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It’s easy to say you simply don’t have time to be mindful. With so much going on in daily life, who has time to stop and be present? But everyone has at least 10 minutes to spare to practice mindfulness.

The point of these brief, daily reflections is to help you tap into calmness whenever life gets too hairy. Practicing everyday mindfulness can also improve your memory and concentration skills and help you feel less distracted and better able to manage crises like dealing with the pandemic.

There is more than one way to practice mindfulness. Still, any mindfulness technique aims to achieve a state of alert, focused, relaxed consciousness by deliberately paying attention to thoughts and sensations without passing judgment on them. This allows the mind to focus on the present moment with an attitude of acceptance.

Three easy mindfulness exercises to try

Here are three simple exercises you can try whenever you need a mental break, emotional lift, or just want to pause and appreciate everything around you. Devote 10 minutes a day to them and see how the experience changes your outlook. It’s time well spent.

Simple meditation

A quick and easy meditation is an excellent place to begin practicing mindfulness.

• Sit on a straight-backed chair or cross-legged on the floor.
• Focus on an aspect of your breathing, such as the sensations of air flowing into your nostrils and out of your mouth, or your belly rising and falling as you inhale and exhale.
• Once you’ve narrowed your concentration in this way, begin to widen your focus. Become aware of sounds, sensations, and ideas. Embrace and consider each without judgment.
• If your mind starts to race, return your focus to your breathing. Then expand your awareness again.
• Take as much time as you like: one minute, or five, or 10 — whatever you’re comfortable with. Experts in mindfulness meditation note that the practice is most helpful if you commit to a regular meditation schedule.

Open awareness

Another approach to mindfulness is “open awareness,” which helps you stay in the present and truly participate in specific moments in life. You can choose any task or moment to practice open awareness, such as eating, taking a walk, showering, cooking a meal, or working in the garden. When you are engaged in these and other similar routine activities, follow these steps.

• Bring your attention to the sensations in your body, both physical and emotional.
• Breathe in through your nose, allowing the air to fill your lungs. Let your abdomen expand fully. Then breathe out slowly through your mouth.
• Carry on with the task at hand, slowly and with deliberation.
• Engage each of your senses, paying close attention to what you can see, hear, feel, smell, and taste.
• Try “single-tasking,” bringing your attention as fully as possible to what you’re doing.
• Allow any thoughts or emotions that arise to come and go, like clouds passing through the sky.
• If your mind wanders away from your current task, gently refocus your attention back to the sensation of the moment.

Body awareness

Another way to practice mindfulness is to focus your attention on other thoughts, objects, and sensations. While sitting quietly with your eyes closed, channel your awareness toward each of the following:

• Sensations: Notice subtle feelings such as an itch or tingling without judgment, and let them pass. Notice each part of your body in succession from head to toe.
• Sights and sounds: Notice sights, sounds, smells, tastes, and touches. Name them “sight,” “sound,” “smell,” “taste,” or “touch” without judgment and let them go.
• Emotions: Allow emotions to be present without judging them. Practice a steady and relaxed naming of emotions: “joy,” “anger,” “frustration.”
• Urges: When you feel a craving or an urge (for instance, to eat excess food or practice an unwanted behavior), acknowledge the desire and understand that it will pass. Notice how your body feels as the craving enters. Replace the wish for the craving to go away with the specific knowledge that it will subside.

You’ve been trying to get your point across, but it’s not getting through. It’s getting you frustrated, maybe a little offended, so you go for a different approach.

You yell.

Now, concert-level volume has its place, like for saying, “There’s a bear behind you” or “Power line down.” But the big question is, how often do those situations come up? The answer is, rarely.

Next question: How often do you reach that intensity? “Too often” is that answer. You know that it doesn’t work. It never feels good. It never makes the situation better. You would just like to stop doing it.

It’s good to have that desire, but you need more to make it happen. What helps is to play detective to uncover your triggers, then set reasonable expectations, because underlying the yelling is stress, something that isn’t disappearing. The question, as Dr. Antonia Chronopoulos, clinical psychologist at Massachusetts General Hospital, asks, is “How do you regulate yourself in a tense situation?”

Start with the basics

Before you can stop, it helps to understand why we yell in the first place.

We could be in a debate and feel like we’re not being heard. We take it as an insult, get frustrated, and the brain’s limbic system sees it as a threat and sets off the fight-or-flight response.

Our blood pressure rises, breathing becomes shallow, and muscles tense up. Since our history factors in, we can start making assumptions. Adrenaline makes everything go faster, and our attention narrows. “When we’re in survival mode, we’re not thinking about creative solutions as effectively,” she says. “The prime directive is to defend, escape, or fight.”

It’s also not a solo act. We’re yelling at someone, and our attempt to control the situation triggers that person, setting off the aforementioned emotional and physiological reactions, and possibly creating a shoutfest (which is anything but festive).

