Category: Lifestyle

Simplicity is key, especially now. In the post-’90s world of excess, we’re all aiming for that minimalist aesthetic, but it can be hard to achieve. As pop-punk queen Avril Lavigne once sang, “Why’d you have to go and make things so complicated?” Chances are Ms. Lavigne was singing about tortuous teen relationships, but this statement also directly applies to skincare.

The last thing you need is beauty regimen with an ingredients list miles-long with no end in sight. Plus, how can you trust any ingredient enough to put it on your face if you can’t even pronounce it?

Thankfully, there is a solution. Lark Skin Co. is a skincare company based in St. Louis, Missouri. Lisa Dolan founded the company based on the skincare needs that she, herself, had. When she was preparing to be a new mom, she scoured beauty stores for a regimen that was simple and natural. Plus, she wanted multifunctional products that used ingredients she could pronounce.

Now, four years later, Lisa works to share products from Lark Skin Co. that fulfill those very needs.

Minimalism is Key

Empty your shelves of exorbitantly priced products that satisfy only one need and make use of a minimalist way of life. Not only is having a million products splashed across your counter an eyesore, it also takes a ridiculous amount of time to complete your skincare routine when you have approximately fourteen different cremes and serums that all serve one purpose each.

Worry not—Lark Skin Co. makes a product specifically for the minimalist in you. The Beauty Balm is multifunctional in the sense that you can use it as a creamy cleanser, makeup remover, moisturizer, hair conditioner, or body balm.

That’s not even the best part! If you’re in a pinch and your hair or skin resembles the Sahara Desert, you can apply the balm to the ends of your hair as a conditioning treatment, or you can apply it to your skin as a deep penetrating moisturizer. This trick is perfect for long flights!

Maintaining Luscious Locks

Is there anything better than running your fingers through silky hair? The answer is no. No there is not.

Lark Skin Co. made their Hair Potion—sans-witchcraft!—which is designed to actually improve the texture and shine of your hair.

Not to mention that this potion protects your hair from heat styling. No more using a copious amount of different products to achieve the desired effect that this product has. Talk about a triple whammy!

Take a Bath; You Deserve it

Life is rough, and you deserve to treat yourself.

There is no better way to release your stress than by taking a bath. What’s more, with the New Moon Ritual Salts you can actually start anew during your soak.

By taking a bath with the luxurious New Moon Ritual Salts, which are infused with lavender and sage, you get the opportunity to set your intentions for the month while detoxing.

Not to mention, Lark has included Himalayan salts as one of the ingredients, which is the ultimate aid in detoxification. Whether you’re detoxing because of the New Moon or because you simply have a case of the Mondays, this is the perfect bath salt for you.

Treat Your Skin to Some Rest and Relaxation

Lark Skin Co. makes a Red Clay and Aloe Clay Mask and it’s exactly what you’ve been missing your entire life. The clay and aloe combine and work together to restore moisture to your skin while reducing any inflammation you may have. While the mask is geared toward those with sensitive and aging skin, anyone can use it. It’s never too young to be proactive about aging!

You work hard—your skin shouldn’t. Give your beautiful face the chance it deserves to be vibrant and hydrated. Take time for yourself throughout the week to give your skin some attention, rest, and relaxation.

Be Good to Yourself

Life is full of complications and compromises, but of all the things you should be compromising on, skincare is not one of them.

Your skin is only as vibrant as the time you put into it. Simplicity is key in all areas of your life, skincare included. Find a routine that checks all of your boxes while using the fewest number of products. If you’re looking to make your life easier, Lark Skin Co. is the brand for you. Give it a try; your skin is waiting!

No one starts the day intending to be unhealthy. For the most part the majority of us try to exercise, attempt to make good meal choices, and generally observe some cardinal rules of health. But sometimes as good as our intentions are, we unknowingly do things that can potentially harm our health.

Think you have everything in check? You might want to have a look at our list of things that many of us do every day that are bad for us.

