Category: Sweat

Remember what it was like to go to the doctor as a child? Yes, there were needle pricks followed by colorful Band-Aids and terrifying, wooden chokey things to facilitate peeking down sore throats.

But there was also the sense that you were in good hands—that even amid the pain and the fear, there was a benevolent, knowledgeable power who was overseeing everything and would offer you some solution for your suffering. (And, thankfully, there was a solution for the vast majority of our childhood ailments.)

Flash forward 20 years. Some of your friends went on to become doctors—friends you trust but who you’re also aware are 100 percent human with the capacity for error.

You’ve had a couple of weird run-ins with your own health that weren’t handled the best way by the doctors you saw, and you’ve been given suggestions that you decided not to follow and diagnoses that you were skeptical of. Later you found out one of the diagnoses was false, rendering all the correlated medical advice complete hooey.

Welcome to adulthood: You still listen to doctors, mostly, but you’re officially a skeptic. You know that doctors don’t know everything and that they never will. You’re aware that there isn’t always a solution.

Even with the healthy dose of disillusionment concerning medical professionals that comes with age, there are still some things you may not know.

Read on for four things your doctor probably won’t say to you, even if they’re true.

1. “You can’t trust my good ratings.”

It’s easy for some doctors to inspire trust in their patients. Maybe they’re charismatic, have a very warm bedside manner, or they’ve never steered you wrong in a diagnosis or treatment plan.

Whatever the case, this is typically a good thing, since confidence in a doctor’s authority may heavily influence how well a patient adheres to the doctor’s prescriptions for health. That’s why a doctor probably won’t go out of their way to let you know that their good ratings don’t always mean all that much.

As Richard Gunderman, MD, PhD, writes in The Atlantic, a doctor’s online ratings can be a slippery gauge of quality for a number of reasons.

These include the fact that you can’t verify whether a reviewer has actually been a patient of the doctor and the lack of reliability in patient satisfaction, which often has less to do with a doctor’s skill and more to do with a doctor’s personality or a patient’s long-term health outcomes.

“Good outcomes do not necessarily reflect good medical care, and the same can be said conversely for bad outcomes,” Gunderman points out.

“A patient with a minor and self-limited viral infection might be very satisfied that a physician ordered several diagnostic tests and prescribed antibiotics, despite the fact that such measures did nothing to hasten recovery. Conversely, a patient with an incurable disease might express great dissatisfaction, despite receiving the very best care possible under the circumstances.”

2. “I’m sick of my job.”

No one wants to appear jaded about their job lest they be seen as ineffective or ungrateful. The stakes can be even higher for doctors, though, given that the price of telling the truth might be a patient’s faith in their abilities.

“How Being a Doctor Became the Most Miserable Profession,” a 2014 article in The Daily Beast, points out that physicians’ unhappiness has been on the rise. As of a few years ago, they were ranked as having the second most suicidal occupation.

A 2016 survey by Merritt Hawkins reports that more than half of American phy
sicians feel “somewhat or very negative” regarding their professional morale and feelings about the current state of the medical profession.

More than a quarter said they wouldn’t be physicians again if they could choose to do their careers over.

“The meme is that doctors are getting away with something and need constant training, watching and regulating. With this in mind, it’s almost a reflex for policy makers to pile on the regulations,” writes Daniela Drake, MD, for The Daily Beast.

“Regulating the physician is an easy sell because it is a fantasy—a Freudian fever dream—the wish to diminish, punish and control a disappointing parent, give him a report card, and tell him to wash his hands,” Drake adds.

3. “Your insurance company makes me jump through hoops.”

Though your doctor will spare you the gory details, your insurance company probably makes their life much more difficult.

Whether your doctor has to dispute a lower level of care recommended by your insurance company or mail them your surgically removed toenail for documentation purposes, you can safely assume that they are not your insurance company’s No. 1 fan.

Illinois family physician and geriatrician Jerome Epplin tells MarketWatch that this is because the people making decisions aren’t actually seeing the patients.

Epplin says that despite his efforts to request costly tests such as magnetic resonance imaging only when they are absolutely necessary, insurance companies routinely reject the claims—even when Epplin has good reason to believe a patient’s health is in peril.

4. “You’re going to die.”

If you or a loved one is diagnosed with a terminal illness, you will likely expect all the details about the prognosis to come from your doctor. As a New York Times article highlighted last year, this is not necessarily true.

The article’s author, Paula Span, points to a study of 178 cancer patients nationwide led by Dr. Holly Prigerson, director of the Center for Research on End-of-Life Care at Weill Cornell Medicine.

After interviewing patients, Prigerson and her colleagues found that even when doctors had knowledge that their patients’ cancer had progressed despite chemotherapy—and regardless of their expectations that these patients had less than six months to live—a significant number of doctors did not inform their patients.

Almost 40 percent of the participants interviewed reported that their physicians had never discussed prognosis or life expectancy with them.

Only nine out of 178 patients—or 5 percent of those interviewed—had a complete enough understanding of their illnesses to correctly answer each of the four illness-understanding questions used in the study.

Some of this can be attributed to miscommunication (like a doctor’s usage of language that isn’t clea
r to a patient) and optimism bias (the tendency to hope for the best outcome despite evidence to the contrary—aka denial). Some of it, however, is due to doctors literally not telling their patients that they have only months to live.

Why? Sometimes it’s for pragmatic reasons: As Span writes, some oncologists believe that failing to offer chemotherapy—even when it won’t do any good—will only encourage patients to hunt down a doctor who will.

But it’s also just hard to be the bearer of bad news—and many doctors still aren’t trained in how to properly deliver difficult, but essential, information.

When I was 23 years old, I sat in my OB-GYN’s office looking at black and white pictures of my insides. “See?” he said, gesturing to the round, straight-lined cysts showing up on ultrasound images of my ovaries. “Like a string of pearls.”

This was the main criterion used to diagnose me with polycystic ovary syndrome—aka polycystic ovarian syndrome, Stein-Leventhal syndrome, and PCOS—along with cystic acne that was in full bloom, a BMI that was nearly in the “overweight” range for my height, and a sprinkle of body hair in unexpected places.
My gynecologist also told me that my relatively short menstrual cycles were proof of this hormone condition, which is estimated to affect between 8 and 20 percent of reproductive-age women worldwide.
He wanted to put me on oral birth control, which I’d gotten off of in college because I felt like it was spiking my anxiety, and metformin, a prescription medication used to stabilize blood sugar levels in people with diabetes.
I was told that the former would prevent new testosterone-producing cysts from forming on my ovaries (something that could lead to more acne, body hair, and infertility down the road), and the latter would keep me from becoming insulin resistant.
I happened to be going through a particularly intense phase of eschewing traditional medical advice, and I said “no thank you” to both. After extensive personal research, I’d decided to try to treat the condition through diet and exercise—eating a whole-foods, lower-carb diet and trying to reduce my weight by 10 percent, which I’d read could help regulate cycles.
The double-edged sword of women’s (understandable) affinity for alternative medicine is that through the process, they may become more informed and empowered about their bodies—but they may also overestimate their ability to interpret scientific studies as laypeople and consequently forego essential medical advice.