And there’s one more part, which gets overlooked: the flight element. If we decide to not yell and end up holding anger in, the same process is still taking place: the tense muscles, shallow breathing, narrow focus. We might not be making a lot of noise, but we’re far from calm or looking to improve the situation. “It’s almost like a freeze response,” Chronopoulos says.

The goal is to find the middle ground: not fighting, not flighting, and where you can be more in tune with the other person.

How you get there

It’s not impossible to calm down while yelling. You can find a way to break the dynamic with deep breathing, pausing the conversation, and/or walking away from the trigger, but it is difficult. The best course is to practice strategies before you need to call upon them, because fear is a primitive emotion, and once we’re in it, the body becomes hijacked. “You can’t just relax in a heated moment,” she says.

It starts with awareness

Log your behavior over one week, noting what prompted the yelling and rating your anger from zero to 10. Think about everything involved: the people, topics, location, and whether you had eaten or slept well, because self-care affects your ability to handle stress.

When you give your anger a number, it becomes more objective. You can feel the difference between a 1, 4, and 8, and are more able to control something in the early stages. And when you write down your observations, you can see patterns and start thinking about how to prevent trouble spots. It might be carrying food, avoiding certain people, or scheduling a potentially tough interaction for when you’re at your best.

Deep breathing can help

There’s no magic count. People have their own approaches. Chronopoulos suggests to just notice your breathing, or even walk away and count to 10. The result is similar. Your mind is off the stress and onto something practical and concrete. One more exercise is to progressively relax your muscles when you’re calm. You’ll then be better able to distinguish between when your body is at ease and when it’s tense. Chronopoulos calls it “discrimination training.” With this knowledge, you can remind yourself to do something as simple as lower your shoulders or unclench your hands.

Imagery is another tool

Preview your day and play out how you’ll handle the sticky moments. When the real thing happens, it won’t be the first time you’re experiencing it.

In the actual situation, use assertive dialogue over yelling or silently seething. It’s about keeping things in the first person, naming the problem, and avoiding calling out the other person. Clearly say, “When you say X, it really upsets me,” then shift into asking, “What can we do to make this work?” It goes from competition to negotiation. “Our voice can become the tool to resolve the conflict,” she says.

You can aspire to never yelling, but it may still happen

And finally, realize that none of the above is foolproof. You can’t predict every situation or be constantly mindful. You can also have different reactions to the same situation, because each day is different. “We’re never in a static state of mind,” Chronopoulos says. “But by taking these measures, we’re putting ourselves into a position for having more control of our emotions and being able to respond in a way that’s more effective.”

By 2050, 13.8 million people in the US will likely have Alzheimer’s disease, and two-thirds will be women. The economic cost is staggering, as it is estimated to rise to more than $2 trillion. Women are at the epicenter of this because the economic threat is especially dire for women, given they are an increasingly powerful element of our global economy and the vast majority of unpaid caregivers. Thus, maintaining intact memory starting early in midlife with the transition to menopause is critical not only for women themselves, but also for their families, society, and our economic health.

Preventing memory decline starts in early midlife

The decline in cognitive ability is not limited to neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer’s disease (AD), but also part of healthy aging, with consequences for our quality of life. Most studies of aging and cognitive decline, particularly studies of AD, begin in people in their 70s. However, understanding factors that happen earlier in life, and how they impact age-related brain changes, is critical for developing prevention strategies for one of the major public health challenges of our time.

What happens to women’s brains through the transition into menopause?

In addition to chronological aging, women undergo reproductive aging in early midlife: menopause, during which they experience a depletion over time of ovarian hormones such as estradiol, the primary form of estrogen that works in the brain. Our research team and others have demonstrated that estradiol directly relates to changes in memory performance and reorganization of our brain circuitry that regulates memory function. Thus, women and men undergo different aging processes, especially in early midlife when reproductive aging is more critical for women than chronological aging. However, cognitive aging is rarely considered a women’s health issue. This is essential, because viewing brain aging as beginning in early midlife, and understanding the impact of menopause on the brain, will allow for development of strategies to prevent memory loss for women.

On average, women perform better than men on measures of verbal memory, beginning as early as post-puberty. However, women’s advantage for verbal memory performance is reduced with menopause. Many women report increased forgetfulness and “brain fog” during the menopausal transition. All women eventually undergo menopause, but there is a large age range for when it begins (from late 40s to early 60s), and substantial variation in women’s experience of its impact.

Over the last 15 years, an increasing number of studies are mapping out the intricate ways in which menopause affects the brain and what helps maintain intact memory. For example, menopause can affect how brain cells are generated, connect with each other, and even die, and these processes impact brain regions that are critical for memory. Menopause also lowers the level of glucose in the brain, the primary fuel used by brain cells. The brain then looks to other metabolic sources to provide the necessary fuel to function — that is, the brain adapts to a new hormonal environment in order to maintain functioning.