Eat From the Salad Bar

You choose to eat from the salad bar for lunch because it has to be good for you with all of the nutritious lettuce, broccoli, and carrots, right?

In truth, although they may appear to offer you good choices, most salad bars also offer high fat food items like creamy potato salad and oily, marinated vegetables, causing the total meal to be worse for you than a burger.

For example, a Wendy’s Spicy Chicken Caesar Salad has 780 calories and 51 grams of fat, and a Pretzel Bacon Cheeseburger has 680 calories and 36 grams of fat. If you choose to eat a salad, make sure you check the caloric content (if available), and stay away from items that contain mayonnaise or a lot of oil.

Sit a Lot

Everyone knows that it’s important to exercise and that not exercising can put you at risk for certain health issues. But did you know just how bad sitting is for you? Recent studies have shown frequent sitting to be linked to increased risk of heart disease, decreased mental health, and other issues.

Surprisingly, even if you regularly exercise—but also sit a lot during the day—you’re still at risk! Experts refer to excessive sitting as “the new smoking,” because people who sit excessively are as unhealthy as those who puff on cigarettes. What should you do if your job requires you to sit a lot? Stand whenever you can!

Compared with sitting, standing burns an extra 20 calories per hour. Also, try to get up and move periodically or make it a point to move every hour or so. Sneak in movement whenever you can.

Pace while you’re on a conference call. Instead of scheduling a meeting over coffee, suggest a walk. Commit to walking during lunch or climbing a certain number of stairs per day.

Wear Skinny Jeans

Sure those tight pants look great on you, but are they worth the risk? An article in the Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery and Psychiatry describes a case of a woman who experienced nerve damage from helping her friend move while wearing skinny jeans.

She was squatting throughout the day, and this caused compression of the area under the knee that houses a lot of nerves. The compression was severe enough to cause numbness in her lower legs that landed her in the hospital for a couple of days.

Doctors say that this condition is called “compartment syndrome.” It happens when the blood supply to the leg muscle is reduced because of tight-fitting pants. This in turn causes swelling of the muscles and compression of the nearby nerves.

What should you do? If you plan on doing a lot of squatting or sitting, don’t wear tight pants. If you don’t have a choice, make sure that you don’t bend down for extended periods.

Bite Your Nails

It may be a common temporary cure for the jitters, but biting your nails may not be worth the risks. The number and type of bacteria that live under your fingernails range from mild to pretty nasty.

Studies have found salmonella, E. coli, and other harmful pathogens.

If you bite your nails, basically wha
tever your fingers touch during the day ends up in your mouth. Even if you wash your hands regularly, most of us don’t get under the nails well, so bacteria festers there.

What can happen if you keep biting? You could end up with severe gastrointestinal issues or other unpleasant sickness.

Hold in Sneezes

We know this one doesn’t come as a shock. Ever try to hold a sneeze in? It feels like your head is going to explode! Well, it kind of can. Sneezes move at a whopping 100 miles per hour and can cause some damage if they’re stopped in their tracks.

Incidents of fractures in nasal cartilage, nose bleeds, and even detached retinas have been reported. What should you do if you’re in a situation where you need to hold it? Just do your best and muffle it in your sleeve.

Stare at a Screen All Day

Your mom was right. If you stare at it long enough, you’ll go blind. Well, maybe not blind, but staring at your computer screen for extended periods can cause some serious eye issues. The most common one is computer vision syndrome (CVS), which is characterized by blurry vision, dry and red eyes, headaches, eye irritation, and neck or back pain.

As you get older (say over age 40), it gets tougher to work on a screen for prolonged periods because your eyes become less flexible, and you become more susceptible to CVS.

What can you do to combat it? A couple of things. Try reducing the surrounding glare on your computer by dimming lights and avoiding window glare. Also, move your computer so that it’s slightly below eye level and about 20 to 28 inches away from your face.

