How To Deal With Problems Associated With Getting Older

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Unfortunately, it is inevitable that you will get older. There will always be issues associated with this and it is up to you how you tackle them. You are far more at risk of developing health related problems such as arthritis and dementia when you are over the age of 60. Here is a list of ailments you may find yourself worrying about and how to overcome them.

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Mental Health

This is vital to keep watch over, when you get to a certain age you are far more at risk of developing cognitive problems such as memory loss associated with dementia or Alzeihmers. It is thought that once you stop keeping your brain busy and active it simply starts to decline. Previously your brain would have been kept active through work or going out with friends. Once you get to retirement age this happens less often. You need to make a conscious effort to keep your brain healthy, this can be done through word and number puzzles such as sudoku and crosswords. 

Diet & Exercise

As you get older you may find it heartbreaking that you can’t eat all the wonderful things you could before. Once you are in your prime your body starts to need less calories, you may find that you need to eat little and often rather than three meals a day. This is due to your metabolism slowing right down, this usually happens around the age of 50. If you continue to eat as you did before you may find that you are putting on more weight around your middle, this is known as middle-aged spread but it can happen in old-age as well. 

You should also be aiming to complete at least 30/45 minutes of exercise each day to keep away any weight-related conditions such as diabetes, heart disease, and strokes. Exercise should be gentle and not too strenuous on your joints. Swimming and yoga are great examples of this. 

Physical Health 

You may notice your physical health taking a turn for the worse as soon as you reach the age of 40, it doesn’t get much better. You might find that your joints are getting stiffer and it takes you that bit longer to get out of bed each morning. You need to be aware of various physical health complaints when you get older as they can be a sign of something more serious. One thing that will be slightly more noticeable is your need to pee more often. As you age your bladder and the muscles you use to hold your wee get weaker, this means you are far more susceptible to incontinence. This is nothing to be embarrassed about and it affects a high percentage of the older population. There are ways you can manage this, incontinence briefs and pads for example. There are more serious cases where you could consider surgery. 

We hope you found this article helpful and it gives you some top tips on how to deal with common ailments you may struggle with when you reach a certain age. Remember, to always consult your doctor if you are worried. 

How to Focus on Improving Your Health in the New Year

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The new year is often when most people set resolutions and vow to improve their lives over the coming twelve months. Many of these resolutions involve losing weight or earning more money. But aside from improving their appearance or their bank balance, there is one meaningful resolution that is well worth making this new year. Focusing on improving your health in 2022 is a new year’s resolution that will make a significant difference in your life. Here are some of the ways you can focus on improving your health in the coming year and make some really positive changes in your life:

Identify Your Goals

It is hard to reach your goals if you are not entirely sure what you want to achieve. Deciding on specific areas of your health you hope to improve will help make it easier to focus on achieving this. Simply saying you want to get healthy can make it hard to measure your progress and challenging to see measurable results. But, setting specific goals such as exercising three times a week or breaking free from an addictive habit will ensure you have something clear to aim for, which will help you to stay on track.

Understand What’s Holding You Back

Often new year’s resolutions are goals people want to achieve throughout the year but keep delaying. Thinking about why you have been holding back on your resolutions is an excellent way to break through the barriers preventing you from taking action. Once you have identified what is preventing you from reaching your goals, you can establish methods to overcome these barriers. When you know what has been holding you back in the past, you should find it easier to commit to successfully reaching your goals.

Make a Plan

After deciding what you hope to achieve from your resolution and identifying the barriers holding you back, it is time to begin making plans. With a clear plan, you can work towards your goals, making steady progress along the way. Thinking about the practical methods you can use to achieve your goals will provide you with a road map to get started and guide you toward achieving them. Sometimes, getting started on your journey towards achieving a goal is the hardest part. So, putting an action plan in place should help you to start and then continue onwards towards realizing your goal. Maybe you plan to beat an addiction, so taking a look at rehablist.org is a great starting point when making your plan, or perhaps you want to take a physical exam at your doctor’s office and make your health plans based on this. Whatever your situation, making a plan with a clear starting point is valuable. 

Seek Support

Trying to commit to something as important as improving your health can be challenging, so it is helpful to seek support. Finding the proper help will make it so much easier for you to commit to focusing on your health in the new year and beyond.