Fortunately, this time, it looks like I was right to not listen to my doctor. The next year, living in Madrid, Spain, I went to an alternative-medicine OB-GYN, who took an ultrasound and said that I looked like I was about to ovulate (PCOSers supposedly don’t ovulate with regularity, if at all) and that she didn’t think my diagnosis was correct.
A few months ago—a full six years after my PCOS diagnosis—another ultrasound of my insides showed that my ovaries were not abnormally cystic. My new (mainstream) OB-GYN assures me that my short cycles are normal. (Though the average cycle length is 28 days, regular cycles can range anywhere from 21 to 35 days.) He also says I should be perfectly fertile if ever I decide to reproduce.
So, do I have PCOS?
My old gynecologist said yes, my current one says no, and I say probably not but honestly who really knows?
Whatever the case, PCOS is a real condition with real effects on those who suffer from it. Symptoms vary from woman to woman, and confusion abounds about how to diagnose it correctly. But we’ve compiled some information here that may be helpful to you if you think you or someone you care about may have PCOS.

Watch for these signs.

There are typically three telltale symptoms associated with PCOS, and according to Mayo Clinic, doctors will diagnose you with the condition if you have at least two of them: irregular periods, polycystic ovaries, and excess androgen.
“Infrequent, irregular or prolonged menstrual cycles are the most common sign of PCOS,” says Mayo Clinic. “For example, you might have fewer than nine periods a year, more than 35 days between periods and abnormally heavy periods.”

When a woman fails to ovulate during her monthly cycle, cysts can build up in her ovaries. While you might reasonably assume that polycystic ovaries would be a definite indicator of PCOS, this is not always the case. Not every woman who has cysts on her ovaries has PCOS, and not every woman with PCOS has cystic ovaries.
As for excess androgen, this is just another way of saying “too much testosterone.” Women who overproduce the hormone may experience symptoms including acne, male-pattern baldness, and excessive hair growth.
Let’s take a minute, though, to acknowledge that the standards for “excessive hair growth” are probably skewed. As you’ll recall, having some dark hairs in unusual places was enough to be considered suspect by my old gynecologist.

Listen to the stories of other “cysters.”

Because there’s so much confusion among both medical experts and patients surrounding this condition and how to diagnose and treat it, one of the best things you can do is get involved with a community of other women who are suffering from PCOS—or as they very charmingly call themselves, “soul cysters”—and learn from these personal accounts.

I recently reached out to women in my own social network who’ve been diagnosed with PCOS.
Here are their experiences, some of which have been edited slightly for space and clarity.
Krista shared her story:
I was diagnosed with PCOS when I was 25. I had ovarian cysts since puberty but not other issues until I experienced a miscarriage at age 24. My cycle never returned after the miscarriage and we were unable to conceive (due to anovulation). I was sent to a fertility specialist … and after an ultrasound, hysterosalpingogram [x-ray of uterus and fallopian tubes], and a TON of lab work, I was diagnosed. Immediately I was given metformin to take twice daily, and I conceived our oldest living child the same month.
I started hormonal birth control at age 16 so any of the symptoms I may have had prior would have been masked by the hormones. I still have issues with hirsutism, hair thinning and loss, and acne at age 30. I am fortunate to not be insulin resistant and don’t have issues with weight gain. I am currently being treated daily with metformin and have no issues.
In Rachel’s case, PCOS is a family affair:
My sister also has it. Though I have ‘fat PCOS’ and she has ‘skinny PCOS.’ My sister is a urologist, and when I was still in college (19), she said I had the textbook description of it. The only issues I dealt with when I was younger were irregular/nonexistent periods and hirsutism. When I hit my mid-20s, I was diagnosed with anxiety and depression, so I was put on selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs).
At 25, I had AWFUL cystic acne along my jaw and far cheek area close to my ear. I was put on spironolactone then and I also use a prescription topical retinoid cream called Tretinoin when necessary. I forgot to mention that I was first put on birth control at 17 after I went through a period of six months where I had no period, and then when they started again, I would bleed for a month straight. I’m currently on birth control, spironolactone, and I’m switching from Prozac to Trintellix.
My sister has irregular periods and hirsutism (hers is milder than mine). She was able to conceive after one round of Clomid and delivered my older nephew in 3/2014. She never had a period after delivering and did not go back on BC, so she had a surprise baby 20 months after my older nephew.
I’ve been told by a reproductive endocrinologist to not even try to get pregnant on my own (when that time comes) and that I should go straight to her. My current gen phys and the repro endo mentioned the name [polycystic ovary syndrome] needs to be changed because so many women don’t exhibit cysts (neither my sis nor I have cysts).
Kara first learned about PCOS in a magazine for teens:
I was about fifteen when I was diagnosed. I had a subscription to Seventeen magazine and read an article that said to see your doctor if you’d had your period for more than a couple of years and it still wasn’t regular (I’d had mine for about 4 by then).

Sure enough I had PCOS, in conjunction with insulin resistance (these two go hand in hand a lot). My doctor put me on metformin for the insulin resistance and a good diet and I lost 40 pounds in a year without trying.
She also put me on the pill to get the cysts to shrink (apparently the estrogen in the pills shrinks them). I had 1 large cyst (14 centimeters across) that the ultrasound tech couldn’t believe wasn’t causing me pain, and two other small ones if I recall. The large one turned out to be located on my fallopian tube, so it didn’t shrink like the ones on my ovaries did. Had surgery with general anesthesia at 15.5 years old to remove the large cyst and my doctor took 2 cups of fluid out of it.
This was right before band camp in high school and having to explain my medical condition to a bunch of teenage boys was interesting! But they were all very supportive (I played a traditionally male instrument in the band). I’m still on metformin and the pill 12 years later to manage insulin resistance and to prevent the cysts from forming.
Sometimes I worry about difficulties I may have if I ever want to get pregnant, and I think this is just another reason I’m leaning towards not having my own children. It’s amazing how many women have PCOS and don’t even realize it, so I’m thankful that Seventeen article was written all those years ago!
Tiffany has jumped through a number of hoops trying to get her PCOS under control:
I was diagnosed with PCOS almost 15 years ago. I would say that since I’ve been diagnosed with PCOS at age 14, things have been difficult. One of the main treatments for this condition is birth control pills. That was quite a process trying to find a pill that didn’t make me feel terrible. Another popular treatment for this condition is a medication called metformin. This medication would always make my stomach hurt so bad. It would always cause nausea as well.
In addition to side effects from the medication, the symptoms of PCOS can be devastating. I experienced issues with the excessive hair growth, particularly on my face. The hair growth got so bad that I was able to grow a decent beard in just over a week. The hair removal process is annoying and it can also become very expensive very quickly.
Also, at the age of 18, I was told that I would probably never be able to have children because of PCOS. That was kind of devastating. In retrospect, the doctors that I visited for treatment didn’t really know a lot about PCOS. In the last 6 months, I have obtained a new OB-GYN and she has enlightened me on PCOS. Some of the issues I have, like muscle and joint stiffness, hot flashes, and loss of appetite, stem from PCOS. After many many tests and a crazy medical adventure with blood clots, it’s hard to say whether or not I still suffer from PCOS.

