5 tips for healthy skin

 Don't have time for intensive skin care? Pamper yourself with the basics. Good skin care and healthy lifestyle choices can help delay the natural aging process and prevent various skin problems. Get started with these five no-nonsense tips.

1. Protect yourself from the sun

One of the most important ways to take care of your skin is to protect it from the sun. A lifetime of sun exposure can cause wrinkles, age spots and other skin problems — as well as increase the risk of skin cancer.
For the most complete sun protection:

• Use sunscreen. Use a broad-spectrum sunscreen with an SPF of at least 15. When you're outdoors, reapply sunscreen every two hours — or more often if you're swimming or perspiring.
• Seek shade. Avoid the sun between 10 a.m. and 4 p.m., when the sun's rays are strongest.
• Wear protective clothing. Cover your skin with tightly woven long-sleeved shirts, long pants and wide-brimmed hats. Also consider laundry additives, which give clothing an additional layer of ultraviolet protection for a certain number of washings, or special sun-protective clothing — which is specifically designed to block ultraviolet rays.

2. Don't smoke

Smoking makes your skin look older and contributes to wrinkles. Smoking narrows the tiny blood vessels in the outermost layers of skin, which decreases blood flow. This depletes the skin of oxygen and nutrients that are important to skin health. Smoking also damages collagen and elastin — the fibers that give your skin its strength and elasticity. In addition, the repetitive facial expressions you make when smoking — such as pursing your lips when inhaling and squinting your eyes to keep out smoke — can contribute to wrinkles.
If you smoke, the best way to protect your skin is to quit. Ask your doctor for tips or treatments to help you stop smoking.

3. Treat your skin gently

Daily cleansing and shaving can take a toll on your skin. To keep it gentle:

• Limit bath time. Hot water and long showers or baths remove oils from your skin. Limit your bath or shower time, and use warm — rather than hot — water.
• Avoid strong soaps. Strong soaps and detergents can strip oil from your skin. Instead, choose mild cleansers.
• Shave carefully. To protect and lubricate your skin, apply shaving cream, lotion or gel before shaving. For the closest shave, use a clean, sharp razor. Shave in the direction the hair grows, not against it.
• Pat dry. After washing or bathing, gently pat or blot your skin dry with a towel so that some moisture remains on your skin.
• Moisturize dry skin. If your skin is dry, use a moisturizer that fits your skin type. For daily use, consider a moisturizer that contains SPF.

4. Eat a healthy diet

A healthy diet can help you look and feel your best. Eat plenty of fruits, vegetables, whole grains and lean proteins. The association between diet and acne isn't clear — but some research suggests that a diet rich in vitamin C and low in unhealthy fats and processed or refined carbohydrates might promote younger looking skin.

5. Manage stress

Uncontrolled stress can make your skin more sensitive and trigger acne breakouts and other skin problems. To encourage healthy skin — and a healthy state of mind — take steps to manage your stress. Set reasonable limits, scale back your to-do list and make time to do the things you enjoy. The results might be more dramatic than you expect.

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Green Tea Diet Plan

 Eating and dieting these days do not usually involve your favorite beverages like green tea and coffee. But this is not always necessarily the case. With some bit of planning and a lot of discipline, your diet plan and weight regime can include your morning cups of coffee or green tea.

South Beach Diet Plan

An idea formulated by Dr. Agatston, the South Beach Diet plan is not low-carb, nor low-fat. According to its originator, the South Beach Diet plan “teaches you to rely on the right carbs and the right fats.”

This diet plan is comprised of three phases – Banishing your Cravings, Reintroducing Carbs, and A Diet for Life. Using artificial sweetener and low-fat milk in your coffee or green tea during all three phases is one way to go on losing weight without having to give up your brewed cup. Going decaf with your coffee might also be a good idea since the objective of this diet is maintaining even insulin levels. If you’re a green tea drinker, then there is less worries for you. Green tea contains only very few amounts of caffeine.

The Zone Diet Plan

The Zone Diet plan was developed by Barry Sears, a former biotechnology researcher at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. This diet plan is based on the maintenance and consistency of insulin levels. Because this diet plan also concerns itself with insulin control, the issues that arise are handled similarly as that with the South Beach Diet plan. Taking decaffeinated coffee and green tea is all right as long as these beverages don’t spike up your insulin. The eating program of the Zone Diet plan requires you to use artificial sweetener and low-fat milk in your coffee or green tea.

