’ll not only end up breaking out all over again each time, but you’ll be additionally exasperating old acne, and never really allowing it to diminish. Thus, by extension, if this happens on a daily basis for a long time—as most of us push our glasses up on various occasions every day—it should come as no surprise that you may be getting
I’m a PT, and I stretch for 5 minutes every day—here’s why that’s the magic number
January 24, 2020 by CWC I always decide how long I’m going to stretch for based on the scenario. If it’s the end of a workout class and we have one minute to stretch things out, that’s all I’ll do. If I’m working out on my own, it all depends on my schedule. Ask a physical therapist, though—AKA someone who stretches people for a living—and they’ll have a very specific answer for how long you should stretch for, regardless of the activity. Meghan King, DPT, a physical therapist with Spear Physical Therapy, bases her stretching routine off of actual studies. The time frame? “It’s at least a 30-second hold for static stretching,” she says, noting that studies have even shown that holding stretches for longer than that don’t give you a greater short-term flexibility boost. “I’ll do multiple holds of 30 seconds, usually three times in a row. That’s what literature says you really need in order to get those long-term flexibility gains,” she says. “Holding it longer won’t necessarily give you any more bang for your buck.” “It’s at least a 30-second hold for static stretching.” —Meghan King, DPT Of course, this doesn’t mean that King is done with her recovery regimen in 90 seconds flat. Her philosophy is to mark off a specific number of minutes minimum to spend stretching out her body. “For me, I tell myself that I’ll do five minutes [of stretching] before I shower,” she says. “Anything is better than nothing, and people have the
What’s really inside a multivitamin? An RD weighs in
January 23, 2020 at 08:30PM by CWC In a perfect world, you’d eat deliciously healthy meals made with only the freshest, most nutritious ingredients three times a day. But this is reality, and sometimes lunch looks more like an on-the-go protein bar than a sit-down veggie bowl. That’s why Tracy Lockwood Beckerman, RD and author of The Better Period Food Solution, advocates for having a nutrition-supporting partner: the multivitamin. “Multivitamins cast a reliable safety net that helps catch and correct nutritional pitfalls,” Beckerman says. For those days when your meals don’t cover off on every nutrient, a supplement can help you hit the mark. “Multivitamins cast a reliable safety net that helps catch and correct nutritional pitfalls.” I know what you’re thinking: Can’t you get enough nutrients through your diet alone, even if you don’t eat like a wellness guru every day? According to Beckerman, even the most perfect diets will likely have nutritional holes. (Sorry to burst your healthy-eating bubble.) Hence the safety net illustration. Your healthy diet does the heavy lifting, but by adding a multivitamin you can rest assured you’re covered on the nutrients you need, no matter how busy life gets. Her go-to is Centrum® Adults Multivitamins, which contains vitamins and minerals, essential nutrients that help support her diet. To help really illustrate the point, we asked Beckerman how much food you’d need to eat to hit the recommended daily amounts of nutrients found in Centrum Multivitamins—so you can see how your diet and your multi
Home births are risky. Why are more women choosing them?
January 23, 2020 at 09:30PM by CWC If you run with a wellness-minded crew, home births are likely something you’ve talked about with your friends—or seen an influencer discuss on social media. Because choosing to give birth at home is not necessarily a thing reserved for the most crunchy-granola of us anymore: A recent study published in the journal Birth reported that at-home births are on the rise. The study, which looked at U.S. birth certificate data over the course of 15 years, found that out-of-hospital births increased from 35,578 in 2004 to 62,228 in 2017 (the last year studied). That means that one out of every 62 births took place outside of a hospital in 2017. However, the medical community is not necessarily enthused by the uptick in out-of-hospital births—primarily because of safety concerns. One 2019 report found that 60 percent of home births between 2016 and 2018 were considered high-risk, and the American Council on Science and Health says the rate of infant deaths is triple for at-home births than hospital births. The medical community is adamant that giving birth in a hospital is the safest way to go. Yet in the deeply personal calculus that goes into choosing how and where to give birth, a small but growing number of women have decided that their best birthing option lies at home. Why? “Nature is not benevolent, it’s brutish” Amy Tuteur, MD, a former clinical instructor in obstetrics-gynecology at Harvard Medical School, is adamantly against home births. She says
If you use just one ingredient to treat chapped lips, derms say to make it this
January 23, 2020 at 08:00PM by CWC Lip balm is one of those products that is critical to have on hand at all times, particularly during the colder months. If you’re anything like me, you’ve got a bedside balm, a desk balm, and individual balms in every bag you own so that you’re covered whenever chapped lips may strike (which, at this time of year, is pretty much a guarantee). But having just any lip balm at the ready isn’t enough to combat those dry-lipped pinches—according to dermatologists, you’ve gotta have the right product in order to ensure you’re giving those lips the love they need. The one ingredient they say you should be looking for in a lip balm? Beeswax, or, for a vegan option, petroleum jelly. “They both retain and lock in moisture,” says Howard Sobel, MD, a New York City-based cosmetic dermatologist and founder of Sobel Skin Rx, who dubs these the absolute “best ingredients” for chapped lips. Both are occlusives, which means that they seal in any hydration in your lips and keep it from evaporating. While you’re in the process of perusing your labels, there’s also one ingredient you should avoid: menthol. The minty-flavored stuff may offer a nice cooling effect to your kisser, but in the process of doing that it actually winds up drying them out, thus doing the exact opposite of what you want a lip balm to do. You know how sometimes after you apply your balm, you suddenly want more,