Further, women with other medical conditions like diabetes and hypertension are at increased risk for cognitive decline. Research into understanding this is focusing, in part, on how the brain and body share similar processes to produce energy to function (metabolism), and how blood pressure and other aspects of the vascular system function similarly in the brain and body.

Can hormone replacement treatment help?

Research shows that timing matters. Initiation of hormone replacement (HR) in perimenopause (roughly four to eight years before menopause) or early menopause may have positive effects on brain activity and memory function, although systematic HR trials have not been conducted during perimenopause. Initiation of HR in late menopause may have adverse effects on the brain, and increase risk of disorders like Alzheimer’s disease. Research is critically needed to establish the most effective timing of administration, hormonal formula, dose, route of administration (for example, orally or by skin patch), and duration.

Further, to date much of the HR research has been conducted in healthy women, and little is known about its impact in women with chronic diseases such as diabetes and hypertension. Finally, there may be differences in responses in women who are genetically at high risk for brain disorders, like AD, that show increased benefits for using HR. Research shows us that one size does not fit all, and precision medicine is needed to identify which women may benefit the most. One example is for women with bilateral removal of the ovaries, particularly at a young age, for whom HR has been found to be very beneficial for brain function. In some women HR may not be an option, and alternative mechanisms may need to be identified, such as targeting levels of glucose and other effects associated with estradiol regulation of the brain.

What can women do to maintain brain health?

There are three major pillars for maintaining intact memory: effortful physical activity, effortful cognitive activity, and social contact. Research shows that the first two of these have direct beneficial effects on the brain, even at the level of cellular function. Social contact is another form of keeping our brains active by external stimuli, novel experiences, and perspectives outside of ourselves. Dietary habits (such as the Mediterranean diet, or intake of omega-3 fatty acids like in fish oil) have also had beneficial effects on memory function. The good news is that these are modifiable lifestyle habits, which may be particularly important for women with hypertension or diabetes who are at higher risk for cognitive decline.

Finally, adequate sleep (currently suggested as seven hours a night) is critical for brain health. Research has shown that during certain periods of sleep, learning is consolidated; that is, sleep plays a key role in storing and maintaining what we learned during the day, and even helps in clearing the brain of amyloid, one of the markers of potential AD pathology. More research is required to fully understand the beneficial impacts of these modifiable lifestyle factors. However, the time to start incorporating them into your life is now.

Topical vitamin C is a science-backed, dermatologist-favorite ingredient that may help slow early skin aging, prevent sun damage, and improve the appearance of wrinkles, dark spots, and acne. Vitamin C is an antioxidant, meaning it fights harmful free radicals (toxins) that come in contact with your skin from external sources like air pollution, or from inside the body as a result of normal processes like your metabolism. Free radicals can damage the skin, and applying topical vitamin C can combat free radicals and may improve the skin’s overall appearance.

Skin benefits of vitamin C

A few clinical studies have demonstrated that vitamin C can improve wrinkles. One study showed that daily use of a vitamin C formulation for at least three months improved the appearance of fine and coarse wrinkles of the face and neck, as well as improved overall skin texture and appearance.

Vitamin C may also help protect the skin from harmful ultraviolet rays when used in combination with a broad-spectrum sunscreen. Clinical studies have shown that combining vitamin C with other topical ingredients, namely ferulic acid and vitamin E, can diminish redness and help protect the skin from long-term damage caused by harmful sun rays.

Further, vitamin C can reduce the appearance of dark spots by blocking the production of pigment in our skin. In clinical trials, the majority of the participants applying topical vitamin C had improvement in their dark spots with very little irritation or side effects, but more studies are needed to confirm the brightening effects of vitamin C.

Additionally, topical vitamin C can help with acne through its anti-inflammatory properties that help control sebum (oil) production within the skin. In clinical trials, twice-daily application of vitamin C reduced acne lesions when compared to placebo. While no serious side effects were reported with vitamin C use in any of these studies, it is important to note that there are only a handful of clinical trials that have studied the effects for vitamin C, and more studies are needed to confirm the findings presented here.

Where to find topical vitamin C and what to look for on the label

Vitamin C can be found in serums or other skincare products. Different formulations of vitamin C can alter its strength and effects in the skin. Consider purchasing vitamin C products from your dermatologist’s office or a verified online retailer, with a clinical formulation that contains an active form of vitamin C (for instance, L-ascorbic acid), has a strength of 10% to 20%, and a pH lower than 3.5, as this combination has been studied in clinical trials. This information can be obtained from the manufacturer’s website under the ingredients section.