Lastly, follow the 20-20-20 rule. Every 20 minutes look away from your screen and at something 20 feet away for 20 seconds.

Wear Contact Lenses Excessively

We know that wearing your glasses is a pain, and a lot of people don’t really dig the laser eye correction surgery. So wearing your contacts is your best option, but wearing them too often may be bad for you.

The mechanism by which the lens sits on your eye causes the tissue of your eye to be blocked from receiving oxygen. As you can imagine, this is not a good thing. Wearing contact lenses too often can cause pain and dryness as well as damage to the corneas.

Give your eyes a break by using your contacts a little less and wearing your glasses a little more. 

Not Clean Your Washing Machine

We wash our clothing in the washing machine—don’t the soap and bleach that we add clean the machine and our clothes at the same time? Apparently not!

Experts say that our washing machines are full of bacteria that get on the wet clothing and then on to our bodies. Microbiology experts explain that in a load of just underwear there can be about 100 million E. coli transmitted to the next load. And E.coli isn’t the only germ present in your wash.

Hepatitis A virus, norovirus, rotavirus, and salmonella can all be sharing the same living space in your washer as well. Want to get rid of these nasty germs? Wash your clothing with bleach and hot water (regular detergent doesn’t touch them).

Can’t use bleach? Use a product like Clorox 2 with peroxide. Also, periodically clean your washer by letting the machine go through its cycle empty with just bleach and water. Want to go the organic route? Experts say that the sun’s ultraviolet rays are as good at killing bacteria as bleach. As often as you can, dry your clothing in the sun.

In 2015, the city of Chicago faced a heartbreaking health crisis.

Not a single person ended up in the hospital due to this threat; no one missed work. Still, the suffering was unbearable.

This illness pulled a dirty trick. It went after man’s best friend.

The H3N2 flu virus doesn’t thrive in human bodies. It infects dogs and, more rarely, cats. The 2015 Chicago outbreak saw 1,000 pets brought low with fever, fatigue, and runny noses. In other words, this virus does to dogs pretty much exactly what the flu does to people.

Veterinarians were able to treat the flu victims in Chicago, and eventually, the epidemic passed. But the virus was only biding its time. In June 2017, the dog flu resurfaced, this time in the Sunshine State. As of this writing, 12 dogs have been diagnosed with canine influenza in Florida, and those numbers are almost certain to rise. Here’s what you need to know.

1. Is your dog at risk?

According to the American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA), canine influenza is caused by a newer virus. As a result, dogs haven’t yet developed immunity.

“Almost all dogs, regardless of breed or age…, are susceptible to infection if exposed to the active virus,” the AVMA states on its website. “Virtually all dogs exposed to the virus become infected, and nearly 80 percent show clinical signs of the disease.”

2. How serious is dog flu?

The symptoms of canine influenza are similar to the flu we’re all familiar with. In its most common form, dog flu causes coughing, fever, lethargy, and runny nose. In rare cases, dog flu is accompanied by pneumonia and fevers of up to 106 degrees. That’s when the illness becomes truly dangerous.

3. Is the dog flu ever fatal?

Just like its human counterpart, canine influenza rarely leads to death. However, fatalities are not unheard of. The AVMA places the fatality rate of dog flu at less than 10 percent.

4. How long does dog flu last?

The vast majority of infected animals get over the illness in two or three weeks.

5. This latest outbreak is in Florida. Are dogs in other states at risk?

The short answer is “yes.” Since its U.S. debut in 2004, canine influenza has popped up in at least 40 states. The risk of infection rises considerably when dogs have contact with each other, as in kennels, dog parks, and animal shelters.

6. What can we do to protect our pets from the dog flu?

The best way to prevent infection is to prevent contact with a sick animal. The virus spreads through nose-to-nose contact between dogs, said Keith Poulsen, a veterinarian who teaches at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

However, Dr. Cynda Crawford of the University of Florida College of Veterinary Medicine said in a news conference that the virus “is also spread very effectively and efficiently with contact through contaminated clothing, contaminated hands, contaminated objects in the environment.”

