Selasa, 31 Juli 2018

10 Tips to Supercharge Your Running Routine

Running bestows a broad range of health and fitness benefits, but those benefits are limited when you run the same way every single day. For instance, if you always run on a path, at the same speed, listening to your MP3 player, at the same time of day, on the same slope, in the same shoes, for the same distance...well, you are robbing yourself of some of the benefits you could be getting from all that valuable movement time.

There are many variables that affect the benefits your run can give you, and we rarely take the time to think about it. So, to help you spice up your running efforts and make sure that you reap the full rewards from each run workout, here are some ways to make your run workout more challenging and beneficial.

10 Tips to Enhance Your Run

  1. Vary Your Terrain
  2. Run Somewhere New
  3. Run In a Group
  4. Stop and Smell the Freakin' Roses
  5. Wear Different Shoes
  6. Run Tech Free
  7. Try Multi-tasking
  8. Carry Something
  9. Vary Your Speed
  10. Run More Often

Let's explore each tip in more detail.

1. Vary Your Terrain

There are 33 joints in each of your feet and when you run over rocks, roots, slopes, dips, and bumps each one of those joints deforms your foot (in a good way). This deformation creates load in those parts of your foot and that loadbearing makes your feet and ankles stronger, more resilient and healthier in general. But if you always run on man-made surfaces, there is nothing there that will destabilize and mobilize these joints. So you are missing out on some real run benefits by limiting your terrain. 

Whenever you can, add hills, slopes, and textures (dirt, gravel, sand) that will challenge your ankles, heels, and toes in ways that just don’t happen on flat, paved ground.

2. Run Somewhere New

Running in familiar territory can automatically change your responsiveness, both cognitively and physically, and can allow you to fall into a movement rut. Let's face it, mindless robotic running is not our goal.

Do anything that will help shake you out of being a dull running machine and into being an enthusiastic running human.

To minimize this issue, choose different routes, surroundings, directions, and distances. If you simply can’t mix it up, at least run that same route in a different direction so you get as many surprises as you can. Do anything you can that will help shake you out of being a dull running machine and into being an enthusiastic running human.

3. Run In a Group

Running with others can often force you out of your "comfortable pace" and that change of pace can result in working your body in different ways. Not only will running at different speeds widen your cardiovascular response to the workout, but it also engages different muscles, a different geometry of your limbs, and makes you a more well-rounded runner in general. 

Running in a group also means being social and that can change your mood for the better. It’s easy to focus on how tired you are or how much you "want this run to be over" when you are alone, but when you are engaged in a conversation or some friendly competition, the time can really fly by.


4. Stop and Smell the Freakin' Roses

Staying in your "running pose" for the entire run isn’t as beneficial as breaking up that repetitive movement with some counter movements. This can be a simple as taking a short walk break where you shake out your arms or deliberately take larger steps to release your hip flexors. But to really make the most of your full range of motion, you can throw in some squats, walking lunges, side gallops, jumping jacks, burpees, or even drop and give me 20.

Or, if you are out for a pleasure run (rather than a specific training run) why not actually stop running and examine those berries growing on the side of the trail? Or give that friendly dog a chin scratch? Or, literally, stop and smell the roses?

5. Wear Different Shoes

When I was a serious runner and was putting in over 100 kilometres per week, I had four pairs of shoes that I cycled through. A minimalist pair that helped me build and maintain foot strength, a cushioned pair for my longer runs, some racing flats for my speed work, and another pair that I just liked the look of and wore to the gym.

Shoes with a narrow toe-box can reduce how much you use the muscles that allow your foot to widen as you put weight on it. When you do this, your toes should naturally splay away from each other. If they aren’t allowed to make this movement, at least some of the time, you could develop some foot issues.

Also, a large heel-drop on a shoe can change the range of motion that your ankles go through. Believe it or not, this affects your knees, hips, spine, and all the way up to your neck and head.