Who shouldn’t use Vitamin C products?

Vitamin C has only been studied in adults and is not recommended for children. Always read the ingredient list before purchasing a vitamin C product. If you have sensitivity or a known allergy to any of the ingredients, consider a patch test or consult your doctor before use. If you have acne-prone or oily skin, consider using a formulation that also fights oils, or contains ingredients like salicylic acid that fight breakouts.

How to use topical Vitamin C

During your morning skincare routine

• use a gentle cleanser
• apply a few drops of a vitamin C serum to the face and neck
• apply moisturizer and sunscreen.

You may experience a mild tingling sensation with the use of vitamin C. You may choose to begin applying it every other day, and if tolerated you may apply it daily. It may take up to three months of consistent use to see a noticeable improvement. If you experience substantial discomfort or irritation, please stop using vitamin C and consult with your physician.

Vitamin C does not replace the use of sunscreen or wearing sun-protective clothing. Be sure to use broad-spectrum, tinted sunscreen daily, and limit sun exposure during peak hours.

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Lately it seems like everywhere I look, someone is vaping as they walk by, stand outside a store, or roll up in the car next to me at a stoplight. It’s not surprising: e-cigarette use, or vaping, has become remarkably popular in recent years. About 6% of adults in the US now report vaping. That’s about 15 million people, double the number from just three years ago. Of course, regular cigarettes are known to cause cancer and a host of other health problems.

While considered less harmful than smoking tobacco, vaping isn’t risk-free. We know some, but not all, of its risks. We also know vaping is increasingly popular among teens and young adults, and this makes the recent FDA announcement authorizing sales of three additional vaping products surprising.

A surprise announcement from the FDA

In its announcement, the FDA authorized the R. J. Reynolds Vapor Company to market and sell its Vuse Solo device with tobacco-flavored vaping liquid to adults.

The FDA denied marketing authorization for 10 flavored products made by the same company. It also reports having denied more than a million flavored vaping products from other companies.

By the way, the agency emphasizes it is not actually approving these vaping products, or declaring them safe. The announcement states that marketing authorization will be reversed if

• the company directs advertising to younger audiences
• there is evidence of “significant” new use by teens or by people who did not previously smoke cigarettes
• R. J. Reynolds does not comply with extensive monitoring requirements.

Why did the FDA take this action?

The decision was reportedly based on data from the company — unfortunately not provided in the press release — demonstrating these products would benefit individuals and public health. How? By helping smokers quit.

Some studies have suggested that e-cigarette use can be modestly helpful for smokers trying to quit. For example, an analysis of 61 studies found that e-cigarette use was more effective than other approaches to quitting smoking. The study authors estimated that out of every 100 people who tried to quit smoking by vaping, nine to 14 might be successful. When only using other methods, such as nicotine patches or behavioral counselling, only four to seven smokers out of 100 might quit. A separate study suggests vaping may help smokers who aren’t able to quit reduce the number of cigarettes smoked per day — at least for six months, the duration of the study.

Does vaping harm health less than smoking cigarettes?

Despite claims that vaping is less harmful than smoking cigarettes and that it might help smokers quit, concern about its risks is well deserved.

• Nicotine addiction. Whether in cigarettes or vapes, nicotine is highly addictive. And the amount of nicotine in many vaping products is much higher than in regular cigarettes. Side effects include reduced appetite, increased heart rate and blood pressure, nausea, and diarrhea.
• Harm to lungs and heart. Vapors from e-cigarettes may contain cancer-causing toxins, metals, and lung irritants. Vaping raises risk for lung diseases, such as emphysema, asthma, chronic bronchitis, and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. It’s also linked to an increased risk of heart attacks. Even secondhand exposure to e-cigarette vapors may trigger asthma.
• Severe, potentially fatal lung injury. In 2019, doctors began seeing people who had recently vaped and developed shortness of breath, cough, fever, and extensive lung damage. Dubbed EVALI (e-cigarette or vaping product use-associated lung injury), more than 2,800 cases and 68 deaths were reported. The condition has been linked to vapors containing THC and a form of vitamin E (called vitamin E acetate) used as a thickening agent when vaping THC. Cases have fallen markedly since 2020. Possibly because of falling case numbers, the FDA announcement of new vaping products didn’t even mention EVALI, which seems odd. If you do vape, see these recommendations to reduce the risk of EVALI.
• Health risks during pregnancy. Nicotine can damage a baby’s developing brain and lungs; some flavorings may be harmful as well. As a result, experts recommend that people who are pregnant not vape.

For teens and children, vaping has additional risks

An alarming number of middle-school and high-school age kids report vaping, despite the nationwide prohibition against selling e-cigarette products to anyone under age 18 (21 in some states). Its popularity is partly related to the marketing of flavors known to appeal to minors, such as bubblegum and berry-flavored products. According to one national survey, approximately 85% of teen vaping involved non-tobacco flavored products.