Talk to your veterinarian. If dog flu has been a problem in your area, your vet might recommend vaccinating your pet.

“The more dogs in a community that we can vaccinate to build up community immunity, the better chance we have of keeping that virus out,” Crawford said.

When T.S. Eliot wrote that “April is the cruellest month,” he must have been talking about allergies.

Just as the sun finally peeks out to warm our chilled bones, the air fills with pollen, dust, and a devil’s brew of allergens designed to make those of us who suffer from seasonal allergies want to go back to bed for a few months.
You can stuff pills down your gullet. You can walk around in a gas mask. But why do that when you can make a few simple changes to your diet for an allergy-free season? This summer, eat these foods to enjoy the sunshine without choking and dripping and being generally miserable.

1. Local Honey

Angels are real, and they are called bees. Not only do our buzzing buddies pollinate our crops for us, free of charge, they manufacture the world’s finest defense against seasonal allergies (maybe—more on that later).
The reasoning is pretty tidy. Local honey is made from local pollen. Local pollen is a serious allergen. Therefore, if you get your system used to the stuff by sampling bits of local honey early in the season, you won’t get all scratchy-voiced and stuffed up.

But does it really work? Maybe, says a doctor named Lawrence Rosen, who consulted with WebMD about foods that treat allergies.
“If you take small doses of honey early in the season, you may develop a tolerance toward pollen in your area,” Rosen said. The key word here is “may.” The jury’s still out, but it’s worth a try. Besides, honey is delicious.

2. Pineapples

Pineapples aren’t just kitschy cups for tropical beverages anymore. The fruit might also help keep your nasal passages clear during allergy season.
The fruit contains this stuff called bromelain, which is an enzyme that can sooth irritation caused by allergies. It might even help with asthma, Rosen told WebMD. Just don’t try to eat the spiny skin. They may be called “pineapples,” but you can’t bite into them like a non-pine apple.

3. Salmon and Tuna

You might recognize these fishes from the semi-recent national obsession with Omega-3 fatty acids. Well, the “good” fats found in tuna, salmon, and certain other ocean residents is also good for toning down the effects of allergies.
It’s all about reducing inflammation, which Omega-3s do quite nicely, thank you.

4. Broccoli (Sorry)

Your mom was right. You should eat your broccoli. That goes double if you suffer from seasonal allergies. Broccoli contains a flavenoid called quercetin that can help to reduce histamine levels.
Histamines are the shock troops of the allergic response. They’re natural chemicals that your body releases when it senses allergens sneaking into your system. They make your eyes water, your nose run, and your skin itch, which is basically the trifecta of seasonal allergies.

5. Hot Peppers

If you thought broccoli was loaded with the histamine-busting flavenoid quercetin, you’ve got to try ancho peppers. These dried poblanos contain like 9 times the amount of quercetin that broccoli can boast. Jalapenos and serrano peppers are also rich in quercetin, so get that hot sauce brewing!

Your doctor will try to be completely honest with you when it comes to your health, medications you may be taking, and other facts about your overall well-being. There are some health-related issues, however, that your doctor may not tell you. Here are some facts that your doctor could be concealing from you.

1. Your doctor likely knows little about health insurance or the cost of treatment.

It’s no secret that doctors are experts in medicine and the physiology of the body. While they might have some idea about the billing aspect of health care, they likely know little more than you do.

There are entire programs dedicated to teaching students about proper medical coding and billing because determining the cost of treatment can become very complicated. Combine that with the fact that your insurance company never pays full price for treatment and instead has worked out agreements with health care organizations in your state for various costs, and the whole thing becomes almost impossible to decipher.

