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Well, not for me.  Years ago, when we were first dating, a woman I know told me never to marry someone who hated what he did. Unfortunately, I did, because I loved him, but over 30 years with a man who violently hates what he does (he's a dentist) has made my life, well, if not unhealthy, then extremely hellish! A new study has found that if your spouse is happy, you will be healthy.   Newswise.com reports that having a happy spouse could be good for your health, at least among middle-aged and older adults, according to a new study published by the American Psychological Association. In a nationally representative study of 1,981 middle-age heterosexual couples, researchers found that people with happy spouses were much more likely to report better health over time. This occurred above and beyond the person’s own happiness, according to the study. “This finding significantly broadens assumptions about the relationship between happiness and health, suggesting a uni...

I couldn't believe this when I read this.  But children in a recent study  identified apple slices as FRENCH FRIES! Apparently all the attempts by food giants to show kids healthier foods just aren't working. In the study  one-half to one-third of children did not identify milk when shown McDonald’s and Burger King children’s advertising images depicting that product, according to newswise.com. Sliced apples in Burger King’s ads were identified as apples by only 10 percent of young viewers; instead most reported they were french fries.   “Burger King’s depiction of apple slices as ‘Fresh Apple Fries’ was misleading to children in the target age range (of 3 to 7),” the Web site quotes principal investigator James Sargent, MD, co-director Cancer Control Research Program at Norris Cotton Cancer Center. “The advertisement would be deceptive by industry standards, yet their self-regulation bodies took no action to address the misleading depiction.” In 2010 McDonal...

Who knew?  According to a new study , want to know the secret to being sexy and in shape at 70?  Play varsity sports in high school. Fit and healthy 70 year olds who don’t frequently visit the doctor have something unexpected in common – they played varsity sports in high school, newswise.com reports. "A new study tracked 712 World War II veterans who were healthy as young men – they had passed a rigorous physical exam when being screened for the military – and surveyed them 50 years later for behavior, background and personality factors that improved their health at 70," the Web site notes. “The most surprising result was those who played a high school sport reported visiting their doctor fewer times a year,” Simone Dohle of ETH Zurich (Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich) said at newswise.com. Dohle, along with Brian Wansink of Cornell University's Food and Brand Lab, conducted the study. “We found that many of those who were active on a team over 50 y...

In direct contradiction of a post I made earlier this month, McDonald's is not leading the pack when it comes to offering healthy food for kids, or adults. Mark Bittman notes in yesterday's NYT that even though every McDonald's exec he's talked to says the fast food outlet is only an occasional "treat" for his kids, why isn't the corporation taking a larger step to really make its food, well, healthier? The company points out that it now substitutes milk, water or juice (not so good) for soda, but still, the soft drink makes up more than 50 percent of the beverages sold to kids. "And, despite a well-publicized announcement a couple of weeks ago that promised to market only water, milk and juice in its Happy Meal advertising, there’s little sign of the sugar-peddling diminishing," Bittman writes. He adds that while it’s true that 21 percent of all Happy Meals are now sold with milk, "the vast majority of that is chocolate milk, which,...

We get an "F." That's what the government sgives our dietary habits , according to Jane Brody.  The Center for Public Science periodically compiles a report card on how we're doing and we, well, flunked. Brody writes, "The analysis of changes in food consumption from 1970 to 2010 reveals that we still have a long way to go before we come close to meeting dietary guidelines for warding off obesity and chronic health problems like diabetes   and heart disease." Though there is some good news, she notes. "Our consumption of added sweeteners, though still significantly higher than it was in 1970, has come down from the 'sugar high' of 1999 when the average was 89 pounds per person." But an average of 78 pounds per person in 2010, mostly as sugar and high-fructose corn syrup, is still too much, the report points out. Brody says we get a B-plus for cutting back on fats and oils, the highest grade awarded,. But...."Yes, we’ve dramati...