Seek out second opinions.

Another reason I’d been suspect of my long-ago PCOS diagnosis was that I learned my gynecologist had also diagnosed one of my friends and both of her sisters with PCOS, despite all of us having different symptoms.
Though now I know that the symptoms can vary widely, at the time I wondered if this was some kind of faddish health hysteria—like vitamin D deficiency or gluten sensitivity—that would soon be debunked or a conspiracy wherein pharmaceutical companies were in cahoots with OB-GYNs to make more women take more prescriptions.
When it comes down to it, doctors simply still don’t have a good understanding of PCOS. But getting a PCOS diagnosis doesn’t mean you have to do whatever you’re told.

“Don’t just trust what the first doctor you see says without doing some research,” one PCOS sufferer, Sara Eaton, tells The Atlantic. “Find another woman with PCOS, go online to some of these support groups. Find a reproductive endocrinologist who knows what they’re doing. Talk to other cysters, read the articles, look for doctor recommendations. We have a syndrome that is so complicated and confusing, one of the best ways we can help ourselves is to be proactive and make sure we find the best and most knowledgeable caregivers available to us.”
When you’re not sure where to start, trust what the majority of scientific experts are saying—because science, however imperfect its conclusions, is the best hope we’ve got for figuring out the truth. Know all of your options. Weigh the costs and benefits.
Above all, keep on moving.

Vanessa Wasta of Johns Hopkins University asked Bert Vogelstein, co-director of the Ludwig Center at the Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center, if there’s anything we can do to keep cancer from claiming our lives. Vogelstein’s response is worth repeating.

“Clearly, some types of the disease, such as lung cancer, are heavily influenced by environmental factors,” he said.
Maintaining a healthy weight and avoiding exposure to known carcinogens, like cigarette smoke, are critical for preventing deaths related to these types of cancer.
According to Vogelstein, approximately 40 percent of cancers can be prevented if people avoid environmental risk factors.
Oncologists, the doctors who specialize in treating, diagnosing, and preventing cancer, aren’t just medical experts. They’re also mortals and therefore as concerned as anyone with keeping their own cancer risks at an absolute minimum.

These are the things oncologists have shared that they do to make sure they don’t end up in the unenviable position of their patients.

1. The Breast Oncologist With Breast Cancer

Dr. Maris Weiss founded the website BreastCancer.org. She’s helped countless women win their own battles against breast cancer. And in April 2010, she found out she had the disease herself.

Weiss’ prognosis is excellent. She caught the tumor early. Still, she points to a few things that women can do to reduce their own risk. Genes are a small part of the big picture, she told NPR.
“The breast cancer genes only explain 5 to 10 percent of breast cancer cases today, and those are ancient, stable abnormalities,” she said. “They haven’t changed. But what has changed over the years … are changes in our outside environment and our body’s inside environment.

“So in terms of the inside environment, with obesity making extra inside hormones that can influence breast cell growth, it also triggers more insulin growth factor.” (Insulin-like growth factor is a protein that regulates the effects of growth hormones in our bodies.)
Weiss continued, “More women have not stopped smoking. They’ve started but they haven’t stopped as quickly as men have. We lead very stressful lives. We don’t sleep enough. We run ourselves ragged.”

Weiss seems to be telling us the best way to reduce the chance of breast cancer is controlling these environmental factors. Don’t drink. Don’t smoke. Take time to de-stress. Get plenty of sleep. That’s Weiss’ recipe for keeping cancer at bay.

2. The Surgical Oncologist from Miami

Dr. Omar Llaguna is a surgeon who specializes in oncology, meaning he actually goes in and removes tumors from patients’ bodies. He follows a strict diet to keep his own risk of cancer as low as possible.
“Clean eating can go a long way in managing your cancer risk,” Llaguna told Reader’s Digest.

“For me, this primarily means avoiding of processed foods and excessive sugar. In addition, I try to eat a diet high in protein, moderate in fat, and low in carbohydrates. But the key is to always avoid processed foods.”
Llaguna also has another cancer-fighting secret. He does CrossFit.
“I encourage all my patients to take charge of their health,” Llaguna told the CrossFit website.
“While we don’t choose to have cancer, we can choose how we live our lives and how we fight the disease. I talk about the positive effects of healthy eating and exercise on the immune system, as well as the sense of overall well being that can be achieved.

“I’ve encouraged many patients to try CrossFit, knowing that it will help them maintain their physical strength and stamina, something very important for those dealing with functional decline after a large operation, as well as post-operative chemotherapy and radiation therapy.”
So there you have it: exercise and healthy eating are the key. What’s so hard about that?

3. The Head of Medical Oncology

Dr. David Khayat is one of France’s foremost experts on cancer. He used to run the French National Cancer Institute, and today he’s in charge of the medical oncology department at the Pitie-Salpetriere Hospital in Paris.
Khayat published a book called The Anti-Cancer Diet that lays out his plan to remain cancer-free. As radio station WBUR reports, Khayat follows five essential rules to keep the risk of developing cancer low:
–Don’t smoke. Ever.
–Eat lots of different kinds of food. Remember that “eating certain potentially carcinogenic products too much and too often can be dangerous.”
–Speaking of diet, try steaming your vegetables. Experiment with stewing too. Get creative in the kitchen.

–Stick to local, organic, seasonal, pesticide-free food.
–Stay physically active. Create a healthy balance between the calories you eat and the calories you burn.
If you follow all five of these rules to the letter, Khayat says, you’ll keep your cancer risk low.

4. The Ex-NASA Engineer

Dr. Matthew McCurdy seems too good to be true. The Austin, Texas–based radiation oncologist started his career as a NASA engineer. He helped John Glenn return to Earth safely after his 1998 trip to space.

After that, McCurdy went on to get an MD from Baylor College of Medicine—and a PhD in bioengineering for good measure.
Today, McCurdy says he treats his patients at the Austin Cancer Center as if they were family. “I join my patients in the fight against cancer and provide hope,” he said on the Austin Cancer Center website. “I’ve managed the cancer care of my own family, and I believe in treating each patient as a member of mine.”
McCurdy’s anti-cancer tip is simple: He eats a Mediterranean diet.

“Multiple studies, including a recent randomized trial published in JAMA [the Journal of the American Medical Association], suggest that the Mediterranean diet supplemented with extra-virgin olive oil can help prevent cancer,” he told Reader’s Digest.
“I try to follow this by eating a whole-foods plant-based diet that includes broccoli, turmeric, and garlic and limits refined sugar, refined carbohydrates, saturated animal fats, and toxic chemicals and pesticides.”

