Misty Jacobs

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Do you know which cancer that kills the most women? It isn’t breast cancer. In 1987, lung cancer surpassed breast cancer as the number one cause of cancer deaths in women.(5) Lung cancer is ...

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“Dad's sick. Aortic aneurysm. Unlikely to survive surgery.” Within hours I was on an airplane to Indiana, and my brother was on another airplane coming from the East. “He has a 10-percent ...

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I drink Coca-Cola if my stomach feels funny, sleep with peeled garlic in my ears when I have earaches and drink cranberry juice when I have a frequent urge to “go.” Doesn’t ...

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In the early days of mental health care, psychiatric patients were handcuffed and shackled in large, underfunded institutions.(3)(5) Prior to World War II, mental health care was not covered ...

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Have you changed the light bulbs in your house to fluorescents and LEDs? Do you take your own grocery bags to the store? Do you keep your car tuned up and tires inflated? This can increase fuel ...

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“Basket case” is kind of a catchy phrase — fun to say, rolls off the tongue nicely. The movie “Breakfast Club” referred to the quirky, shy girl as the basket case, a character I’ve identified with ...

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How authentic are you? Authenticity, or being true to oneself, is a moral state according to researchers from Northwestern University.(1) Are you comfortable with yourself, comfortable ...

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You have a cancer diagnosis — Check. You’ve been prescribed a course of chemo — Check. Nausea ensues — Check. Your concentration is gone, along with your memory and word retrieval. ...

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How you feel about access to health care probably says a lot about your politics. When the Affordable Care Act was being debated, 61 percent of Democrats favored the law versus only 12 percent of ...

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In June I attended my twenty-fifth college reunion. Preparing for the drive down, I joked on Facebook, “I hope I can publish a book, get a facelift and lose 30 pounds in the next 3 hours.” ...

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Gratitude is among the first social graces we teach our children. For every cookie, every birthday gift and every kind word, we incessantly remind them, “Say thank you.” Gratitude is among ...

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Would you know if you were having a heart attack? More importantly, would your doctor correctly diagnose you? Possibly not, according to a recent study by the University of Leeds. Using their ...

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I’m a forty-something, never-thin woman who started playing tennis about four years ago. After a few years of playing two to five times a week, I started paying the piper for my enthusiasm — knee ...

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Our culture is rife with suggestions on how to inoculate our brains against dementia: learn a language, eat olive oil, and drink coffee. We can exercise (I know a lot of bright old people ...

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Depression has been my companion since at least the age of 10. My father suffered from it. Probably one of his parents did, but as a child of immigrants in an era where mental illness was ...

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Quick! Where’s your body? Are you folding up compact and snug like origami, or is your body dominating your space, arms akimbo and feet spread? Like it or not, your body is projecting ...

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How have you navigated the losses in your life — layoffs, divorce, a cancer diagnosis? Anxiety and depression are normal responses to adversity. But how long did it take to reset your course? ...

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As addressed in Religion and Medicine on the Right to Die, with the exception of Unitarianism, the world’s major religions reject euthanasia: God alone decides the length of our days. But when ...

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How rude are you? Manners are on the decline, as discussed in my first article on the subject, “How Rude Are You? Manners for Millennials.” Good manners aren’t English country-home secrets ...

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Despite what health writers like me tell you about balance and self-care, caregiving is rife with stress, including self-denial, self-sacrifice, exhaustion and grief. A Google search of “Stress ...

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In 2005, John Rehm, husband of radio producer and NPR host Diane Rehm, was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease. In 2012, John entered assisted living. After two years of continuous decline, ...

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Newsflash: If you aren’t trying to be polite, chances are people find you rude. But who defines polite? The dinner table, once a school of social-emotional health, where many children learned ...

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A lifelong sufferer of depression, I want depressed people to get well however they can. I am not anti-med. But being on meds requires managing the side effects of those meds. There is no ...

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Sponsored by: HFACTOR How well are you hydrating? Remember, good hydration is more than just the eradication of thirst. Water covers 71 percent of the earth’s surface and comprises about 60 ...

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First off, let’s address the hocus pocus of the “detox” trend. No randomized, controlled scientific trials have been performed to prove detox diets work.(1) Your kidneys and liver are ...

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How do you experience being female? Do you equate your worth with your sexual attractiveness? Do you enjoy the attention you garner with a pretty face, or large breasts, or high heels and a short ...

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All of sudden, the waste bins in dorms seem to fill instantaneously with tampon wrappers and tissue-wrapped pads. The mantra of every woman caught unprepared echoes through the halls, “Do you have ...

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Are they big enough? Too big? Perky? Drooping? Breasts are a powerful symbol of femininity, and their idealization represents an impossible standard for most women. Think of Marilyn Monroe, ...

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As women, our physiology and our place in society affect how much stress we encounter and how well we manage that stress. The chemical reaction in the brain called the “fight or flight response”, ...

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The World Health Organization classifies migraine as one of the top 20 most disabling illnesses on the planet. This illness of the brain is now linked to diseases of the heart. One-fifth of the ...

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Kate had been happily married for 23 years. Her husband, John, was a stockbroker on Wall Street. They had two children, a home in New Jersey with a housekeeper, gardener, and pool man, and a ...

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White middle-aged Americans are experiencing a dramatic decline in life expectancy, according to a study released in 2015. Death rates for white Americans between the ages of 45 and 54 increased ...

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In April 2011, Pamela Chanko’s parents, Mark and Anita, returned from a trip to an empty fridge. Her father ran to the store for bananas and milk. While crossing a Manhattan street, he was hit by ...

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Depressed people are isolated people. Loneliness is a self-selecting symptom of the illness. And like their brothers-in-arms, the pessimists, we more accurately assess our total lack of control ...

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In 2008, Fred Holliday went to the doctor with fatigue and hypertension. He had lost a lot of weight and intermittently had blood in his urine. By January 2009, he had developed rib pain and a ...

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Years ago, my cousin in San Diego invited us for a beach weekend. Who says no to that? My husband and I set out with the kids on a road trip to spend time with extended family and acquaint our ...

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My father had hypoxic dementia due to a cardiac surgery gone amiss. When I sat with him in the garden at his rehabilitation center, he repeatedly asked to see his parents. My father was 75. ...