Search Results for: stomach in knots

Coping with Anxiety (2)

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Anxiety got you by the throat? Or perhaps it has your stomach in knots and your heart in a vice. Help is at hand. Following on from Coping with Anxiety (1) here are some more tips for dealing with those anxious feelings that just won’t go away. • Give yourself permission to feel anxious about the issue that is concerning you. We often give ourselves a hard time over the way we are feeling, and in doing so, we make our anxiety worse by minimizing or even dismissing the reason that we are feeling anxious. We believe other people would … Continue reading →

The Physical Effects of Anxiety

It may start in your head, but chronic anxiety – day after day, week after week, month after month, year after year – inevitably elicits some pretty profoundly negative responses from the rest of your body. So if you’re living with anxiety, as well as a painful or troublesome physical condition – particularly of the heart, lungs, stomach, muscles, skin, immune system, reproductive system, weight and/or head (as in headaches) – it’s time to make the connection. You may literally be making yourself sick with worry. As shared in my new book, Overcoming, Anxiety, Worry, and Fear: Practical Ways to … Continue reading →

Roping Your Teen

Some might think I’m a little too sentimental and maybe I am. But once again I am facing this new season in life that has just really hit me. My 16-year-old son has his learner’s permit. He started driver’s education and when I went to pick him up Friday he proudly announced that he had passed his written test. So we took a trip to the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) to get his learner’s permit. It felt so strange. I remember not that long ago doing the same. Okay, maybe it was a long time ago but it somehow … Continue reading →

“Fast Food” for Moms-to-be

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For some moms, pregnancy means an overhaul when it comes to diet. For others, it’s nothing new. Whether or not healthy foods are part of your regular diet, eating healthy on the go can be tricky, especially in a world where cheap, fast food is available everywhere. When your stomach is growling, fight the urge to pull into the drive through by keeping your purse and car stocked with healthy snacks. Prepare snacks ahead of time, storing them in zippered sandwich bags, ready to grab on your way out the door. Not sure what to bring along? Here are some … Continue reading →

The One Thing I Said I’d Never Do, Continued

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I stood there rereading the paragraph, feeling as though I’d been punched in the stomach. “Mother stated she drank large amounts of beer until the seventh month and used tobacco throughout.” (For the blog telling the first part of this story, click here.) I called our social worker, who had seen the news only a day or two before I did. I told her I was really concerned and she said she was also. I wondered aloud if the birthmother had been telling the truth when she said she hadn’t drunk during her pregnancy with Meg as well. The social … Continue reading →

The Perfect Snack for Your Book

I’m not a drinker (Mormon! that was a Pirates joke) but I’m told there is a wine for every meal. Red wine with beef, white wine with fish. But what about pork, the other white meat? What would you drink with that? Ah, but I digress. I had a thought – if there is a wine for every meal, shouldn’t there also be a snack for every book? I have compiled the following list, a suggestion, if you will. Romance novels – how about something sweet? Strawberries dipped in chocolate, chocolate chip cookies, chocolate anything – you see, chocolate feeds … Continue reading →

Stress and Digestion

Stress affects most organs of the body and the stomach is no exception. Stress can cause those familiar knots in the stomach, some types of ulcers, constipation, diarrhea, poor absorption of nutrients leading to further ill health, and oversecretion of stomach acids. If all this sounds like a pain in the gut, it is! Of course, not all these conditions are caused by stress alone, but a person who is subjected to chronic stressors in their life will almost always suffer some form of digestional difficulty. It may be a sore stomach, frequent burping, heartburn or gastric reflux, or bouts … Continue reading →

BITSS of Intuition

Intuition is the adult term for what kids know as early warning signs. It is said that females have better intuition than males because girls are more sensitive. Perhaps that’s only because some of us train our sons NOT to rely on their intuition and not to show their feelings about things. We like them to be manly: rational, sensible, scientific, and cut off from their feelings. And when male children are sensitive we put them down by telling them not to be girls/sissies/cry babies!? The other thing we often do when children show emotion is to tell them to … Continue reading →