It’s important to know that

• nicotine negatively affects the developing brain
• the high exposure to nicotine and other toxic chemicals through vaping may be particularly harmful to kids because of their smaller body size
• the addictive potential of nicotine may mean that kids who vape are more likely to become cigarette smokers.

The bottom line

For nonsmokers and teens, there is no controversy: don’t start smoking and don’t vape.

If you’re an adult smoker trying to quit, be aware that the balance of risks and benefits and the long-term health consequences of vaping are uncertain. We need more solid research to help people make decisions. Meanwhile, the FDA has come down on the side of a limited authorization to help adult smokers quit. We’ll know only in retrospect if that was the right move.

Last week, the FDA authorized the Pfizer/BioNTech COVID vaccine for children ages 5 to 11. After conducting their own review, the CDC now recommends this vaccine for children in this age range, who can begin receiving their first dose within the week.

While many families have been eagerly awaiting the opportunity for their children to be immunized, others are hesitant. And most parents have questions about how COVID-19 affects younger children, vaccine safety in this age range, and whether the benefits outweigh potential risks. As a pediatric infectious disease specialist, I hear certain questions crop up repeatedly. Here’s what we know so far.

How does COVID-19 affect children in this age range?

While children continue to be much less likely than adults — especially adults 65 and older — to get severely ill from COVID-19, some children do get very sick. Thousands of children 5 to 11 have been hospitalized or need ICU-level support to recover from this infection. Almost 150 children in this age range have died from COVID-19. Additionally, over 5,000 cases of a serious inflammatory condition known as MIS-C that can follow COVID-19 infection have been reported. The majority of cases of MIS-C have occurred in children in this age range.

How has the Delta strain of the virus affected children?

The Delta strain of the virus that causes COVID spreads easily, particularly among people who haven’t received the vaccine. Children ages 5 to 11 remain more susceptible to infection, given their ineligibility to be vaccinated. In fact, more than one in five new cases recorded over the past two months while Delta infections surged in the US occurred in this age group, according to weekly reports from the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Children’s Hospital Association.

Can children spread the virus to others?

Several detailed reports describing outbreaks associated with settings such as summer camps, daycares, and schools, and those tracing transmission of COVID-19 within households, clearly demonstrate that children can spread this virus and infect others with whom they come into close contact.

Which COVID vaccines and doses are authorized for children ages 5 to 11?

Pfizer/BioNTech is the first COVID vaccine authorized by the FDA for this age group, based on results from a randomized controlled trial evaluating safety and immune responses. A separate trial launched by Moderna is being considered separately.

In a small number of children, the Pfizer/BioNTech trial compared three doses:

• 30 micrograms (the dose adults receive)
• 20 micrograms
• 10 micrograms.

This part of the trial showed that 10 micrograms, the smallest dose, resulted in fewer side effects while still generating robust immune responses similar to responses achieved with higher doses.

In the next part of the trial, more than 2,200 children ages 5 to 11 were randomly assigned to receive either a 10-microgram dose of the vaccine (two-thirds of participants) or a placebo dose (one-third of participants). All received two shots, spaced three weeks apart.

Those given the vaccine had similar immune responses as 16-to-25-year-olds who had received the full-dose series of two shots.

When Pfizer/BioNTech submitted data to the FDA, there were not many cases of symptomatic COVID-19 infections in trial participants. Out of 19 documented cases, most had received the placebo shots. Estimates suggest the efficacy rate of the vaccine is 90%. (Efficacy measures how much a vaccine reduces infection in a controlled trial.) Tests confirmed that the Delta viral strain had caused the infections.

What do we know about side effects for children this age?

Most children had no side effects other than pain at the injection site. Those who did have side effects most commonly experienced fatigue, headaches, and/or muscle aches after the second dose rather than the first dose. For example, only 6% of children had fever after the second vaccine dose. There were no cases of severe allergic reaction to the vaccine.

What is not yet known?

In very rare instances, the Pfizer/BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine is linked to myocarditis, which is an inflammation of the heart. When this occurs, it is mostly seen in young males following their second dose of an mRNA vaccine (Pfizer/BioNTech or Moderna). Most cases are mild, and children show no signs of long-term injury to the heart.

Among the 5-to-11-year-olds who received the Pfizer vaccine during the trial, there were no cases of myocarditis. However, this side effect is very rare and might not be noted until the number of children receiving the vaccine is much higher. The FDA and Pfizer/BioNTech will continue to closely monitor this age group for any occurrence of this rare side effect.

Can children get vaccinated against COVID-19 and influenza at the same time?

Yes. Children and adults can safely get both vaccines at the same time. The CDC urges everyone to get flu shots to help stay healthy during this flu season.