Blood Type Diet Plan

The Blood Type Diet plan is a weight loss regimen where the foods you eat are based on your blood type. The eating program of the Blood Type Diet plan is more restricted compared to the South Beach Diet plan, the Zone Diet plan, and the Atkins Diet plan. For instance, for people with blood types A and AB, coffee is highly advised. But for those with blood types O, adding coffee to the Blood Type Diet plan should be avoided. Green teas on the other hand are acceptable for any blood types. However, adding natural sweeteners like sugar, honey, stevia, or maple syrup in green tea should be avoided in this diet plan.

Sugar Busters Diet Plan

The name of the diet plan says it all. Subscribers to this diet plan are highly cautioned against sugars. Coffee and green teas are perfectly fine but only use artificial sweeteners.

Atkins Diet Plan

Another low-carb diet plan variety, the Atkins Diet plan works best with caffeine-free coffee and green tea. For best results, artificial sweeteners in your green tea and coffee are advised to keep your carbs down.

Paleolithic Diet Plan

Also called the Stone Age Diet plan, this diet plan is based on the consumption of simple, unprocessed foods that our Neanderthal ancestors would have eaten. This diet plan is perfect for green tea drinkers. Green tea is simple and 100% natural steamed dried leaves from the Camellia sinensis plant. If you’re a coffee drinker, you might be in for a tougher choice since you might have to give up coffee all together with this diet plan. Sugars in green teas are still a big no-no, especially the refined kind.

As you can see, there are plenty of options available to help you with your diet plan, and enjoying the benefits of green tea is a great place to start.

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When decide to start a dieting

Life has a way of fouling up our the best laid plans. First you decide to keep your car cleaner, "I'll wash it every Saturday morning." Great, you have a plan. Saturday comes along and someone calls inviting you to go golfing. You think, "I was going to wash the car, but I'll do it when I get back," and off you go. Maybe you do wash the car later that day, but maybe you tell yourself, "I'll wash it next Saturday. It really wasn't that dirty." 

Next week Saturday comes along and someone invited you camping so you're in the woods thinking, "Oh, well, I can't wash the car from here, can I?"

Another Saturday rolls around and  you've forgotten all about your car washing plan, so even though you're not doing anything else you're thinking, "I don't really FEEL like washing the car right now. I'll do it later," and so it goes.

"Life is what happens while you're busy making other plans."  -- John Lennon

It happens to all of us. You join the gym and immediately get the flu. Sign up for a adult education class and you're car breaks down on the first night. When you need to water the grass there's no rain in sight, but wash the car and what happens? These examples aren't meant to give you a pessimistic outlook but instead point out why persistence in the face of obstacles is what separates the haves from the have nots.

It's not what happens but what you DO with what happens that matters.

The best approach is one-day-at-a-time, or even lesser intervals depending on what you are attempting to do. If you're trying to quit smoking, you might want to take things half-an-hour at a time. With food or eating it can be one meal at a time, one hunger pang or craving at a time, or whatever interval works for you.

Choose your Time Interval then Make it Happen

If you say you'll never do something again (smoke, overeat, over drink) it never lasts (you must build in the possibility of occasional lapse), but if you wake up in the morning and decide for that day, and only that day, that you will follow through with your plan, for just that one day, then it can and will happen. There's a real rush of accomplishment when you wake up and realize that yesterday you did it; you accomplished what you set out to do. Each accomplishment make it just that much easier to decide again to follow-through and it gets easier and easier.   

Let the successes build, and let the lapses pass. It takes practice to get proficient no matter what you are learning, so plan to persist. Small lapses aren't failures, they are only lapses, and you then decided for the next time period. Doing this allows you to per-plan when you know you'll not stick to your eating plan, thereby making it okay on occasion to over indulge. Holidays, special occasions. People who maintain a healthy weight do this all the time without thinking. When you give yourself permission to indulge, it's amazing how much less you'll feel like indulging. Take away the forbidden fruit and it's just an apple.

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Children's Health

Your child's health includes physical, mental and social well-being. Most parents know the basics of keeping children healthy, like offering them healthy foods, making sure they get enough sleep and exercise and insuring their safety.
It is also important for children to get regular checkups with their health care provider. These visits are a chance to check your child's development. They are also a good time to catch or prevent problems.
Other than checkups, school-age children should be seen for

• Significant weight gain or loss
• Sleep problems or change in behavior
• Fever higher than 102
• Rashes or skin infections
• Frequent sore throats
• Breathing problems

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