We’ll trust anyone who worked at NASA before becoming an award-winning oncologist.

5. The Artist

Dr. Diljeet K. Singh practices gynecologic oncology at a hospital in McLean, Virginia. When he’s not busy saving lives, though, he indulges in an artistic hobby.

“I paint several times a week, and I try to do it outdoors so I can spend some time in nature, which I also find stress-relieving,” Singh told Prevention magazine. Based on his own experience enjoying art, Singh suggests that his patients take pottery classes to keep their risk of cancer lower.
“It serves two purposes: It allows you to be creative, and it gives you a social outlet. One study in female breast cancer patients found that those who were the most creative had the most favorable prognoses. Other research shows that the more social support cancer patients have, the greater their chances of survival.

“Personally, I think the key to both is that they relieve stress, which causes cellular changes that increase cancer risk. My advice is to take time every day for something that allows you to express your creativity: journaling, cooking, gardening, decorating.”
Lots of oncologists warn their patients to watch stress and to find ways to live a more laid-back life. Dr. Amy Lee told Reader’s Digest that stress interferes with the immune system, which must “be in optimal condition to seek out and destroy cancer cells.”

Taken as a whole, this advice from leading oncologists suggests that we can best prevent cancer by living a happy, healthy life in the first place. Good things, the doctors say, lead to better.

“Boost Your Metabolism in 5 Steps!” “Don’t Let Your Metabolism Die With Your Workout.” “Burn, Baby, Burn What You Eat Faster!”
Do today’s hottest health and wellness headlines have you thinking that you need to be thinking (more) about your metabolism? Are you wondering what the heck metabolism actually is and why you need to be so concerned with it?

If your answer is yes, we’re here to help!
Your metabolism is the process by which your body converts what you eat and drink into energy. It’s a two-part operation—a catabolic reaction and an anabolic reaction. The catabolic reaction breaks your food down so it can be digested and absorbed. The anabolic reaction happens when these broken-down pieces are used to rebuild and sustain your body’s tissues.
When people talk about how fast your metabolism is, they’re actually referring to your basal metabolic rate (BMR), which is the sum of your body’s catabolic and anabolic reactions. Your BMR is basically in charge of breaking food down but is also responsible for other functions like breathing, circulating blood, adjusting hormone levels, and growing and repairing cells.

Your metabolism can be fast or slow and more often than not is related to your weight. If you have a high metabolism, you burn energy quickly and typically have a leaner body, whereas if your metabolism is slow, your body typically has a higher percentage of fat.
But what makes your metabolism high or low?
A lot of things affect your metabolism, from your body size (the bigger you are, the more you burn), how much muscle vs. fat you have (the more muscle you have, the faster you burn), whether you’re male or female (men burn more quickly than women), and your age (the younger you are, the more you burn).

And, other factors aside, some people are just born with faster metabolisms and others with slower metabolisms.
When you have a faster metabolism, you may maintain a leaner look more easily, be more energetic, and be able to eat more (and less healthful) food without noticing much change on the scale.
Before you curse your bestie whose metabolism appears to be through the roof, there are things you can do to speed up your metabolism if that’s what you’re after. Of course, you can’t control your age or sex, but here are six easy ways to increase your body’s ability to burn.

1. Hit the weights.

The number one thing you can do to boost your metabolism is to increase the amount of muscle that you have. At rest, a pound of muscle burns about 10 calories a day, whereas fat burns two to three calories per pound, per day.

When you’re performing a hard workout, muscle burns even more, but unfortunately, as you age, the amount of muscle you have decreases every decade.
This is the main reason that your metabolism diminishes with age. The way to keep your muscle from diminishing—and your metabolism lifted—is to build that muscle back up.

How do you accomplish this? The best way is to strength train. Hitting the gym and opting to work with weights two to three days a week is the most effective and efficient way to build muscle.

2. Try HIIT training.

High-intensity interval training, also known as HIIT, is a type of cardiovascular exercise distinguished by its alternating rounds of intense exercise followed by recovery periods. For example, you run as fast as you can for 30 seconds, and then rest for 60 seconds. This gets repeated a set number of times, inspiring a complete workout.

HIIT not only burns a huge number of calories during its exercise portions, but it also keeps your metabolism going even after you’re done. This is due to something known as excess post-exercise oxygen consumption, or EPOC.
After an intense exercise session, oxygen consumption (which burns a lot of calories) stays high as your cells work to repair and restore your body. Regular cardio workouts can’t do this.
An article published in the Journal of Sports Sciences notes that exercise-intensity studies indicate higher EPOC values with HIIT as compared with low- to moderate-intensity, steady-paced cardiovascular training. And a study conducted at the University of Guelph in Canada showed that fat burning was significantly higher after as little as six weeks of interval training.

Try adding a few HIIT intervals to your cardio twice a week. Use a 1:2 workout to rest schedule. For example, exert yourself as hard as you can for 30 seconds, then rest for twice as long (60 seconds). Perform this for 5 to 10 intervals or however many you can tolerate.
(And try our at-home HIIT videos!)

3. Don’t starve yourself.

Eat less, and your body will burn more calories and be thinner, right? Not exactly—it’s a bit more complicated than that.

You see, your body is pretty smart, and it looks out for your well being. So if you eat too little (and not often enough), your body may suspect that it’s going to starve. In an effort to protect itself, it attempts to conserve energy and hold on to the calories you have consumed by slowing your metabolism.
Of course, this is exactly the opposite of what you’re trying to achieve. So how do you speed your metabolism up while still being mindful of calorie consumption? The answer is to give your body just enough of what it needs to feel safe and secure by eating small meals (aka grazing) throughout the day.

When you eat smaller meals as opposed to larger, heavier meals, your burning potential (along with your energy) is boosted throughout the day.

4. Keep a balance.

As you’re grazing, you want to pay attention to what you’re grazing on. Protein and fiber not only help keep your blood sugar stable, they require more energy to digest than refined carbs. A whole lot more!

Studies show that meals that have the same total caloric content but are composed of different ingredients are digested totally differently. In other words, a calorie is not just a calorie.
Clean, whole-food meals that include a lot of protein and fiber are digested much more slowly than meals of processed, simple carbohydrates. Almost twice as slowly, in fact.

What does this mean for you? Try to incorporate some type of protein and fiber into every meal you eat in order to keep your metabolism kicking.

5. Hydrate!

You need water in your body to fuel its everyday processes. And, surprise! Metabolism is one of those water-dependent processes.
If you don’t drink enough water, your body suffers, and your metabolism slows to compensate. Be sure to drink plenty of pure water—not coffee, tea, soda, or even juice—to keep your body well hydrated.

As a side note, it may be helpful for your metabolism to make sure the water you drink is cold. German scientists found that you can boost your burning up to 50 calories more a day by drinking cold, as opposed to warm, water. They believe that the added boost occurs when the body uses energy to warm the water up during digestion.