6. Run Tech Free

Wearing technology every time you go out running can intrude on your mind's ability to give itself over to the body, which is when you really experience that feeling known as the "runners high." Plus, leaving your devices behind occasionally can free you from any preconceived notions you have of how far, fast, and long you are able to run.

It's easier to be aware of your head position, arm swing, knee drive, and footfall when you aren’t mesmerized by the mad rhymes of the Beastie Boys.

Leaving your MP3 player behind can occasionally be helpful too. Learning to pace yourself using just your footsteps, the sound of your breath, and the feeling of your stride is a great way to perfect your pace. It is also easier to be aware of your head position, your arm swing, your knee drive, and footfall when you aren’t mesmerized by the mad rhymes of the Beastie Boys.

7. Try Multi-tasking

On the other hand, if you can run farther or more often while getting something else done while you run, then let yourself indulge in some tech every once in a while. Mixing work-time and run-time is a great idea by taking a meeting on the run using some bluetooth headphones. Listen to an audiobook while you run (or a podcast) can help you learn something new. There is even some dictation software that could allow you to write the next great novel while you run.

Figuring out ways to be productive while you run means you may be inclined to make more time for it, and that is never a bad thing.


8. Carry Something

Grab something moderately heavy right now. Hold it in front of your torso and make note of how that feels. Now hold it over your head. Feel that? Every way that we hold an object requires that we balance and rebalance with a particular set of muscles. When we change the position of what we’re holding we also change the muscles being used. 

The same is true for the loads that we carry when we run. Backpacks, ankle weights, wrist weights, weighted vests, even the devices we carry or strap to our arms and wrists change the muscles we are using and how we use them. If you never carry anything when you run, give it a try. If you always carry your phone in your right hand, use your left. If you have access to ankle weights, try doing some short runs or sprints with them on. This isn’t an everyday type of idea but mixing it up occasionally can make us better runners and movers.

9. Vary Your Speed

We touched on this a little bit earlier but not only will running at different speeds widen your cardiovascular response to the run, it will also engage different muscles.

New runners often go out for every single run at what is referred to as a "tempo" effort. They basically try and go as hard as they can, for as long as they can, and as often as they can. Not only is that not a lot of fun and not helpful for becoming a well-rounded runner (or mover), but you will also hit your performance ceiling pretty quickly.

One of the aspects that we avid runners struggle with is the idea of running easy on our easy days and hard on our hard days. Running truly easy seems like a waste of time and running truly hard is—well—truly hard. So, instead, we remain in that middle ground and go stagnant. Don’t let this happen to you. Vary your speed, pace, and cadence during one particular run and also from one run workout to another.

10. Run More Often

If you always run once a day, most days of the week, and then spend the remainder of the day being sedentary, you are limiting your fitness, health, and general well being. Breaking up the repetitive geometry of being sedentary has actually been shown to change things like arterial function, muscle length, and mood. While those extended long runs do bestow some positive health outcomes, there are still more benefits that you are missing out on due to the fact that you are doing all your movement in one go.

Running to a yoga session is a great way to arrive warm and ready to be flexible.

Try breaking up your run into smaller chunks and intersperse them throughout your day. Or try running to your swim class and then jogging home. Running to a yoga session is a great way to arrive warm and ready to be flexible. Also, running is a great way to commute to and from work.

Finding creative ways to both indulge your running habit and also expand its effects on your body is a worthy endeavor.

I hope you are feeling inspired to get out there and mix up your running routine so that you'll enjoy running for many more years to come. 

For more info, tips, and to join the conversation, head over to Facebook.com/GetFitGuy or twitter.com/getfitguy. Also don't forget to subscribe to the Get-Fit Guy podcast on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, SoundCloud, Spotify, Google Play or via RSS.



