We just don’t connect. When I say up, she says down. If I’m horny, she’s not, and if she is, I’m not. She says it’s because of my “period.” She says I have worse periods than she does.

DISCONNECTION:

SENSE OF HUMOR, TRAGEDY, VALUES IS COMPLETELY DIFFERENT

HUSBAND

CONNECTION:

SENSE OF HUMOR, TRAGEDY, FAIRNESS, VALUES IS THE SAME FOR BOTH SPOUSES

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TENDING TOWARD    TENDING TOWARD

CONNECTION    DISCONNECTION

Do you laugh and cry with your spouse about the same things, reacting in the same fashion and intensity to life events (connection)? Or do you seem to be at different emotional levels, out of sync, with few examples of shared emotional response (disconnection)?

The dinner couple scored too far toward disconnection. Remember that some disconnection, a tolerance for different emotional levels at different times, is necessary in marriage, but this couple is out of balance, too out of sync. The wife felt a lonely sense of tragedy at her marital situation, surrender regarding the children, and compliance in sexual interactions. Her emotional reaction was unshared by her husband, who instead felt boredom, disregard, or lack of involvement with the children. He was invigorated by activities that had little to do directly with the marriage. While the wife cried alone at the dinner table and felt sad, the husband drove alone to the softball game and felt frustrated.

Disconnection was apparent in their sexual life. “I’d love it if she would do oral love more. You know. Suck on me down here. She does it, but it’s not like she wants to or anything. It’s kind of a gift or a trade-off. A little sucking for a little hugging.” The husband hoped for but did not find in his wife a connection, a shared sexual arousal in an important part of his sexual life.

The wife felt quite differently. She performed fellatio because she perceived them as a couple of “high order,” and things always seem to get done. The wife reported, “I don’t mind doing it, you know. Going down on him, I guess it is. But he makes it more of a prostitute thing. I like to be stroked and touched. It’s like he wants me to do it ‘to him’; we don’t do it together or anything. He just lies there, pushes my head down, and humps at me. I’m afraid I’ll gag or throw up. Just because he likes me to do it to him, he assumes I should like it when he does it to me. Well, I don’t. I can’t stand it.”

Our highly ordered couple is disconnected, going through the sexual motions, with both partners disappointed. Their dinner-table situation reflected the same pattern. The entire sexual system is out of balance, leaning first to too much order, then to too much disconnection.

*29\97\8*

It is hereditary and tends to run in families. It may be brought on, or made worse, by emotional factors, by injury or by infection. It may be mild or severe, be localised to one or two areas or generalised and affect the whole body. It may be stable and chronic or it may be unstable, rapidly flaring and active.

The treatment of psoriasis is well established although new treatments have been introduced for severe and resistant rashes.

Sufferers need to understand the aims and limitations of treatment, and the nature of their disease. The rash, being chronic and incurable, tends to come and go. It may be present unchanged for many years and the person comes to terms with it. Then it may suddenly clear, only to reappear months later.

Treatment may completely clear the rash but it will inevitably return as there is no permanent cure. But this shouldn’t discourage those who suffer from it, as control is possible.

It is uncommon on the face. Only one person in four with this condition will have it affect more than 5 per cent of the skin surface.

*537/71/1*

Many people suffer in bed at night from painful cramps, usually involving the calf muscles or the small muscles in the sole of the foot.

These cramps are not usually related to any underlying problem but are thought to be due to mechanical factors.

With normal muscle tone, each group of muscles has an antagonistic group which pulls the limb in the opposite direction. When the muscles are completely at rest, as can occur in bed, normal contraction of some muscles may occur without the antagonists being activated and so the extreme contraction leads to painful cramping.

When you lie flat on your back in bed, the weight of the bed clothes may push the foot down. The same thing can happen when you lie face down and the foot is forced down. Should contraction occur in the calf muscles, the foot is already in extreme flexion.

One way of preventing this cramping action is to keep the foot in a neutral position, by having a pillow at the bottom of the bed, so the foot is neither down nor up. One way of stopping cramp is to force the foot into the opposite direction so the contracting muscle is forced to lengthen.

Quinine taken at night can certainly reduce the frequency of cramps. How it works is unknown, but it is effective.

*281/71/1*

Croup usually develops suddenly and the child, well on gtyng to bed, might wake during the night with the typical croupy cough — a hard “brassy” sound — and have difficulty in breathing. The larynx is swollen and there is marked difficulty in breathing in.