How to Make 2022 Your Best Year Yet

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There are many typical starts to a new year which can often end in disappointment. We set goals for ourselves which are often quite unrealistic. Usually, these new commitments and promises we make to ourselves are forgotten or abandoned by the time February rolls around. Setting new year aspirations also come with a lot of pressure, often taking away from our lives rather than adding them. This post will give you some food for thought on how to really make the most of the new year and the fresh energy it brings to make lasting changes that will continue for years to come. 

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1. Remove any Pressure. 

The first tip is to remove any pressure from yourself going into the new year. This means getting rid of any preconceived notions you may have of the year to come. Allow yourself to have some reasonable goals but get rid of any pressure you are putting on yourself to fulfil all of them in the first month of the year. So often, bringing in new goals and building the foundations for these to happen takes longer than a month. Putting pressure on ourselves to fulfil them within this limited timeframe can be more damaging as the disappointment leads you to abandon them.

2. Get Your Ducks in a Row. 

It will be impossible to start the new year off right without making sure you have everything you can have in place to start. This means properly thinking through your goals for the year. What do you need for these goals? What steps do you need to take? For example, if you want to start a successful blog, think through what tools you need to start. How many times a week will you need to post? What kind of audience do you want? It may be worth considering investing in SEO to get initial traffic. This is the kind of thought process you need to go through for your new goals to stick. Although it may appear daunting writing all the steps you need to go through, by splitting the larger goal into smaller steps, the plan will eventually seem easier to tackle. It can be worth trying to tackle some admin in the Twixmas period as it is often quieter, allowing you the time to finish things you have been putting off. 

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3. Avoid Choosing the Same Goals You Choose Every Year.

This is an essential step as it avoids feelings of failure already creeping into your goal-setting. A common goal individuals choose is to lose weight or get in shape. If this is something you have said to yourself before, try quantifying this goal. Do you want to lose ten pounds? Do you want to be able to run a marathon? This can give you an easier place to start as you come into the new year, narrowing the focus and making it easier to start. 

4. Be kind to yourself. 

Don't be too harsh on yourself if you go off track in the new year. If your goal was to make some home improvements, for example, and you have hit a couple of roadblocks, there is no reason to rush. Take a minute, and don't let the disappointment discourage you. Figure out what went wrong, and then attack again. But if you need to rest and recover, that's fine too. The most important thing is to keep trying and pushing yourself despite hitting roadblocks. 

5. Get Support

Another way to stay kind to yourself is to make sure you have got a great support system behind you. Cut ties with people that consistently make you feel bad about yourself. This can include feeling drained, jealous, or small. The people and environment you surround yourself with are paramount when feeling better. Don't be afraid to cut people off, even if you think they haven't done anything to upset you specifically. What you feel around them will tell you whether you need them. You should ensure that the people you are left with uplift you, and for anybody, you can't cut off, maybe because you live with them or work with them, try to distance yourself as much as possible. Above all, don't be afraid to put yourself first in the new year.

Try to follow these tips as much as possible. If you do, you should be well to feel your best in 2022, and making your goals actually happen.

Christmas On A Budget: Tips For A Fun And Affordable Holiday

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Giving gifts during the holidays can be stressful, both mentally and financially. I've compiled a list of ideas for spending less money on Christmas this year.

As you get older, your attitude toward the holiday’s shifts. Even though your feelings of happiness and friendliness should remain, your attitude toward gifts should shift.

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It goes from being something you are looking forward to being something you dread doing.

Maybe not, but when you're expected to give as much as you receive, gift-giving takes on a whole new meaning. When you're working with a limited budget, spending a large sum of money on a large number of people can feel like an imposition. It should come as no surprise that so many Americans end the year with credit card debt, unable to pay it off before the next holiday season rolls around.

Christmas shopping, on the other hand, does not have to be expensive. There are a number of strategies that can be used to reduce or eliminate holiday expenditures. All that is required is an openness to new ideas.

Make A Plan

When shoppers fail to plan ahead for Christmas, their spending often exceeds their budgets. Determine your Christmas spending budget, and then make a list of all of your responsibilities, including gifts, travel, and decorations, and stick to it. Add a monetary value to each item, erring on the side of overestimating.

Saving money this year may be difficult, but consider this: it will allow you to get a head start on your debts next year if you spend less this year.

One of the best ways you can create a plan is to read some budgeting tips on frugal living blogs. 