How to Strengthen Relationships with 'Process Conversations'

Relationships. I just love relationships. Friends, shmoopies, vendors, colleagues, bosses. Relationships are great, because you get to interact with another person. And how do you know they’re another person, and not just your imaginary friend? Because they don’t behave how you expect! They’re different from you. They think differently. They react differently. They even smile differently. And that, sadly, is the problem with relationships as well. No matter how much we wish it were so, people just aren’t mindless automatons, behaving the way we want.

Most of these mismatches aren’t a problem, as long as you know they’re coming. Indeed, you might love hearing shmoopie’s stories about that time with the dog, the porcupine, and the two-gallon jug of raspberry jam. You might laugh and laugh and laugh! But, please, couldn’t it wait until not when you’re in the middle of trying to write the concluding paragraph of your thesis?

Set Expectations Up Front

When you start a new relationship, or when you check-in on an existing one, or when you quietly decide not to quit your job (this week), have a conversation where you set expectations about how you’ll conduct your relationship.

These are called “process conversations,” because you’re designing the process you’ll use to run your relationship. While process conversations don’t guarantee smooth sailing, they can help deal with predictable relationship issues in advance. And you can be sure there are plenty of predictable issues.

How Do We Communicate?

How does someone prefer to communicate? In this glorious age of information technology, true communication has never been more difficult. We’re overwhelmed from all sides. We mostly use text, which is extremely inefficient and lacks emotional cues. And we all have two dozen inboxes. 

One person might consider texting to be an extreme invasion of privacy. Another might want all communication to happen via text. Often, a person will have multiple communication platforms and use them for different things.

Agree on which communication medium to use for casual communication, emergencies, and event planning.

How Do You Like to Receive Feedback?

Being friends or colleagues, we of course want to give each other helpful advice. “Those pants you wore to the art opening last night? I know you love spandex, but sometimes you might want to choose your clothing based on criteria other than stretchability.”

Some people like feedback blunt. Some like it diplomatically. Some like it in writing, sent via text message. Some like it by voice. 

Agree on how you like to receive feedback and over what medium.

How Do You Work Best?

If you’re like me, you work best when you’re surrounded by friends and colleagues laughing and talking and having a great time...and then shutting up completely for 19 consecutive hours until my current project is done. At which time we can all laugh and talk and have a great time again.

Other people like to laugh and interact the whole time. Still others like to lock themselves in a cabin in Antarctica and only emerge once every six months. Establish respect for each others’ work habits early.


How Much Checking Up Do You Need?

When I first started working with Intern MG, I called him a week before a deadline to see how things were progressing. He almost bit my head off for doubting that he would turn in his deliverable on time. He’s not a man to be micro-managed.

Contrast this with my artist friend Sparkles. Sparkles lives in the moment. Very, very in-the-moment. If Sparkles is working on a project, I need to check in every couple of days to make sure things aren’t running wildly late.

Most people have a good sense of how closely they need to be managed. Ask and share. When you do work together, you’ll be able to hit the right balance for each other.

What’s Your Decision-making Style?

Some people like to have their hand in every pot. If there’s a decision to be made, they want in, whether or not they’re qualified to have an opinion on the decision. Some people prefer to leave decision-making to others. And most of us are in between.

Discuss how you like to be involved in decisions. When shmoopie and I are planning a vacation to Montreal, my decision-making style is easy. I say, “You make all the decisions. It’s a holiday. I don’t want to deal.” Shmoopie then makes all the decisions.

When we’re planning the house finances, however, it’s a very different story. I say, “We make decisions together, responsibly, taking into account our retirement plans, income for the year, and savings rates.” Then shmoopie takes out a second mortgage to pay for Presidential Suite accommodations on the trip to Montreal.

As you can see, reaching agreement on decision-making style can have tremendous implications for retirement.

Saying You’re Sorry

Fifty years ago in the movie "Love Story," Ali McGraw’s character Jennifer says, "Love means never having to say you’re sorry." "Love Story" was fiction. Plus, Jennifer dies. Who's sorry now, Ali? Who's sorry now?