6. Get to sleep.

It may seem counterintuitive, but in order for your body to burn calories, it needs proper rest. According to University of Chicago researchers, 100 percent of the participants in a recent study of the impact of sleep deprivation on fat cells were unable to tolerate the metabolic consequences of sleep deprivation.

In fact, after just four days of sleep deprivation, the body’s ability to properly use insulin became disrupted.
Shockingly, the insulin sensitivity of participants’ fat cells dropped by more than 30 percent, a difference akin to the disparity between lean and obese participants, or non-diabetic and diabetic individuals prior to sleep deprivation.

When your insulin is disrupted, your metabolism goes haywire and fat ends up getting stored more often—and in all of the wrong places.
So, try to aim for seven or more hours of sleep per night.

What so-called health advice do you follow daily that is actually hocus-pocus?

Here are the top eight most common medical myths that you can officially ignore.

1. You lose most of your body heat through your head.

“Wear a hat—you’ll catch a cold!” says your mother as you sprint out of the house. The myth that heat is lost from the head more than any other part of the body is

. The study followed and x-rayed patients over a five-year period, separating those whose scans confirmed the presence of arthritis into one group and those without arthritis into another.

Surprisingly, it turned out that participants who reported no knuckle-cracking behavior had slightly higher rates of arthritis (18.1 percent versus 21.5 percent) than those who admitted to cracking their knuckles.

Arthritis can be caused by normal wear and tear of the joints, an infection or injury, or an autoimmune disorder. But anxiety-ridden knuckle-crackers can rest easy knowing that their nervous habit is no more dangerous to their health than nail biting or foot tapping.

6. Sitting too close to the TV ruins your eyesight.

When television sets were first introduced, some color models emitted high amounts of radiation that could cause eye damage. This led experts to recommend that adults and children sit as far away as possible from screens. 

However, TV and computer monitor safety has been regulated since the ’60s.

So, even though sitting ridiculously close to a screen makes your eyes work harder, it won’t do any permanent damage to them.

Same goes for reading or doing work in the dark. The lack of light might result in eyestrain, but overall, ophthalmologists agree that it’s genetics and age that cause your eyesight to go, not your late-night reading habit.

7. Eating at night makes you fat.

Feeling guilty about your late-night snacking habit? Let us put your mind at ease! Studies show that it doesn’t matter what time of day that you eat as long as you maintain the appropriate calories eaten to calories burned ratio.

The secret of weight gain and weight loss lies in simple mathematics —you must burn as many calories as you eat in order to stay the same weight. If you eat more and exercise less, you’ll gain weight.

Conversely, if you eat less and exercise more, you’ll lose weight.

It doesn’t matter what time you eat your meals, although studies do show that those who snack at night, have a tendency to mindlessly eat with disregard for serving size. This may cause them to eat more than they realize. If you’re a nighttime snacker, keep your calories in check by pouring a serving size of your late-night meal and stowing the package away.

8. Sugar makes kids hyperactive.

Bad news for parents! Your child’s restless, unruly behavior can no longer be blamed on their high-sugar snacks.

Research studying how children reacted to diets containing different amounts of sugar found that no amount of sugar (artificial or natural) affected their behavior—not even in participants diagnosed with attention deficit–hyperactivity disorder.

Where a noticeable response did occur was in the parents. 

When told that their children were given sugar (even if they hadn’t been), parents automatically believed their children were acting differently even though they were not.

If personal trainers had a dollar for every time a woman came into the gym saying she doesn’t want to lift weights because she’s afraid of getting bodybuilder muscles, none of them would have to get up at 4 a.m. to support themselves anymore.

The theory that working with dumbbells causes women to make incredible gains in muscle mass, giving them a “powerlifter look,” is a myth and does a disservice to women.

Weight training can do great things for the body. It strengthens bones, increases metabolism, and, yes, builds muscle.

But without the assistance of supplements, women are incapable of getting as big as male bodybuilders, because they don’t have the same testosterone coursing through their veins.

If this comes as a surprise to you, it’s in your best interest to consider these fitness myths to spare yourself from wasting any time—or worse, hurting your body.

Myth #1: The best time to work out is first thing in the morning.

We think a morning person originated this myth! In truth, there aren’t any studies to corroborate the idea that one time of the day is better than another for pursuing physical health and success.

Since consistency is key to exercise adherence, the best time of the day to work out is whatever time of day you’re actually going to do it.

Everyone has habits and patterns, and by trial and error, you’ll be able to figure out when you most enjoy working out and are best able to fit it in.

As a side note, studies have shown that people who work out in the morning tend to feel more energized and alert throughout the day.

Myth #2: Exercise is the best way to lose weight.

Although exercise can burn calories, increase your metabolism, and make your body look more toned and healthy, exercising alone isn’t the best way to lose weight. When you’re looking to make a significant change on the scale, you can’t assume that you can eat whatever you want and just “work it off” later.

Studies have shown that it’s not lack of exercise that causes people to be overweight; it’s unhealthy dietary habits. The first step toward reaching your weight loss goals is adhering to positive dietary change. Only after you’ve established a healthy diet can you expect exercise to boost your weight loss potential.

Some research does show that when exercise and diet are combined, people lose weight much faster than by dieting alone, and they keep it off more consistently. Still, research widely points to diet playing a much bigger role in weight loss than exercise does.

Myth #3: Sit-ups are the best exercise for your abs.

Ah, the dreaded sit-up—hated by every grade-schooler who was made to do as many as possible in a minute for the Presidential Fitness Test. Unfortunately, as hard as sit-ups may be, they don’t actually do a whole lot for your core other than leave it in pain.

Sit-ups are hard on your back and hip flexors, can pull on your lower back, and only target a few muscle groups in an isolated manner.

We know your high school gym teacher (and the president) thought sit-ups were the bomb, but there are other safer and more effective exercises that target your abs.

One in particular is the plank. This core winner engages a balanced set of muscles located around the front, back, and sides of your body and gives you a chance to stretch your back (or, more technically speaking, your posterior muscles).

Myth #4: Sports drinks are the best way to rehydrate after a workout.

We know you want this one to be true (because that blue electrolyte powder is just so tasty), but unfortunately, most sports drinks are filled with sugar and preservatives that don’t do much to refuel you—unless you’ve engaged in a seriously intense workout or been exercising for more than an hour, that is.

In short, refueling after a quick jog around the neighborhood or a pickup game of basketball requires nothing more than a nice tall glass of water.

Now, if you’ve committed yourself to the town’s 10k and are sweating like a wrestler in a rubber suit, experts say you’ve got to replace your electrolytes and refuel properly.

New studies show that the best way to do this is not just with carbs and electrolytes, but with a little protein in the mix as well.

A study conducted in Spain with 24 elite cyclists showed that after 60 minutes of physical activity, beverages that contained protein and carbohydrates were absorbed better and refueled the athletes more efficiently than carb–electrolyte combos alone.

So if you’re on your way to do a half marathon, pick up a sports drink that’s got some protein in it for after the race.

Myth #5: It takes two weeks to get out of shape.

If it takes forever to get in shape, it should take just as long to get out of shape, right?