Look Out For Extra Savings 

A long list of gifts to buy? Here are a few favourite ways to look out for savings:

• Look for coupons.

• Join a store's mailing list

• New subscribers usually get an extra 10%-20% savings. Even creating a new email address to receive several discounts.

• Use a rewards card

• Credit card with a cashback offer

• Buy used gift cards

Talk To Your Loved Ones

If you are struggling to make ends meet, Christmas may seem like an imposition. Stress during the holidays may cause people to harbour ill will toward their more prosperous relatives and friends.

Discuss with your loved ones the possibility of skipping the gift exchange or spending less money. You don't have to tell them everything; just enough information to make sense to them is sufficient. Your brother-in-law who has recently become a parent might appreciate a year off from the madness of holiday gift-giving.

Summary

As an adult, purchasing gifts for friends and family members become a chore. Although it's not really enjoyable, coming up with non-traditional gift ideas is.

Remember that there are many different ways to be creative, so continue to think beyond the box.

Do you have any other ideas that could help? Please share some of them in the comments below. 

4 Worthwhile Investment Opportunities for Keen Investors

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If you are a keen investor, this is the blog post! In it, we will be discussing four worthwhile investment opportunities that can generate significant returns. Moreover, these investments are all safe and have minimal risk associated with them. So if you want to make more money in your spare time, keep reading!

 

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The Stock Market

The stock market is an excellent opportunity for investors looking to make money. Although there are risks involved, if you play your cards right and invest in the right companies, these can be minimal. Another great reason investing in stocks can be so lucrative is compound interest. Compound interest means that as your investment starts to generate more returns over time, those returns will also begin to develop their income! In other words, this could mean a lot of money being made from minimal effort on your part.

Real Estate

Real estate is another great investment opportunity. The beauty of investing in property is that there are many different ways to do it. For example, you can invest in a property and let someone else rent it out, or you could become a landlord and take care of the renting yourself. Real estate can be a very lucrative investment, whichever route you decide to go down. In fact, over the past few years, the average return on investment for properties has been around 11%. Not too bad! So even when you don't have cash in hand, consider different Mortgage Quotes to make that investment leap you've always dreamt of.

Cryptocurrencies

If you are not careful about investing in cryptocurrencies, then your capital can be at risk. The price of this type of investment is incredibly volatile, and the market can be easily manipulated by those who know what they're doing! However, if you decide to invest in them, make sure that you only ever put money into something that you would feel comfortable losing. For example, don't sell your house or car to have more funds for cryptocurrency investments! Cryptocurrencies being an emerging asset class, also means a lot of research is required before fully diving into one. So try starting small with someone like Bitcoin before moving on to larger ones such as Ethereum or Ripple.

Commodities Trading

Commodities trading is another excellent opportunity for keen investors to make money. Many different commodities can be traded, but some of the most popular ones are oil, gas, and metals. This type of investment has been around since ancient times! For example, in China, trade routes were established as early as 2000 BC, where goods were exchanged using gold, silver, or silk coins, which would later become known as "hard currency." So if you have any spare time on your hands and want an extra income stream, then these opportunities could work well for you. Remember, though friends don't let friends buy cryptocurrencies without talking with a financial advisor beforehand!

The Stock Market: One of the most popular investment opportunities in the stock market. This involves investing in shares of companies, and over time your investment will grow as the company becomes more successful. The key to making money in stocks is to research before investing; make sure you understand what you are buying into!

Newborn Checklist: Essentials You Need Before Your Baby Arrives

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Expecting a new baby is an exciting time in many parents’ lives due to the chance to welcome a new life into the world. According to Baby Center, just under 4 million babies are born in American annually. There is no shortage of advice for expectant parents regarding getting ready to receive their bundle of joy. Nevertheless, there are some bare essentials you will need for starters to prepare for your child. So, if you’re keen to find out which needs to be in place prior to your baby arriving, take a look at these points.

1. A crib

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Securing a sleeping place for your child is perhaps the most essential arrangement you have to sort out before the baby arrives. Bassinet cradles and three-sided cribs are ideal for the first few months. Many cribs come without mattresses, so you must buy quality, comfortable, and fitting ones. Double-sided mattresses are popular among parents because you can use them for the baby and toddler years, giving a little extra "mileage" in usability. Alternatively, you can choose a certified mattress as a more sustainable choice for your baby. Consider getting more comfort items like crib sheets, light blankets, a sleep sack, and waterproof mattress covers.