Every relationship is made much more efficient if you just start apologizing on day one and keep apologizing for everything. If the other person says "You apologize too much!", apologize for that, too. Eventually, they’ll write you a very big check to go away and stop bothering them.

But while you’re still together, find out the other person’s apology language. Then you know how to apologize so they actually hear it as an apology. For details on the Five Apology Languages, check out Get-It-Done Guy episode 351.

Propose and Have that Initial Conversation

When should you set all this up? Now. Sometime early in a new relationship, have the process conversation. Don’t say, “Let’s have a process conversation.” Most people will look at you like you’ve lost your mind. Though the ones who jump at the chance will probably be great to be with. 

Instead, introduce the topic casually. “You know, I like to be able to be the best (boss, friend, co-worker, employee, shmoopie) I can. Would you object to that?” If they say yes they object, then that’s important information you can use. Run. Fast. Far away.

Otherwise, say, "Great." And then ask them about the various things we’ve been discussing. You may wonder if you can just start a process conversation, just like that? Yes. You can. Go do it.

Whether you’re getting a new boss, becoming a new boss, getting new co-workers, starting up with a new boyfriend, girlfriend, intersexfriend, husband, wife, or polyamorous family unit, a process conversation upfront can help it get off—and stay off—to a great start. Ask about communication channels, feedback, micromanagement, decision-making, and apologies. Pretty soon you’ll have a handbook for the relationship that will make it easy to have a great time together, putting your attention squarely on the agenda the two of you share.

I’m Stever Robbins. I like blunt feedback delivered kindly, and my apology language is acts of service. Follow GetItDoneGuy on Twitter and Facebook. If you have projects that are stalled or taking too long, check out my “Get-it-Done Groups” accountability groups. Learn more at http://SteverRobbins.com. Image of people engaged in process conversation © Shutterstock



What Is a Fecal Transplant? (Gross, Yes, But Also Life-Saving)

We have roughly the same amount of bacterial cells in our body as we do human cells, if not more. Our microbiome of bacteria, fungi, and viruses are populated by more than 10,000 different species that help protect us against infections and even assist in our reproductive health. The microscopic creatures living in our gut specifically help us digest food, aid our metabolism, and fight off gastrointestinal infections. In fact, our gut microbiome plays such an important role in our health that doctors are looking at ways to harness that power for fighting off infections.

Harnessing the power of the gut microbiome may sound pretty sophisticated, but what I’m really talking about here is poop. Specifically, poop transplants. How do poop transplants work and why would someone go in search of a poop donor in order to get a transplant?

What Is a Fecal Transplant?

A fecal (or stool or insert other of your favored words for poop here) transplant—also called a fecal microbiota transplantation (FMT for short) or, more generally, bacteriotherapy—is the transfer of stool from a person with a healthy gut microbiome to a sick person whose gut bacteria has somehow been disturbed from its natural order. The transfer is usually done directly to the colon or large intestine via a colonoscopy. Fecal transplants can also be done by a tube inserted into a patient’s stomach or sometimes by pill.

In standard medical practice, the majority of fecal transplants are used to treat an infection known as Clostridium Difficile (or C. diff). C. diff typically arises when a patient has taken a strong course of antibiotics that ends up killing too much of the desirable bacteria in the digestive tract. This can irritate the colon and cause painful, intense diarrhea that can even lead to death. One particularly horrific-sounding result of C. diff is known as toxic megacolon, where the colon becomes dangerously enlarged.

As many as half a million people in the United States suffer from C. diff annually and the infection results in as many as 15,000 deaths per year, usually among the elderly. C. diff infections and their associated treatments are also estimated to cost healthcare facilities in the United States $496 million and insurance companies over $547 million.

C. diff infections are most commonly treated with antibiotics but with limited success, particularly because antibiotics often caused the infection to begin with. Antibiotics disturb the healthy microorganisms, the very ones needed to fight off the C. diff, and the most common strains of C. diff are antibiotic-resistant.