Unfortunately, no.

The two-week rule that floats around some gyms and keeps not-so-motivated exercisers feeling confident their gains won’t go to waste if they ditch out for 14 days is, for the most part, wishful thinking.

On the whole, the old “use it or lose it” adage is accurate when it comes to exercise and the body.

A study of runners, rowers, and power athletes found that overall muscular strength can be maintained for as long as a month after an athlete stops their training activities but that their sport-specific skills went into decline around the two-week mark.

More specifically, slow-twitch muscle fibers in runners and fast-twitch fibers in powerlifters declined after 14 days.

And what about cardio? Well, those gains don’t fare as well when discipline goes by the wayside. Another study found that after just 12 days of inactivity, VO2 max (the maximum amount of oxygen the body can use) dropped by 7 percent, and endurance-associated enzymes in the blood decreased by 50 percent.

The moral of the story? Even though periodic rest is good for the body (and the soul), you may not want go more than a week without doing some sort of cardio, and you’ll want to get back to your strength training within a two-week timeframe.

Myth #6: Weightlifting turns fat into muscle.

“Transform your fat into muscle!” promises another fad fitness infomercial. As real (and exciting) as the actors make it sound, the reality is that you can’t turn fat into muscle.

Fat-to-muscle magic is impossible, because fat and muscle are two different types of tissues.

Fatty tissue is found between muscles and around internal organs like the heart and liver, whereas muscle tissue is found throughout the body.

Strength training builds the muscle that surrounds fat, but it doesn’t replace it. Muscle does, however, in an indirect way, use burned fat as energy to grow.

This is where the myth may have come from in the first place.

Diet and exercise create opportunities for fat to be broken down into fatty acids and glycerol, which are absorbed into your bloodstream then used by your muscles for energy.

Kristin McEwen knows a thing or two about gym etiquette.
She’s vice-president of YMCA of Metro Atlanta (Georgia), and she’s seen it all. People walk into the gym in skimpy outfits, cell phones blaring. They forget to change their stinky old workout clothes. Worst of all, McEwen told CNN, they sweat all over the machines—and don’t lift a finger to clean the equipment.

“We’ll have people who come in, and they will sweat profusely, and they will leave puddles around the equipment,” McEwen said. Anyone would agree with her final comment on the situation.
“It’s gross,” she said.
Surely, no one should have to deal with rude and clueless people while working out. Even if the rules of the gym remain unspoken, most people know them instinctively.
So don’t be “that person.” You know the one. They don’t re-rack their weights, or they engage in a full-on screaming phone conversation while walking on the treadmill at 0.01 mph. Use this list to brush up on rules for the gym so you can help ensure working out is just a little more tolerable for yourself and everyone else.

1. Do not disturb.

When someone has headphones on, leave them alone. This may seem obvious, but some people haven’t figured it out, at least not in our experience. People use music or podcasts to help them focus and get in the zone for their workout, and when another person insists on attempting a conversation, it’s terribly distracting.

2. Get swol, not sick.

Infections spread easily in the public gym setting. It’s incredibly important to wash your hands before using any equipment. 

Also, wipe the machines down as soon as you’re finished. If you’re worried about the cleanliness of your gym, wipe machines down before you use them too and let an employee know about any…issues.

3. Mirror, Mirror on the Wall

The squat rack mirror is not the place to touch up your makeup, pose for multiple selfies, or perfect your flex.

The mirrors placed around a gym are meant to check form and for safety. They aren’t there for you to check yourself out.

4. Where did the weights go?

Don’t make people search the entire gym for weights or barbells. The gym is a public place, and everyone has the right to easily locate and use the equipment. When bars or weights don’t end up back their rightful places, it isn’t fair to others.

5. Clean up after yourself.

Crushing a 300-pound squat set is impressive, but you aren’t finished after the last rep is completed. Whenever you add weight to any of the equipment, you must remove it when you’re finished. Bars that do not get cleared will start to warp over time, eventually rendering them unusable. Plus, it’s common courtesy. If you can put 300 pounds on the bar, you can take it off.

6. Leave the cool moves on the dance floor.

Unless you’re doing serious interval training, there’s no reason to bust out any moves on the treadmill. You’re risking serious injury when you crank the speed up and try to hop on and off.

Leave those kinds of stunts to the professionals.

7. Contain yourself.

Bringing a towel, a water bottle, and your phone into the gym is perfectly acceptable—just don’t leave these items strewn around. It’s a total faux pas to save machines with personal items. Plus, cluttering up a space other people are using isn’t cool.

8. Hygiene is important.

There’s no way around getting sweaty during a good workout. However, it’s important to make sure your hygiene is on point before stepping foot in the gym. Be sure to wash your workout clothes frequently and, please, wear deodorant!

Also, don’t forget McEwen’s sweat-puddle horror story. Pack a towel and use it to sop up the puddles of sweat that prove your workout is working.

People have been getting tattoos for millennia, but recent studies show some unexpected potential side effects of this permanent art form. As it turns out, a lot goes on in our bodies when we get tatted up.

Thanks to modern science, however, we’re better able to understand how our bodies live with ink—and how that ink can affect us when we exercise.

Yes, really. Stay with us.

First, it’s important to understand what happens when you get a tattoo.

There’s no way around it: Getting a tattoo hurts. What else can you expect from something that involves needles being punched into your skin over and over?

But the effects of a tattoo don’t disappear with the pain. A tattoo is forever (more or less), and surprisingly enough, we have our immune system to thank for that.

Ink from a tattoo gun punches through the epidermis (the top layer of the skin) to deposit into the dermis (the middle layer). The dermis consists of a gelatinous substance filled with blood vessels, sweat glands, and nerves. When the needle from a tattoo gun penetrates the skin, it technically creates a wound, so our body’s immune system reacts accordingly.

Cells called macrophages rush to the puncture site to begin “cleaning up” loose ink particles by removing them from the area. But some macrophages don’t make it out of the dermis and become trapped.

Dye that isn’t removed by the macrophages is soaked up by dermal cells called fibroblasts. Ink that is trapped in macrophages and fibroblasts becomes permanently suspended in the dermis, and as a result, it’s visible through the skin.

What happens next?

Our bodies don’t stop reacting to the ink after the initial healing process. In fact, the ink becomes something of a permanent intruder, as the ink-filled macrophages are regularly replaced by a younger version. That could potentially affect the way our sweat glands function, according to a new study.

Maurie Luetkemeier, professor of integrative physiology and health science at Alma College, conducted research to see exactly how tattoos may interact with our skin’s physiology. Luetkemeier and his researchers used 10 healthy men who all have tattoos on one side of their upper bodies. The age of the tattoos varied, but the subjects had an equal amount of un-inked and inked skin.

Next, researchers placed small patches with a sweat-inducing chemical on both tattooed and un-tattooed skin for 20 minutes. Scientists then removed, swabbed, and weighed the patches.

