Maybe you’ve been too busy organizing your notebooks for the new semester, but the season of winter is here. For some of you, that means hot cocoa, the opportunity to wear your cute knit hat, and general jolliness all around. But for others, it means the return of unwanted feelings like depression, pessimism, and exhaustion.

It’s normal to feel a bit less enthusiastic about life when the freezing cold weather starts to make walking to class a serious chore, not to mention a safety hazard (I have slipped on ice and fallen on my ass in front of people waaay too many times). But if you think your case of the winter blues is more intense than your friends’, you might have Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD). SAD is a mood disorder believed to be caused by the lack of sunlight during the winter months. Read More »

Ready for Spring Break? Yes, I am even talking to the 50% of you college students who are staying home this year. And why not? You don’t have to be off in Mexico doing really stupid things to have a good time. You’ve all been working hard and everyone deserves a little down time to let loose with a good book or an even better playlist.

Just because there is a little recession doesn’t mean you can’t have fun too. Or get a tan (and some D). Or, if nothing else, see a really bad movie.

If you are leaving town, don’t forget the essentials to take, the things you absolutely should not take, and the souvenirs you must bring home. And make sure to bring along the beach bag. God forbid you should be stuck on a tropical beach without your Blackberry, Us Weekly, and extra swimsuit.

Oh, and be sure to brush up on everything you need to know about Spring Break survival. Like the fact that everything that happens on Spring Break makes it way back to campus…with tons of exaggeration. Including STIs.

Don’t make the same mistakes we did in the past and be prepared. With a hot body and a cute dress.

The letter D is the fourth letter of the alphabet. It’s also one of the most important things you want for your body so your bones don’t deteriorate and so you don’t look like one of those Twilight vampires.

What do I mean, you ask? Well, I’m talking about vitamins. Specifically, Vitamin D.

Did you know that this D-elightful vitamin increases calcium absorption and thereby helps encourage healthy bone growth? It has shown promise in helping to prevent certain cancers, heart disease, diabetes, hypertension, multiple sclerosis, and osteoarthritis.

The Institute of Medicine currently recommends an Adequate Intake (AI) of Vitamin D of 200 International Units (IU) for adults under age 50 (that means you!). As new studies continue to showcase vitamin D’s potential benefits, more scientists are calling for increased recommendations, some suggesting as much as 1,000 IU!

That number seems high at first, but considering that a fair-skinned person can manufacture 15,000 IU or more of vitamin D in as little as 30 minutes of sun exposure, it’s not that hard to get. In case you don’t like the outdoors, though (or it’s just too cold during winter), here are some easy ways to make sure you get enough D in your life: Read More »

Some “buttah” is exactly what dietician Edith Blum recommends in her new book, Eat, Drink, and Be Gorgeous, which claims that eating full-fat foods instead of fat-free foods can help you lose weight!

So what does this mean?

Chocolate every day? Check.

Cocktails? Check.

Cheese, chocolate cake, biscuits, avocado, whole milk, chips, and sorbets? Check, check, and check.

This “no-diet diet” allows you to enjoy the foods you love that are usually condemned by the common fad diets that we occassionally follow. Or try to follow, at least. But lemon water, cabbage soup, and a crate full of bananas just aren’t realistic methods of losing weight in the long run. Blum advises us to forget our traditional beliefs of what good foods and bad foods are, and focus on the nutritional qualities of each food instead.

On food:

Fat is good; we need cholesterol and certain saturated fats to make and regulate our hormones, so we can avoid depression and even cancer. Quality trumps quantity in importance, Blum stresses, so certain “fabulous fats” found in nuts, seeds, and olive oil should be ingested at every meal, while “frankenfats” such as those in low-fat, low-cholesterol spreads and margarines should be banned from your diet to ward off headaches and and joint aches. Eat egg yolks in conjunction with egg whites, and don’t say no to that little voice in your head that screams for a smear of hot butter on warm toast. Starchy foods like rice, beans, and corn are also good for you, as well as the occasional cocktail, as long as there’s no sugar. Read More »