Fecal transplants offer a potential simple, effective, and cheap alternative. By placing a healthy person’s stool, and the healthy microorganisms that come with it, into the sick patient’s colon, the balance of good versus bad bacteria can be re-established. The “good” bacteria competes with the C. diff and inhibits the invading infection’s growth.

Fecal transplants aren’t entirely new. There is some evidence that they were used in ancient Chinese medicine, offered in the form of yellow "soup," to treat food poisoning and severe diarrhea. Veterinarians also use a practice called transfaunation to transfer stomach microorganisms from a healthy animal to a sick one, like through cud from cows.

But how effective are fecal transplants? Broader studies still need to be done on larger groups of patients in order to definitively determine the effectiveness of sharing stool, but the initial results are promising. In a recent clinical trial, 20 patients with C. diff were given treatment: 9 had fecal transplants and 11 had a 10-day course of antibiotics. Five patients in each group were cured, as in they did not see a recurrence of the infection within 70 days. The four patients not cured by the transplants were then given antibiotics which cleared the infection for two of them.


What Is the Downside to Fecal Transplants?

Reading this you may think the downside to fecal transplants would be quite obvious—getting an enema or swallowing a tablet of someone else’s stool sounds pretty disgusting. But when faced with potentially life-threatening diarrhea, patients get over the “ick” factor pretty quickly. There are other factors to worry about when considering a fecal transplant.

Since doctors believe our gut microbiome affects so many aspects of our health, it’s possible that taking in someone else’s stool could bring with it other baggage. For example, there is at least one case study where a woman gained a significant amount of weight after she received a fecal transplant from her daughter who was herself overweight. Others have reported developing irritable bowel syndrome after a transplant.

Stool donors also have to be carefully screened for any diseases because even the healthiest looking person can be unwittingly harboring germs. The company OpenBiome which connects stool donors with needy recipients—and pays $40 per stool donation!—only accepts 3% of its potential donors after their initial screening is conducted.

Fecal transplants offer a promising alternative for fighting antibiotic-resistant strains of Clostridium Difficile.

The doctors at Johns Hopkins Medicine recommend that donors not have had any antibiotic exposure or tattooing or body piercing in the last 6 months, they should not be immunocompromised, have history of drug use or have recently traveled to endemic areas. They should also, of course, be free of gastrointestinal disorders themselves and will be tested for infectious pathogens like Hepatitis or HIV.

Without proper tests, a suitable stool donor cannot be identified and so medical advice says not to try fecal transplants at home without the support of your doctor. There have been reports of would-be do-it-yourselfers using the wrong kind of gelatin capsules to create their own fecal transplant pill. Some of the gelatin pill casings easily bought online dissolve far more quickly than those used in proper transplants, which causes the stool to be released in other places throughout the body before it can get to the large intestine. Rogue stool roaming the stomach and small intestine can lead to bloating, congestion, and diarrhea that can last years.

The Bottom Line on Fecal Transplants

For now, fecal transplants offer a promising alternative for fighting antibiotic-resistant strains of Clostridium Difficile. More research is needed to determine what makes the ideal stool donor, how best to prepare the stool for transplant, and the best way to transplant it to the recipient. Further studies will also have to be done to determine whether fecal transplants can help fight ailments other than C. diff, like inflammatory bowel disease (including ulcerative colitis and Crohn’s disease), irritable bowel disease, obesity, Type II diabetes and any other gastrointestinal disorders related to gut microbiota.

Until next time, this is Sabrina Stierwalt with Everyday Einstein’s Quick and Dirty Tips for helping you make sense of science. You can become a fan of Everyday Einstein on Facebook or follow me on Twitter, where I’m @QDTeinstein. If you have a question that you’d like to see on a future episode, send me an email at everydayeinstein@quickanddirtytips.comImage © shutterstock.