A randomized, controlled trial in the UK evaluated adults who received a flu shot or placebo shot in one arm and their second dose of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine in the other arm. The researchers reported in Preprints with The Lancet that side effects and immune responses were similar, whether the flu shot or a placebo shot was given at the same time as the COVID vaccine.

What other steps can parents take to protect children against COVID-19?

Parents should remember that an individual is not fully immunized and protected by the vaccine until 14 days after the second dose of the Pfizer vaccine. Masks are recommended for anyone who is unvaccinated, or not fully immunized, when indoors with people outside of their household. If rates of COVID-19 are high where you live, masks may be recommended indoors for vaccinated individuals as well.

Parents can continue to encourage other simple habits that help prevent colds, flu, and COVID-19, such as washing hands often, coughing or sneezing into an elbow, throwing away used tissues quickly, and avoiding crowded places and people who are ill when possible.

The holidays are supposed to be a time of joy and celebration, and the meal is a centerpiece of the occasion. But when you’re a caregiver for an aging parent, the joy can be overshadowed by stress.

Whether you’re observing winter holidays — such as Hanukkah, Christmas, Kwanzaa, or New Year’s Eve — or holidays that fall during another time of year, take steps in advance to ensure that you and your loved one can enjoy the meal together with as little stress as possible. These tips can help.

Consider the dining schedule

Your mom or dad might normally eat at a different time than the planned holiday meal. If the meal times don’t match, give your parent a nutritious snack to stave off hunger, or find out if it’s possible to serve the holiday meal at a time that’s good for your parent. If other festivities are on the docket, consider that timing as well. Your parent likely has a limited amount of energy to spend visiting with others, so allow plenty of time to eat.

Serve your parent easy-to-eat food

Holiday meals often feature special-occasion foods that may be overly rich or hard for your parent to cut, chew, swallow, or keep on a fork or spoon. Talk about this beforehand, if that’s possible. Know which foods your parent should avoid, such as nuts. Serve safer choices in small amounts, and help by cutting up hard-to-eat foods before they come to the table or arrive on a plate.

Another option is serving something simple for your parent to eat that won’t need much supervision and won’t make a mess. Rice or fine pasta with vegetables, pureed beef or fish stew (no bones!), or mashed root vegetables and beans are some examples. If you’re not hosting the holiday event, ask if it’s okay to bring a meal that’s right for your parent.

Remember medicines

If your parent normally takes prescribed drugs at meals, don’t let this holiday be a time to get off schedule. Go over the medication list in advance and set a timer on your phone to remind you of dosing times.

Work in shifts with other guests

Have a conversation ahead of time with other guests who can help. When assisting a parent during a meal, you may not get much of a chance to eat your own food or chat with people at the table. Build in a break by arranging for another guest (perhaps a sibling) to take a turn helping out.

Plan the bathroom break

When you have to go, you have to go. And aging parents, like young children, sometimes need to excuse themselves mid-bite. A bathroom trip before the meal might reduce that risk, but it’s no guarantee. Work out in advance who’s going to assist your parent if nature’s call arrives during the meal.

Keep fluids handy

Make sure your parent is staying hydrated and getting enough fluids before, during, and after the meal. Also, keep an extra glass of water handy, and a straw if necessary, in case your parent is having a hard time swallowing food. Note also that moistened food is easier to swallow, so consider adding a little extra sauce to a parent’s meal.

Watch alcohol intake

While alcohol may be offered at the holiday meal, it doesn’t mean it will be safe for your parent. Alcohol consumption can lead to falls in older adults, and can interfere with medications. Ask your parent’s doctor if a little libation is allowed. such as a half-glass of wine. If not, consider offering your parent non-alcoholic beer, wine, or champagne if they’d like it. And mind your own alcohol intake: while you’re acting as a caregiver you’ll need to stay in control.

Arrange your parent’s exit well in advance

Gatherings can be tiring and stressful for older adults, and your parent might be ready to leave before the holiday meal officially concludes, especially if guests linger. Decide on a realistic exit time and let other guests know about it in advance, so everyone can plan accordingly.

If all goes well, you and your parent will both enjoy the holiday meal and wind up feeling the glow of meaningful family connection, sharing, and love — all of which are great for health.

In all aspects of our lives, we rely on experts, from home repairs to weather forecasting to food safety, and just about everything else that’s part of modern society. There’s just no way to know everything about everything. Yet when it comes to medicine, people seem to be taking their health in their hands in ways they’d never consider if, say, their car brakes needed repairs and they weren’t auto mechanics.

What if your brakes were shot?

Suppose a well-recommended car mechanic tells you your brakes need repair. Hopefully, they explain why this is necessary and review the pros and cons of your options, including no repairs. You certainly could get additional opinions and estimates. But to make a decision, you’d have to accept that a mechanic has specialized knowledge and that their advice is sound. Quite likely, you’d get the brakes fixed rather than risk injury.