2. About one in 20 cancer diagnoses made by a primary care doctor are incorrect.

Primary care doctors have an incredibly difficult job. Instead of specializing in just one part of the body, they focus on the entire thing. They also see an incredibly large volume of patients every day. This makes errors relatively common, even among the most dedicated primary care physicians.

Because they are under pressure to see so many patients, primary care doctors can fall victim to heuristics or the act of making mental shortcuts in a rushed situation. They have to make important decisions based on probabilities and likely outcomes.

While they are often correct, these doctors are still human beings who can also make mistakes by rushing through an exam. Experts suggest asking questions like, “If it’s not cancer, what could it otherwise be?” This will force your doctor to slow down and think critically.

3. Emergency rooms make more mistakes on the weekends.

If you have to go to the emergency room on the weekend, you are more likely to run into complications or problems, especially if you have a chronic condition. That’s not because the volume of patients is higher, it’s because the number of health care workers is lower.

Doctors and nurses are just like the rest of us: they want weekends off to spend time with their family members and friends. The more experienced staff gets to pick their hours and often chooses to be off on the weekends. This results in less experienced workers seeing patients on the weekends, and lower numbers overall. This inexperience makes it more likely that they will overlook something important when it comes to your condition.

4. There are safer times to get elective surgeries.

If you feel the need to undergo elective surgery, you should try to avoid scheduling it on the weekend. Just like the emergency room, the more experienced surgeons tend to have the weekends off. This results in a two percent higher mortality rate in patients going under the knife on the weekend.

If you are undergoing elective surgery, talk to your doctor about his or her preferred time to perform the surgery. This can ensure you’re getting the experienced hand you trust and not some other doctor that you’ve never met.

Many women enjoy a glass of wine in the evening with dinner or before bed. It can assist with relaxation and helps people unwind after a long day at work. Many women also think that wine helps with heart health, a nice added bonus.
Unfortunately, recent studies have found that there may actually be a risk for women who indulge in a glass of wine on a daily basis. It’s causing women everywhere to reconsider what was once seen as a healthy habit.

Researchers have known for some time that heavy alcohol use and breast cancer were related. The more alcohol a woman drank, the more likely she was to develop this terrible disease. That’s why, for years, doctors recommended that women (and men, too) drink alcohol only in moderation.
The previous recommendation was that women should drink no more than five ounces a day. The benefits included a healthier heart, better skin, and even help in preventing hearing loss. This was welcome news to women everywhere and an invitation to drink for their health.

A recent study, however, is questioning whether any amount of alcohol is actually good for women. It followed 119 women worldwide and examined their alcohol intake and their risk for breast cancer. It examined both premenopausal and postmenopausal women. The results were pretty stark.
Drinking just ten grams of alcohol per day (equivalent to a small glass of wine, eight ounces of beer, or one ounce of hard liquor) increased the risk of breast cancer by five percent in premenopausal women and nine percent in postmenopausal women. Naturally, women everywhere were alarmed by these results.

The news wasn’t all bad, however. The researchers also found that increased daily activity led to a decreased risk of breast cancer. This might mean that getting enough exercise could cancel out the health problems caused by drinking wine daily. That’s far from certain, however, so if women want to be as healthy as possible, they may want to cut out alcohol out of their diet altogether while still getting daily exercise.
Critics of the study have argued that the sample size is too small to draw any firm conclusions. With only 119 women studied, more research will be needed before we really know what connection, if any, there is between small amounts of alcohol and breast cancer. This initial study does point to a connection, even if it’s not conclusive.

For women who have a family history of breast cancer, giving up alcohol completely may be the best course of action. If you are a woman who drinks wine for the health benefits, you can simply drink organic grape juice instead of wine. Grape juice contains all of the health benefits of wine without the risk. Just make sure the grape juice you’re drinking doesn’t have added sugar, or it could lead to weight gain.
While more research is needed, women who are extremely concerned about breast cancer should give up alcohol until more research has been done. This way, a woman can be sure she’s doing everything possible to avoid this terrible health condition.