Minggu, 29 Juli 2018

4 Reasons Aunts and Uncles Are Essential to Parenting

As the oldest of five siblings, when we adopted our first baby and were then blessed with seven more, not only was I super excited, but my sister and brothers were equally as thrilled. They jumped right in and helped with feedings, babysitting and yes, even diaper changing! As my kids grew and started playing sports, acting in school plays, or needing rides to a practice or work, they always had an aunt or uncle to turn to if mom or dad weren’t available.

As a parent, I’ve loved that my kids have had their aunts and uncles to lean on regardless of whether or not I’m able to support them. It’s a huge comfort knowing that the family unit I grew up with—and in which I acted as a second mother, being the oldest—is so close to my eight kids. I’m not sure if Hallmark has cards to celebrate this special family relationship, but if they did I’d be sending them off by the dozens to my siblings.

If your kids are fortunate enough to have a loving aunt/uncle relationship to tap into as they grow and mature, consider your family lucky and embrace it. Today, Mighty Mommy shares four important reasons families should welcome the special bond between kids and their aunts and uncles. 

4 Important Reasons to Embrace Aunts and Uncles

  1. A Strong Role Model
  2. Shoulder to Lean On
  3. Unconditional Cheerleader
  4. Bonds You and Your Sibling

Here are each in more detail.

1. A Strong Role Model

Today’s youth are heavily influenced by many factors outside of our own homes. Social media platforms, peer pressure, suggestive television and cable programs, massive marketing and consumer campaigns, and their obsession with smartphones and electronics are ultimately persuading our kids to make choices, good and bad, on a very consistent basis.

Many kids are also growing up in a home in which both parents are away at work and, for many, single parent family-units are becoming the norm. I can relate. Having been divorced for five years now, my kids went from having their mom home every day after school to now having an empty home environment until I return after my 10-hour workday, many nights exhausted, in time to make dinner and oversee homework.

Although my kids have active lives with sports and other activities, on the days I just can’t get home to help with the carpool or to figure out how we’re going to build someone’s science project out of empty toilet paper tubes, my kids have been able to rely on one of their aunts or uncles to keep the home fires burning until I pull in the driveway.

One of my brothers is an emergency room physician. He only recently married so he’s always been hands-on in helping with transportation, meal preparation, unforeseen medical mishaps, and is just a great listener when my kids need to dump their problems. My brother is ten years younger than me and considers himself very youthful and in touch with this younger generation. (I’m still better at fashion than he is!) I’ve tried never to take him and the rest of my sibling group for granted because of the positive impact they have on their nieces and nephews.

I’ve always loved the expression that it takes a village to raise a child, and when it comes to family—particularly aunts and uncles—I can’t think of a better support system and role models for our kids than these people.

2. A Shoulder to Lean On

Because of the dynamics of our family being so large, there have been a good handful of moments when, unfortunately, their dad and I just haven’t been the support system they needed.

Sometimes a child gets themselves into a bind and needs advice, but doesn’t want to tell their mom or dad. Or perhaps they are fighting with their mother or father and need to vent to someone they feel they can trust. An aunt or uncle can be that special shoulder to lean on.

For example, a couple of years ago one of my newly licensed sons was pulled over on a weekend night after midnight. One of his headlights was out. He became nervous and went into panic mode. The police officer sensed his anxiety and decided to search the car. (It being my minivan, it naturally was a mess, my own fault for not having cleaned it during the entire baseball season.) When the officer checked the rear storage, he found a few bottles of wine. (Yes, these were mine—I couldn’t pass on the two-for-$20 Pinot Grigio sale at our local wine store.)

My anxious son freaked out when the officer questioned him about the wine and worked himself into such a tizzy that the police officer suggested that he not drive home. My son was a nervous wreck, somewhat embarrassed (his new girlfriend was in the car), and didn’t know what to do next. Instead of calling me, he decided to call his uncle.


My brother drove right to the place he had been pulled over, parked my minivan, and drove my son’s girlfriend home and then brought him back to his house. They talked about how he was feeling, and then I got the call from my brother that everything was fine, but that they’d be back in the morning with my car.

