Health and Beauty Articles for Women

Yoga doesn’t just calm you down; it can also help you shed weight. Here’s how some sun salutes helped one skeptic get skinny

Nicole Beland

A month ago I was exercising rarely and had packed 5 extra pounds on my thighs and backside to prove it. My favorite jeans were banished to the back of a drawer, and I was fidgeting in bed every night. I was exhausted but too wired to sleep. It was awful. But I’d be lying if I said it was unusual. As a freelance writer, part-time editor, and live-in girlfriend to a night-owl musician, I work crazy hours and go out as often as I can. Sure, I’d go on mini health kicks for a week here and there. Then I’d get bored and return to pulling all-nighters and gorging on nachos. In a way, I was the worst person to test yoga for its weight-loss potential. But, in another, I was the best. Most people fall off the exercise wagon as quickly and as often as I do. If I could make yoga stick and slim down, it would bode well for yo-yo dieters everywhere. It would also be pretty surprising, considering that yoga is far better known for promoting relaxation than burning fat.

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10 can’t-go-wrong options to satisfy your hunger and your desire to drop a few pounds

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Like margaritas, sex can be even better when experienced al fresco. “Having sex outside awakens the senses,” says Sandor Gardos, Ph.D., a sex therapist and the founder of MyPleasure.com. “Feeling the breeze on your skin, smelling the freshly cut grass—stimuli are very erotic.” Plus, the fear of getting caught can add a thrill.

To inspire you, we’ve come up with prime outdoor spots for getting busy, plus advice on the best positions in each.

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Tummy ache? Massive diarrhea? Uncontrollable gas? Here are 10 of the most common abdominal problems, and advice from the pros on how to fix ‘em.
ERIN HICKS

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It’s arguably the trickiest job in the office, especially when under scrutiny from competitive colleagues and exacting bosses.

Sure, we’ve all felt the alpha-female thrill of taking on more to showcase our kick-ass efficiency, but sometimes there’s just too much to get done—which can lead to a major meltdown.

“Limited time and overwhelm are the biggest contributors to pressure,” explains Talane Miedaner, author of Coach Yourself to Success. “They scatter your focus, making it impossible to complete anything and leaving us erratically firefighting every tiny task.”

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Kicking your liquid-sugar habit may be the easiest route to a flatter belly

By Tom Hansen

Your diet sucks. No, not the odd cheese-curls-for-dinner days. We mean the average 400 calories a day you suck down through a straw. A recent study in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition showed that around 37 percent of our total daily liquid calories come from sugar-sweetened drinks. And here’s the really crazy part: Guzzling those beverages has a bigger impact on our waistlines than anything else we eat.

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Find out how to get more disease-fighting, fatigue-banishing vitamin D—without exposing yourself to the sun’s damaging rays.

Alisa Bowman

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Eating right is as good for your complexion as it is for the rest of your body. Feed it the 10 foods it’s starving for.

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On the list of life’s greatest pleasures, massages rank up there with wine and chocolate. But a good rubdown does more than just ease achy muscles. Depending on the technique, it can melt away stress, get you in the mood for sex, or function as an especially erotic kind of foreplay. “Massage is the ultimate bonding experience,” says certified massage therapist Lisa Skye Carle. “Pampering each other feels nurturing and intimate, and you’re bound to discover loads of new and unexpected erogenous zones along the way—it’s the ultimate primer for sex.” Whether you want to wind down or get all wound up, there’s a massage here to meet your needs.

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The term “retail therapy” is a bit of a misnomer. Sure, buying yourself something expensive can improve your mood, but the boost is often temporary. In fact, you usually end up feeling worse later on (like when your credit card bill arrives). Fortunately, there are ways to spend your money—even if you don’t have much of it–that will bring you true long-term happiness. Over the past 25 years, behavioral economists and psychologists have been examining the connection between money and mood, and they’ve made some intriguing discoveries. Using their research, we’ve identified five simple ways to reallocate your budget so that you feel more bliss.

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