I was intrigued when I saw this headline at weather.com, 13 healthy habits that can hurt .  We're all so drummed over the head about healthy behaviors, I thought, hmm, let's see exactly what we're not supposed to be doing, after all. 1.)  Sun.  Not too much.  OK, OK, sunscreen.  We all know that. 2.)  Water.  Drinking only that during high-energy exercise depletes the body of sodium, causing fatigue and sometimes fainting.  Drink energy drinks, too, but watch out for the sugar. 3.)  Exercise.  Too much is the problem.  Many think the more they exercise, and the harder, the more quickly they'll get in shape.  Not.  Too much exercise can actually cause a person to lose strength, says weather.com, and cause fatigue and muscle pain. 4.)  Exercise, again.  But this time it's people who are addicted to it.  I know quite a few, and may even be one of them, at times.  When it makes you ru...

Who's healthier?  You or your car? It's the theme of a cute new commercial, with the guy I adore (used to be on QVC) asking people all these questions.  (Wish he'd take off that baseball cap, but maybe he has no hair under it?) The new question is, what's in better shape, you or your car . Predictably, the folks all say their car, including the guy who says he needs a new wheel, but his car is doing great. But what's the truth of this?  Do we take better care of our cars?  Sue Curry, PhD, recently blogged on at the Huffington Post that this is a matter not to be taken lightly.  While cars have gotten smaller and more compact, we've gone the opposite way.  She references Martin Becker, a renown "healthcare promoter," as she describes him, who facetiously noted that "we should weigh less than our cars." But in the years since he said this, she reports, "Cars have become lighter and we all know what's happened to our weight....

So you've tried to get your kids to eat their fruits and veggies and if they didn't, oh well.  But a new study is showing that what kids eat when they're growing up is vital to their health long-term. Of course, the study was done on fruit flies but scientists promise it applies to us.  And the big surprise?  Protein is more important than sugar ;-).   In a finding that could very well have application to human beings, researchers "discovered that a larval diet that’s predominantly protein is better than a diet of sugar when it comes to the reproduction and development of the next generation of the small flies, which count human-like metabolism among their many biological similarities." Mother flies that grew up eating protein gave birth to more offspring and these infant flies were healthier and stronger than females grown as larvae on a diet that mostly included sugar, according to newswise.com. The doctors on the research team lambasted our current d...

OK.  So you're determined to eat healthier. Why not have some chcken?  A broiled chicken leg, thigh, and a breast -- that should do it. Not.  People are eating healthier, it's true.  But they're eating more.  According to reuters.com, people are eating large portions of healthy food, thinking it doesn't matter. But calories are calories.  "People think (healthier food) is lower in calories," Pierre Chandon, a marketing professor at the INSEAD Social Science Research Center in France, told Reuters' Kerry Grens, and they "tend to consume more of it." Portion sizes have become larger over the years, as have plate sizes.  I purposely went out and bought smaller plates so less food looks like more (and you actually eat less).  Now when I go to a restaurant and see the heaping amounts of food on the (huge) plate, I sometimes want to send it back, but more often, just take half home.  In an interesting study, Grens reports, participants w...

If you think there still aren't healthy options at most fast food joints, you're right.  CBS News in New York reports that in the last 14 years not a lot has changed.   Offerings are no more nutritious than they were when we first started worrying about it, according to a new study. Though fast-food chains have improved their meat, saturated fat, and caloric intake levels, they have seen a huge rise in their dairy and sodium levels, according to the study. Included in the study were McDonald’s, Burger King, Wendy’s, Taco Bell, Kentucky Fried Chicken, Arby’s, Jack in the Box, and Dairy Queen. The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation study found that "the nutritional quality index of fast-food meals went from 45 out of 100 in 1997 to (only) 48 in 2010." Most families visit one of these chains at least twice a week, the study also found. Thankfully, my son isn't big on fast food so we rarely go, though I must admit we went through a period a couple of years ago i...

Big surprise.  Physically fit kids do better in school.  Wish I could get my son off the computer!!!! http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/physically-fit-students-do-better-in-school-than-others-study-finds/2012/12/14/6e181614-6a25-11e1-acc6-32fefc7ccd67_story.html