The tattooed skin produced half as much sweat as the untattooed skin but contained twice as much sodium. These findings suggest tattoos can permanently alter the skin, and Luetkemeier speculates the lingering ink-filled macrophages could be changing the chemical environment of the skin. Another possible explanation: The ink particles could be slightly blocking the sweat glands.

The good news is that the blockage isn’t serious enough to cause overheating.

Tattoos also have a few benefits.

The tattoo process is painful, but the rush is pretty powerful. Almost every tattooed person will reference the emotional boost they feel after getting the work done. So could there be a link between tattoos and self esteem?

A small tattoo-related study was conducted in the UK to find out if there is any connection between tattoos and positive body image. The 82 subjects were asked to rate their physical anxiety and body appreciation levels before, immediately following, and three weeks after getting their first tattoo.

The results showed that both men and women had lower anxiety and higher body appreciation and self-esteem immediately after getting the tattoo. It’s interesting to note, however, that men’s positivity kept increasing, whereas women reported higher levels of physical anxiety in the three weeks following.

As the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) notes, body ink carries some dangers, but ultimately, it’s a personal decision. In any case, the health benefits and drawbacks of tattoos certainly warrant consideration, particularly if you’re planning a piece.

 
You are never alone.
Everywhere you go, you carry legions of microbes around with you. Your gut is teeming with more than 100 trillion microscopic organisms. The latest research suggests that these ever-present companions engage in an ongoing chemical conversation with your brain that can have intense effects on your emotional life.

Just ask Emeran Mayer, a gastroenterologist and director of the Oppenheimer Family Center for Neurobiology of Stress at UCLA. Mayer has been writing about the mind–gut connection for decades, and he recently wrote a book with a title that will surprise exactly no one familiar with his work. It’s called The Mind-Gut Connection: How the Hidden Conversation Within Our Bodies Impacts Our Mood, Our Choices, and Our Overall Health.
“The gut and the brain are closely linked through bidirectional signaling pathways that include nerves, hormones, and inflammatory molecules,” Mayer writes.
Rich sensory information generated in the gut reaches the brain (gut sensations), and the brain sends signals back to the gut to adjust its function (gut reactions). The close interactions of these pathways play a crucial role in the generation of emotions and in optimal gut function. The two are intricately linked.

If you’ve ever felt a rumble in the pit of your stomach while being rejected by a crush; if you’ve felt a warm glow in your belly while cuddling with a loved one; if your stomach has ever clenched up during a moment of unabashed rage—then you won’t need much convincing to accept Mayer’s point.

And the research uncovering this constant interplay between gut and mind keeps pouring in.

A recent study in the journal Psychosomatic Medicine uncovered a clear connection between the gut microbiome and regions of the brain that are associated with mood and emotion. Research like this has the potential to reframe questions of identity and even the definition of “individuality” itself, and it all starts with poop. Yes, poop.

Researchers began their study by collecting fecal samples from 40 healthy women. They sent the samples off to be tested. They weren’t just being gross; fecal samples are the best way to get a snapshot of an individual’s gut biome, because they contain a lot of the little critters that live in the digestive system.
Meanwhile, the researchers hooked the women up to a functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) machine to watch their brains flash as they reacted to a series of images that were intended to spark deep feeling.

Some of the images were designed to make viewers unhappy, whereas others were more positive. They tracked each woman’s brain behavior when she looked at these images and then compared that data to the microbial zoo in the subject’s gut.
There were two particular groups of microbes that the researchers noticed immediately. Some of the women had more Bacteroides, while others were full of thriving Prevotella populations. When a Prevotella-heavy woman looked at an unhappy image, the parts of her brain associated with processing senses, emotions, and attention lit up. Her hippocampus, which tends to regulate extreme emotional reactions, remained comparatively dim.

Unsurprisingly, then, these women had much stronger negative reactions when shown the negative pictures.

Their counterparts with more Bacteroides in their guts had more active hippocampi and were able to resist getting sucked down into the doldrums just from looking at a sad picture.

Who knows if this means what it seems to mean. This study only showed correlation between gut microbiome contents and emotional response. It will take lots more science before we can assume that Prevotella makes people depressed.
Still, this whole line of research sort of explains why Mayer calls the gut “the little brain” in his book. Gut microbes really do appear to interact with the “big brain” in impactful ways.
“There are receptors throughout our bodies that respond to signals from the microbes or the metabolites they produce,” Mayer said in an interview with the Los Angeles Times.
For example, certain microbes can influence the production of the serotonin molecule, which plays a role in appetite regulation, food intake, well-being, and sleep. That gives the microbes a tremendous ability to influence overall health states.

Also, some microbe signals can activate the vagus nerve endings in the gut, which are like an information highway to the brain. Many of these effects are seen in animal studies. Researchers manipulated the microbes in the guts of mice and saw different behaviors. But these same behaviors were abolished when they cut the vagus nerve.
We have a long way to go before we start to understand the complex relationship between human emotions and the gut microbiome. But we’ve also come a long way from the early view of bacteria as simply “the enemy.”
Science writer Ed Yong explains the growing conception of microbes as natural elements of the human body in his aptly titled book I Contain Multitudes: The Microbes Within Us and a Grander View of Life.

“[We] are continuously built and reshaped by the bacteria inside us,” Yong writes. It’s a symbiotic relationship that stretches back to the very beginning of humanity, and beyond, back into our evolutionary past. Humans and the microbes that live within them evolved together.
Yong underscores this strange fact when he questions the title of his own book.
“Perhaps it is less that I contain multitudes and more that I am multitudes,” he writes.
As we learn more about how the lifeforms that we carry affect the deepest parts of our lives—how they are, in a very real way, part of what we refer to when we say “us”—it seems pretty likely that new frontiers of medicine will open up.

Maybe we’ll even discover new conceptions of selfhood. After all, our microbial companions don’t just live inside our bodies. We breathe them out in a constant cloud, and who’s to say that doesn’t thin the barrier between self and other? Or maybe even dissolve it completely?

In 2013, a 35-year-old pregnant woman walked into a St. Louis hospital and told her doctor she was unusually weak and dizzy.

These symptoms began a month before, and they got worse and worse. By the time the woman went to the hospital, she was 37 weeks pregnant.

But at the hospital, the woman’s troubles only increased. Her heart rate, already irregular, got faster and faster. Doctors admitted her to the intensive care unit and started her on an intravenous drip full of fluids and electrolytes; the woman’s potassium levels were dangerously low.
Potassium is an important electrolyte that’s essential for the normal function of the brain, nerves, and muscles. Low potassium, or hypokalemia, can cause a number of problems, including weakness, cramping, fatigue, constipation, and, in serious cases, heart problems.
The woman’s situation was getting more serious by the hour, as detailed in a case study published in the medical journal Obstetrics & Gynecology. Doctors not only had to figure out what was causing the woman’s symptoms, they had to make sure to save the baby.

It soon became clear that the woman’s heart muscle was weakened, a condition known as peripartum cardiomyopathy. This disorder only occurs in about 1,000 to 1,300 women in the U.S. every year, and no one knows what causes it.