In asthma, by contrast, there is difficulty in breathing out. Normally when we breathe in, the chest expands and the rib cage moves out. When there is obstruction to the free inward flow of air, the mobile chest of the child moves inwards when breathing in and rib retraction becomes obvious.

Sometimes the obstruction is so marked that the child needs a tracheotomy (opening made in the windpipe) so that he can breathe.

The child with croup may be well again next day, only to have the symptoms recur that night, particularly when the cold damp air comes down.

Children with distressed breathing due to croup may get great relief from breathing warm, moist air. This can be delivered by means of a special machine which can be bought or hired.

Filling the bathroom with steam by running the hot taps and closing the door and windows may be quickly effective.

*30/71/1*

When cancer cells lodge in lymph nodes or other parts of the body, they don’t always immediately start multiplying to form an obvious secondary growth. Cancer cells have the ability to lie dormant, sometimes for many years. You could think of them as seeds which are waiting for the right conditions before they start growing. It is this ability of cancer cells to lie hidden and dormant which makes it very difficult to know whether we have completely got rid of every cancer cell. The only real test is the passage of time—we must wait until every hidden cancer cell would have started to grow and make its presence obvious. This length of time differs for different types of cancer. With some cancers we can be very confident of a cure after only two years free of any signs of disease; in others, secondary growths can still develop twenty or more years later.

*38/40/1*

The important word here is ‘prevent’. At the moment there is no treatment that will significantly replace bone that has been lost Once bone is lost through osteoporosis, it is, for all practical purposes, lost forever. Spinal vertebrae that become deformed through osteoporosis remain deformed forever. If you are at risk of developing a condition which is virtually irreversible, prevention becomes very important.

There is considerable evidence to show that starting oestrogen therapy within two years of the menopause, and staying on it for at least five years, can reduce your risk of getting a fracture of the hip or of a vertebra by 50 per cent. If you have had an early menopause you will have more years without oestrogen ahead of you, so you will need to stay on it for longer, probably until 65 or 70. Obviously HRT is more effective if started early and before you have lost much of your bone mass, but it really is never too late to start. In the United States, women sometimes go on it for the first time after a fractured hip in their nineties! Even in quite elderly women, HRT can slow bone loss.

*48\42\4*

Women consider having a hysterectomy for reasons such as chronic abdominal pain and excessive bleeding, and because of a doctor’s recommendation. Non-medical reasons may also influence the advice of medical practitioners, and of a woman’s family and friends. According to recent Australian and US studies, a doctor’s advice about hysterectomy may have more influence on a woman’s decision about surgery than her understanding of the reason(s) for the operation, its probable aftereffects, or the alternatives available. Presumably, a doctor’s recommendation for a non-surgical approach may be equally persuasive.

Dorothy’s ‘decision’ to have a hysterectomy followed her admission to hospital to have bladder repair surgery. The night before the operation her doctor visited her and, as he was leaving, said casually, ‘We might as well take your womb out while we’re in there, because you don’t have any need for it now.’ When asked how she felt about this, Dorothy said she accepted it without question because she believed her doctor knew what was best.

There is no doubt that some women prefer to leave decisions about their health care entirely to their doctors, even to the extent of preferring the doctor to decide whether or not they should have major surgery. But it is becoming increasingly common for doctors and women to work together, exchanging information and ideas and, in the end, coming to a mutual agreement about the best course of action.

Psychologists have identified five basic patterns of behaviour used by individuals when faced with choices about things like health investigations and treatments.

• Complacently continuing whatever has been familiar until then, which may involve discounting new and relevant information.

• Uncritically adopting whichever new course of action is most strongly recommended or is considered to be ‘the fashion’.

• Escaping the conflict by delaying decision making, shifting the responsibility to someone else, or making wishful excuses to bolster a particular alternative, meanwhile refusing to consider pertinent information.

• Searching frantically for a way out of the dilemma and impulsively seizing upon a hasty solution that seems to promise immediate relief. This type of decision making means that the full range of consequences of a particular choice are never considered.

• Searching painstakingly for relevant information, thinking carefully about it in as unbiased a way as possible, and weighing the alternatives carefully before making a choice.

Although the first two patterns may save time, effort and emotional turmoil, they often lead to decision making that is less than ideal and has unfortunate consequences. The third and fourth patterns likewise tend to be associated with undesirable results. The fifth pattern, termed the Vigilant approach’, usually leads to high-quality decision making. Its major features include identifying the feasible options; sorting out personal values, objectives, barriers to particular actions and incentives to others; assessing the consequences of a particular choice; planning how best to put the decision into effect; and anticipating what will happen as a result of that decision.