Would you berate the mechanic personally because they told you something you didn’t want to hear about your beloved car? Let's hope not. And unless you knew a lot about cars, you probably wouldn’t tinker with the brakes yourself, or take the advice of a neighbor to spray the tires with vegetable oil because a friend of his cousin said it worked for his car. And you wouldn’t take your car to a veterinarian — it just wouldn’t make sense, right?

Yet hundreds of thousands of people in the US are rejecting advice on getting a COVID vaccine from well-respected health authorities like the National Institutes of Health (NIH), Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Healthcare providers have somehow become the target of taunts, hostility, and even death threats for encouraging people to protect themselves and others.

Fear of the proven and an embrace of the unproven

What’s driving this? It seems to be some combination of distrust ("these so-called experts don’t know what they’re talking about"; "they rushed the vaccines just to help the drug companies") and unfounded suspicion ("they’re trying to control us, experiment on us, inject microchips in us"). Some people see recommendations regarding COVID-19 as attacks on American values ("mask and vaccine mandates infringe on my personal freedom").

At the same time, many who dismiss the advice of true experts are embracing unproven and potentially dangerous remedies, such as ivermectin pills and betadine gargles.

How did we get here?

Some reasons we’ve seen erosion in trust placed in public health experts are

• Politics. COVID-19 quickly became a political issue in the US. For example, trust in the CDC varies markedly by political affiliation, with Democrats giving much higher marks to the CDC, FDA, and NIH than Republicans.
• Social media. Misinformation spread through social media is rampant, and much of it has been linked to a small number of people.
• "Pseudo-experts." Even impressive credentials don’t automatically qualify everyone to be experts in a pandemic disease. Recent examples include radiologists, cardiologists, and chiropractors who have made headlines with their controversial views.
• Personal gain. Some have profited financially, politically, or otherwise by deliberately spreading health disinformation and denouncing expert advice.

Confusing changes in message

Public health messaging about protecting ourselves from COVID-19 also affects trust. For example, recommendations around wearing masks were inconsistent early on, and have continued to change since then.

While some confusing, seemingly contradictory messages were true missteps, most are simply changes in recommendations based on a change in circumstances, such as spiking virus cases or a more easily spread variant causing severe illness, hospitalizations, and deaths.

Particularly in the early months, no one had all the answers. But as we have accumulated information from research and real-world experience, changes in recommendations should not only be expected but embraced. It’s usually a reflection of the close attention experts are paying to changing circumstances.

Doing your own research?

A wait-and-see policy can be risky — and not just when it comes to fixing your car brakes. The virus that causes COVID-19 was only discovered 18 months ago, and vaccines have been in use for less than a year. Yet already we have an enormous amount of data from research and real-world experience from many millions of people.

So, when someone says they want to "wait and see" or "do their own research" rather than accept the advice of their own doctors or public health experts, what exactly does that mean? Are they waiting to see if something bad will happen to those who were vaccinated? How long is long enough?

Unless you’re a cutting-edge virologist, immunologist, epidemiologist, or public health expert, doing your own research isn’t likely to provide more reliable data than studies published in peer-reviewed medical journals that guide the CDC and FDA. Of course, most people "doing their own research" are relying on others who are also not doing actual research, yet they discount the findings and recommendations of true experts.

It’s important to ask questions. But pose them to your doctor. Rely less on people who tell you what you want to hear, and more on those who trained in science and whose careers have been devoted to improving health.

If your fingers or toes ever turn pale (or even ghostly white) and go numb when exposed to cold, you might assume you just have poor circulation. That’s what I used to think when I first started noticing this problem with my own hands many years ago. It usually happened near the end of a long hike on a spring or fall afternoon, when the temperature dropped and I didn’t have any gloves handy. My pinkie, third, and middle fingers would turn white, and the fingernails took on a bluish tinge. As I soon discovered, I have Raynaud’s phenomenon, an exaggeration of normal blood vessel constriction.

Raynaud’s phenomenon: Not just poor circulation

When you’re exposed to a cold environment, your body reacts by trying to preserve your core temperature. Blood vessels near the surface of your skin constrict, redirecting blood flow deeper into the body. If you have Raynaud’s phenomenon, this process is more extreme, and even slight changes in air temperature can trigger an episode, says rheumatologist Dr. Robert H. Shmerling, senior faculty editor at Harvard Health Publishing and corresponding faculty in medicine at Harvard Medical School.