There was no question that the woman had peripartum cardiomyopathy, but that still didn’t explain her terribly low levels of potassium.

Her health care team gave her medications to treat the heart condition and turned their attention to the infant. They induced the woman and she gave birth to a healthy son. He weighed 5 pounds, 4 ounces, and, thankfully, did not appear to have suffered from his mother’s health scare.

Two days later, she provided the clue that explained her entire condition. She had been eating huge amounts of baking soda for years, she explained. This craving proved to be a terrible danger to the woman and her child.
“Eating large amounts of baking soda (which contains sodium bicarbonate) can lead to severe electrolyte disturbances, muscle breakdown and ultimately heart failure or cardiomyopathy,” Miami-based TopLine OBGYN Sarah Bedell, MD, tells HealthyWay.
At first, the sick woman’s box-a-day habit was a self-administered treatment for hiccups, but when she got pregnant, it became a craving.
Anyone who’s ever been pregnant understands that you end up craving some weird foods, but this woman’s pregnancy craving put her life—and the life of her baby—in danger.

Fortunately, once she quit eating baking soda, her potassium levels evened out, and she got healthy enough to go home with her brand new baby boy.
Here’s the thing, though: This woman’s case was not the first of its kind. The literature shows at least two similar cases, in which pregnant women crave baking soda, eventually eating so much of it that they develop health problems.

The condition is called pica, and it’s often associated with pregnancy.

Not everyone who develops pica craves baking soda exclusively. People with pica end up with all sorts of strange cravings for non-food substances.

In many cases, cravings can be difficult to overcome.

“Pica is defined as the persistent eating of non-nutritious substances that are typically not considered food for at least one month,” says Bedell. “Examples of substances commonly consumed with this condition include ice, starch, earth, chalk, charcoal, toilet paper, baby powder and coffee grounds.”

Incidence rates of pica in the United States are between 14 and 44 percent, although that includes every form of the disorder, not just pregnancy-related pica. One study of 128 pregnant women found that 38 percent of the participants developed pica before giving birth.
Pica cravings occur in fewer than 25 to 30 percent of pregnant women, reports the American Pregnancy Association. But one study of 128 pregnant women found that 38 percent of the participants developed pica before giving birth.
Unfortunately, though, many doctors assume that only a fraction of their patients with pica are stepping forward for treatment.
“Compulsive eating, especially of inedible objects, can be a source of considerable embarrassment or ridicule,” points out a chapter in the medical textbook Clinical Methods: The History, Physical, and Laboratory Examinations. “Hence, only a few patients come to the physician complaining of their unusual eating habit.”

There’s reason to believe the practice may be more widespread than the statistics show. That’s just another reason why, if you develop pica, you shouldn’t feel ashamed about it. But what, exactly, could lead to a craving for dirt or ashes? As the American Pregnancy Association says, “Don’t panic. It happens and is not abnormal.”

Although researchers have yet to pinpoint the cause of pica, most associate it with a little-known vitamin or mineral shortage.

Unfortunately, this condition is part of the mystery of human health, and there isn’t one specific explanation that can tell the whole story.
“Eating clay or soil, which contain several minerals, could provide a way for the body to replenish low levels of these nutrients,” says Bedell. “This theory is imperfect, however, as several consumed substances (ice, toilet paper, etc) have minimal or no nutritional value.”

One article in the Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics associates pica with an iron deficiency (also known as anemia). That’s something Bedell has seen in her own practice.
Bedell explains that “pica is often associated with anemia, which results from low blood counts or low iron stores in the body. This makes pregnant patients particularly susceptible, as anemia is commonly seen in pregnancy. Low levels of zinc have also been associated with pica.”
According to Clinical Methods, even slight iron deficiencies, not severe enough to earn the label “anemia,” have been associated with pica.
“In fact,” the book reports, “A pica may be detected in as many as 50 percent of all persons with iron deficiency.”

Pica in pregnancy, as well as cravings in general, are common.

Whether patients lack iron, zinc, or some other mineral—and this probably goes without saying—there are far healthier ways to get enough vitamins and minerals than eating dirt.
In fact, depending on the severity of the pica, sufferers like the woman in the above story can easily place their health at risk. For pregnant women with pica, those health risks also apply to their unborn child.
The American Pregnancy Association warns that “eating non-food substances is potentially harmful to both you and your baby. Eating non-food substances may interfere with the nutrient absorption of healthy food substances and actually cause a deficiency. Pica cravings are also a concern because non-food items may contain toxic or parasitic ingredients.”

However, if you do find yourself giving into odd cravings for dirt or soap while pregnant, don’t think that you’ve completely lost your mind. Remember, that study found a nearly 40 percent rate of pica among pregnant women. It’s not good for you, but you aren’t alone.
“Patients should be reassured that pica in pregnancy, as well as cravings in general, are common,” Bedell reminds us. She continues, “Treatment should focus on safety. Treating possible underlying causes, such as anemia, with iron should be attempted, but may not always stop cravings. Of course, eating dangerous materials should be stopped immediately.”
That’s not always as easy as it seems, though, Bedell explains.
“In many cases, cravings can be difficult to overcome,” she says.

So if you are pregnant and you find yourself craving dirt…

Listen to the American Pregnancy Association when they say: “Don’t panic. It happens and is not abnormal.”

Most women who experience pica for a short period of time do not experience any adverse effects.

So what should you do if you suspect you have pica while you’re pregnant? “If you think you are suffering from pica you should discuss this with your OBGYN as soon as possible, so it can be discussed if what you are consuming is harmful,” Bedell says.

She also recommends contacting “your local Poison Control Center if you think you have consumed something that poses immediate danger.”
A healthcare professional can walk you through the risks of these strange cravings. For many women, that alone is enough to help them beat the temptation to grab a big bite of dirt.
You can also monitor your iron levels and make sure you get enough vitamins and minerals. Introduce dark, leafy greens and lots of beans in your diet. Even white rice supplies a lot of iron. Whatever iron-rich food you prefer, be sure to eat lots of it. Sufficient iron might help to prevent pica from developing in the first place.
You can also provide yourself with alternatives to giving into your cravings. Try carrying sugar-free gum everywhere you go. If you feel a craving coming on, start chewing your gum until the temptation passes.

“Patients should try to substitute what they are eating with something that has similar qualities but is less harmful. For example, women who crave rubber can try chewing gum instead, and those who crave soil or clay can substitute oatmeal,” says Bedell.
Finally, the American Pregnancy Association recommends telling a friend what you’re going through. That friend can “help you avoid non-food items,” according to the APA website.
“In most circumstances, pica is not dangerous. Most women who experience pica for a short period of time do not experience any adverse effects. However, depending on the type and amount of substance being consumed, pica can lead to serious health consequences,” says Bedell. “Poor outcomes are usually seen if repeated consumption occurs over time.”
Whatever you do, don’t start eating boxes and boxes of baking soda every day. We’ve seen where that path leads, and it is frightening.