Today, many women are participating actively and responsibly in making decisions about their health and are having a major say about investigations and treatments. Your consent should always be sought before a procedure is carried out, except in the most unusual of circumstances, such as an emergency during major surgery when your life would be threatened if a particular action was not taken. In addition, your consent should always be sought for participation in medical research. Remember also that it is your right to withdraw from treatment by a particular practitioner at any time.

For most women, a decision for or against a hysterectomy involves the following considerations:

• an assessment of the impact of the existing medical condition and its symptoms on quality of life

• a comparison of physical risks and effectiveness of various forms of treatment

• a personal assessment of the importance of the uterus and of emotional reactions to the current situation and to removal of the uterus

• careful consideration of any relevant social and cultural factors

• the views of a doctor or doctors, a partner and close friends

• an assessment of the skill and care of medical personnel available to you.

*62\198\4*

In the sleep laboratory it is shown that REM sleep occupies about 25 per cent of the time spent in sleep. When a person takes sleeping pills, REM sleep is reduced to 5 or 10 per cent of sleep time, but if the pills are continued for many days the REM component gradually returns to 25 per cent However, it has been shown that if sleeping pills are suddenly stopped there is an increase in REM sleep to about 40 per cent of sleep time, and, in the following nights, more dreams and nightmares are experienced. This is because the sleep induced by drugs is not a natural sleep—it has less of a REM component. When the drugs are stopped, there is a catch up in REM sleep, and this is called ‘rebound of REM sleep’ or ‘rebound insomnia’.

Initially benzodiazepine is prescribed for the treatment of insomnia arising from stress or some other reason. When the original stress is over, and the reason for taking these pills is gone, the drugs are stopped abruptly. This is when rebound insomnia sets in. People who suffer from rebound insomnia believe that they have lost the innate ability to sleep. This rebound insomnia is only transient and lasts just a few days. If these people persevere, the rebound insomnia passes and their sleep becomes normal again. However, there may be some who become psychologically dependent on these pills, meaning their confidence to sleep has disappeared. These are the people who should find this book useful, as it will help them regain their confidence to sleep.

It has also been shown that sleeping pills stop working after two weeks. The reason is that the body develops an increasing tolerance to the pills. The same dose of sleeping pill is no longer resulting in sleep as it used to. But then why do people persist in taking them? The answer is to prevent the withdrawal symptom—rebound insomnia.

*61\174\4*

Those of us who have difficulty with our speech can use the relaxing mental exercises to gain greater fluency. Those who stutter, and who are tense when speaking, can be helped because the practice of the exercises lowers the general level of anxiety. Tension is reduced and the words come more easily.

We can also incorporate our relaxing mental exercises into our speech therapy. We practise the exercises, and while still completely relaxed in both body and mind we count aloud—slowly, easily, clearly—and all the time we maintain the relaxation of body and mind. In the same way we can practise by reading and reciting.

Speaking on the telephone is often a major problem for those who stutter. This situation is very well suited for help from our mental exercises. As we take up the receiver our eyelids close, and we relax completely. We are leisurely, and we take our time before replying, and as we do so we feel the relaxation through the whole of us.

Difficulty in speaking in public is due to the mobilization of anxiety. The practice of relaxing mental exercises reduces our general level of anxiety, and also makes us less inclined to overreact to stressful situations. We thus come to have a little more in reserve, as it were, for the stress of making a speech. Sometimes a real phobia can develop in relation to making public speeches. In these circumstances we can get help by following the principles which.

Some years ago a man from a country town came to see me on account of his speech difficulty. He was in his middle thirties. He had had two or three previous periods when his speech had been bad, but each time it had settled down in a matter of a few months. But this time it seemed to be getting worse. He was under increased stress at his work, which had made him tense, and his speech difficulty was associated with a jerky movement of his head. I had him relax several times in my consulting room and his trouble subsided. However, this was some years ago at a time when I had not realized the importance of the patient learning to do the relaxing himself.

He returned with a recurrence of his trouble a couple of years later. This time I showed him how to do it himself. His symptoms again subsided, and I have not seen him since. As he was very appreciative of the help I had given him, I think it fair to assume that he would have contacted me if he had had any further trouble.

If real stuttering is associated with anxiety and nervous tension it can be helped by this approach. On the other hand if you should be one of those who stutter in the absence of anxiety it is better to seek help through orthodox speech therapy.