"Cold weather is the classic trigger for Raynaud’s phenomenon. But it can occur any time of year — for example, when you come out of a heated pool, walk into an air-conditioned building, or reach into the freezer section at the supermarket," he says. In addition to the hands, Raynaud’s can also affect the feet and, less often, the nose, lips, and ears. During an episode, the small arteries supplying the fingers and toes contract spasmodically, hampering the flow of oxygen-rich blood to the skin. Some of these vessels even temporarily collapse, and the skin becomes pale and cool, sometimes blanching to a stark white color.

Technically, Raynaud’s phenomenon is a circulation problem, but it’s very different than what doctors mean by poor circulation, says Dr. Shmerling. Limited or poor circulation usually affects older people whose arteries are narrowed with fatty plaque (known as atherosclerosis), which is often caused by high cholesterol, high blood pressure, and smoking. In contrast, Raynaud’s usually affects younger people (mostly women) without those issues — and the circulation glitch is generally temporary and completely reversible, he adds.

Preventing and treating Raynaud’s phenomenon

As I can attest, the best treatment for this condition is to prevent episodes in the first place, mainly by avoiding sudden or unprotected exposure to cold temperatures. I’ve always bundled up in the winter before heading outside, but now I bring extra layers and gloves even when the temperature might dip even slightly, or the weather may turn rainy or windy. Other tips include preheating your car in winter before getting in, and wearing gloves in chilly grocery store aisles.

In general, it’s best to avoid behavior and medicines that cause blood vessels to constrict. This includes not smoking and not taking certain medications, such as cold and allergy formulas that contain phenylephrine or pseudoephedrine and migraine drugs that contain ergotamine. Emotional stress may also provoke an episode of Raynaud’s, so consider tools and techniques that can help you ease stress.

If necessary, your doctor may prescribe a medication that relaxes the blood vessels, usually a calcium-channel blocker such as nifedipine (Adalat, Procardia). If that’s not effective, drugs to treat erectile dysfunction such as sildenafil (Viagra) may help somewhat. You may not need to take these drugs all the time, but only during the cold season, when Raynaud’s tends to be worse.

Warm up affected areas quickly

Once an episode starts, it’s important to warm up the affected extremities as quickly as possible. For me, placing my hands under warm running water does the trick. When that’s not possible, you can put them under your armpits or next to another warm part of your body. When the blood vessels finally relax and blood flow resumes, the skin becomes warm and flushed — and very red. The fingers or toes may throb or tingle.

What else is important to know?

Some people with Raynaud’s phenomenon have other health problems, usually connective tissue disorders such as scleroderma or lupus. Your doctor can determine this by doing a physical exam, asking you about your symptoms, and taking a few blood tests. But most of the time, there is no underlying medical problem.

When a child starts to stutter, it can be alarming for parents. But most of the time, it’s nothing to worry about.

Stuttering is very common. In fact, according to the National Institute on Deafness and other Communication Disorders (NIDCD), 5% to 10% of all children stutter at some point, usually between 2 and 6 years of age.

Stuttering takes different forms

Children who stutter know what they want to say; they simply run into trouble when saying it. There are three different kinds of stuttering:

• Repetitions, when children repeat a word or parts of a word (“Can I pet your d-d-d-d-dog?”)
• Prolongations, when they stretch a sound for a long period of time (“Sssssssssstop it!”)
• Blocks, when they have a hard time getting words out.

Stuttering is more common in boys than girls and can run in families. We do not understand exactly what causes it. Most likely, it occurs due to a combination of factors, which may differ in each child who stutters.

Developmental stuttering, the most common form of this speech disorder, happens as children are learning speech and language skills. Stuttering can be caused by a brain injury, but that’s far less common. Contrary to what many people believe, it is rare for stuttering to be caused by psychological factors.

Helping your child manage stuttering

Nonetheless, stuttering can cause distress and stress for children and parents alike. That’s why the best way to manage stuttering is not to focus on it, but rather to be patient and supportive. For example, the NIDCD suggests that parents of children who stutter should

• create relaxed environments for conversation: set aside time each day to catch up with your child
• speak in a slow and relaxed way yourself
• resist the temptation to finish your child’s words or sentences yourself; let them finish
• focus on the content of the message rather than how it is delivered.

To the extent that you can, ignore the stuttering — but if your child brings it up or seems bothered by it, be open and accepting. Acknowledge that it is happening, but tell your child that it is fine and they shouldn’t worry. Also see additional tips from the American Academy of Pediatrics on ways parents can help toddlers and preschoolers with stuttering.

When to get more help with stuttering

Most stuttering goes away by itself within about six months; overall, 75% of children who stutter stop completely. You should talk to your pediatrician or a speech-language pathologist if

• the stuttering has continued for more than 6 to 12 months
• the stuttering started after ages 3 to 4 years, as this may make it more likely to continue
• the stuttering has increased in severity or frequency
• there is a family history of stuttering that continued past early childhood
• your child is upset or frustrated by the stuttering.

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