2. Diapering

Reusable cloth nappies and disposable diapers are the options available to parents for their child's diapering needs. Cloth nappies are reusable and eco-friendly, making them a great choice if you are big on sustainability. Also, cloth diapers are more pocket-friendly, considering that a whopping 27.4 billion disposable diapers are used in the US annually! While the idea of using cloth nappies may be new to you, you will get used to them after a while. And even though disposable diapers may seem more convenient, they are costly, more likely to rip during changes, and are less environmentally friendly. Therefore, consider which diapering options will best suit you and invest accordingly.

3. Clothing

Some experts think you should secure at least six “onesies," about four infant gowns, and three blankets wide enough to swaddle the baby as a start to welcoming your child. You will also need about five pairs of pants, eight stretchy sleepers, a sweater and cap, and about six pairs of socks or booties, scratch mittens (to keep the baby from scratching his or her face), and some cardigans for winter. Experts suggest that you consider the fabric, safety, size, and comfort of your baby’s clothes when making your choices, so keep this in mind while shopping.

4. Feeding

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Many nursing mothers will agree that bibs, burp cloths, nursing pillows, etc., are essentials for feeding your baby, whether you are breastfeeding or not. So, invest in these items before the baby arrives. You will likely need breast pumps and milk storage containers for convenience in case you have to be at work or somewhere else urgently. Should you choose not to breastfeed, you would need supplies like formula, bottles, and pacifiers. Also, a bottle brush and dishwasher basket will help clean your feeding items, so prioritize this when shopping.

5. A Baby Support Pillow

Baby support pillows, like the ones sold by the topponcino company are a must-have for any nursery. They ensure that your baby is safe, comfortable and cozy whenever you have to put him or her down for a while. You can also use them to wrap your baby up while you hold him or her for extra support during those first vital months of nursing.

Do Word Puzzles Keep Your Mind Sharp Or Not?

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For years, companies have been encouraging adults to engage in regular “brain training” to train their neurons, just like their muscles, and make them stronger. But the relationship between solving puzzles and cognitive performance is anything but clear cut. Doing crosswords doesn’t seem to have a one-to-one relationship with the sharpness of our minds. So what the heck is going on? 

What Does The Evidence Say? 

When psychologists and brain researchers examined the question, they found conflicting results. A 2001 study in Brain and Cognition, for instance, found that as people get older, they perform worse on games designed to test working memory. Younger subjects almost always had the upper hand.

A study in the Journal of Experimental Psychology from 1999 found that older people who do crosswords don’t experience any reduction in the speed of cognitive decline. So, the researchers concluded that the brain might not be analogous to muscle tissue at all. 

But then another study in Psychology of Aging in 2000, found that doing crosswords regularly did, in fact, reduce the speed of memory loss as people get older.

So what the heck is going on here? Can you really train your brain like the rest of your body to keep it youthful?

The Importance Of Hidden Information

Although the science is mixed, some researchers think that certain types of word puzzles can actually help cognition. 

Consider a riddle, “what is full of holes but still carries water?” 

You can’t just read the statement and then think it through analytically to solve it. You won’t get anywhere. No matter how long you stare at it, the answer won’t pop out at you from the words on the page. 

Instead, you have to think “out of the box,” drawing on your knowledge of context. Eventually, if you think broadly enough, the idea of a sponge will enter your mind, and you will solve the riddle. 

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The cognitive processes here are profound. Not only do you have to unscramble the problem, but you also have to open yourself up to novel ideas. Otherwise, you can’t resolve the riddle at all. It is a necessary part of the process. 

Finding hidden information is essentially what riddles are all about. They appear to allude to something that doesn’t make sense on the surface, but that can be resolved with the right idea. 

Riddles have appealed to people down the centuries, partly because their solutions are so unexpected and novel. You get a buzz of satisfaction when you solve one that makes you want to go on and do the next. 

Word puzzles, like riddles, therefore, could help train the mind by creating new connections in a way that many other types of problems don’t. Perhaps that’s why there have been mixed results in the literature. Performing rote calculations (in sudoku, for instance) uses well-worn neural pathways. But solving a riddle necessarily implies having to come up with an entirely novel solution. 

What do you think? Can solving riddles make you a better thinker overall?