A lad of eighteen had stuttered since he had first learned to talk. He was extremely tense and anxious, and when he would go to speak, his anxiety would seem to become quite uncontrolled. With the relaxing exercises over a period of some months he developed a rather careful, but almost normal pattern of speech.

On the other hand a man of twenty-six, with a terrible stutter, who had come some distance to see me, failed to obtain any material help at all. This man, unlike the previous patient, was really quite unconcerned about his stutter. He had no real anxiety. His purpose in coming to see me was that his firm had offered him a better job if he could get rid of his stutter.

*86\57\2*

In this country, the idea of having some citrus fruit or citrus juice every day is so popularly spread and associated with the concept of a wholesome diet, that even a suggestion of citrus being anything but beneficial is met with skepticism.

Let me state right at the beginning that there is nothing wrong with citrus fruit per se. All fruits, including oranges, lemons, and grapefruits, are excellent foods and used with wisdom and in moderation could constitute an important part of every diet

However, in recent years many nutritionists and medical researchers have questioned the value of citrus in the diet. It was shown in tests that citric acid in citrus fruit can cause tooth damage. It has also been shown that citrus juices are finked with peptic ulcers and can unfavorably affect the general health.” Some nutritionists and health writers, impressed by the findings of these researchers, have concluded that all citrus fruits should be eliminated from the diet

It seems to me that the citrus question has been handled rather unscientifically. It is unfair to condemn citrus fruit as such when so many other factors related to its use are not taken into consideration.

First, in tests, which put citrus fruit in a bad light, usually only citrus juices are used, not the whole fruit.

Second, most citrus fruit in this country has not been given a chance to ripen fully on the trees. They are harvested unripened to assure an early market Unripe citrus has a much higher content of acids, which can be very harmful, even when the fruit is eaten whole. It is, of course, even more injurious in the form of a concentrated juice.

Third, we should not forget that citrus fruit today is so loaded with toxic chemicals of various kinds—preservatives, artificial colorings, insecticide sprays, waxes, etc.—that some of these are bound to be consumed; this is especially true in regard to commercial juices, where the whole fruit, skin and all, is squeezed in huge, powerful presses.

Then, how many of us do use fresh juices anymore? The great majority of Americans drink frozen, reconstituted, or canned fruit juices, not to mention so-called fruit drinks, where there is actually not much of real juice or fruit at all, only artificial colorings and flavorings and various chemicals and preservatives.

Citrus fruits are rich in vitamin C, which is very important for arthritis sufferers, because it is essential for the health and stability of collagen and all connective tissues of the body, as well as for all vital processes of the body and proper functioning of organs and glands. The juice of half a lemon in a glass of warm water, sweetened with one teaspoon of honey, is an

excellent morning drink for anybody, including persons with arthritis. But it should not be taken every day for prolonged periods. It should be alternated with vegetable broths and herb teas.

Likewise, half a grapefruit once or twice a week, or one whole orange two or three times a week, will do no harm but lots of good. Again it should not be continued endlessly, but alternated with periods when other fruits are used.

The modern, efficient communication and cold storage system makes it possible to buy any kind of fruits and vegetables, anywhere in the United States, any time of the year. This is called progress. But from a nutritional point of view this is a very unfortunate development. This is admittedly great “marketing progress,” but it has contributed to the establishment of such unhealthy habits as using certain fruits or, which is even worse, certain fruit juices every day of the year, year after year.

All fruit should be eaten “in season.” Eat citrus only for a few months during winter when it is harvested. Then switch to the other fruits as they come “in season”—various berries, peaches, cherries, apples, etc. This way you will get fruit always when it is fresh and at the peak of its nutritional value, and your body will be afforded an opportunity to obtain a great variety of nutritive elements. In storage, even cold storage, all produce gradually loses its vitamin content.

The nutritive value of various fruits—vitamins, minerals, enzymes, trace elements, etc.—varies considerably. Also, the habit of eating fruit in season will be a good protective measure for possible damage by an overdosage, as is the case with citric acid in citrus fruits.

In summary, citrus fruits are good for you if you eat them whole and in moderation, not more than two to three in a week. (Lemon is an exception. It can be juiced and used diluted in water in drinks and in salad dressing.) But use citrus only in season and sec that it is organically grown without poisonous sprays. In practice, it would mean that you have to buy it only from sources you can trust or from the better health food stores which sell certified, organically grown produce.

If you live in northern parts of the country you can leave citrus fruits out of your diet entirely and replace them with vitamin C-rich apples and other fruits grown in the area.

*43\176\2*