What a relief for me as the parent to know my son was safe but that he had someone to talk to and helped guide him in the right direction.

The most important thing is to have an adult to turn to when it's necessary for the child and not always convenient for the parent. It’s comforting for me as a mother to know that my kids have special family members they can lean on during awkward or difficult times.

3. An Unconditional Cheerleader

When I finally became a parent, not only did I know I’d love my kids to the moon and back, I also figured I’d be their biggest support system. When they were learning to walk, stack blocks, name their colors, or use the potty, I held my pom poms tightly and waved them frantically so that my kids would know what a fantastic job they were doing.

We never expected three of our children to have significant speech delays. When most 12-month-old babies are learning to say “mama” and “dada,” three of our kids didn’t utter these precious words until they were nearly three. Though we stayed the course and encouraged them over all their hurdles, there were plenty of days when I simply just didn’t have it. But you know who did? My kid’s aunts and uncles. They were right there every step of the way, with every new word and sentence, cheering them (and us!) on unconditionally.

Now that my kids are teens and college-aged (and all talking a mile a minute), they really respond favorably and gratefully to the time their aunts and uncles spend with them. It might just be a text they receive asking how they did on their final exam or an invite to go to the popular new movie that just released. When they connect with their aunts and uncles, they feel special! They admit that it feels great to know other adults in their circle are interested in their well-being. As a parent, it feels even better to know that people you trust have a genuine interest in supporting and unconditionally loving your kids.

4. Bonds You and Your Sibling

When I longed to become a mom my main focus was on the love I would offer a child simply because I had dreamed of all things motherhood since I was a little girl. I knew deep in my heart I would cherish all those mommy moments—cuddling and feeding a precious newborn, tucking in a weary toddler who had run me ragged all day long, reading a pre-schooler magical nursery rhymes, hugging a teen who wouldn’t pass their driver’s license test on the first try—the list goes on and on.

What I didn’t factor into this parenting equation were the feelings of deep gratitude and pride that would envelop me as I watched my own brothers and sister love and care for my eight kids during their pivotal, milestone moments. They’ve been at my side when one of my kids has hit a home run, struck out with bases loaded, aced their SATs or didn’t get asked to the prom because they had a learning disability. During life’s incredible ups and downs, my siblings—my kids' aunts and uncles—have experienced their highs and lows right alongside me.

Being in the throes of so many amazing and disappointing childrearing moments for the past 25 years can still take my breath away, but the fact that I’ve experienced most of them with my siblings has been a gift that I hope I’ll never take for granted. Best of all, my kids have witnessed the bond my sister and brothers and I have shared since becoming a mom—something I truly cherish as I hope they will someday with their own families.

What impact have aunts and uncles made in your child’s life? Share your thoughts in the comment section at quickanddirtytips.com/mighty-mommyor post your ideas on the Mighty Mommy Facebook page. You can also connect with me on Twitter @MightyMommy or email me at mommy@quickanddirtytips.com.  Visit my family-friendly boards at Pinterest.com/MightyMommyQDT. Image of aunt and uncle playing with nephew © Shutterstock.



Jumat, 27 Juli 2018

5 Wily Ways to Encourage Summer Reading

We as parents all know the drill: try our darndest to keep our kids reading throughout the summer so when they hit the books again in the fall, they still have momentum. Momentum is everything when it comes to kids and reading. 

In Why Summer Reading Pays Off Year-Round, Laurie Calvert, a teacher who is working as the Director of Teacher Outreach at the US Department of Education, emphasizes that the "summer slide"—the tendency for students, especially those from low-income families, to lose some of the achievement gains they made during the previous school year—can be avoided by ensuring that children are both as engaged as possible in whatever they choose to read and read consistently.

Keeping our kids, particularly our tweens and teens, reading all summer long is easier said than done. Though we all have good intentions to keep the pages turning during the lazy, hazy days of summer, there are many families who scramble to achieve this when late August graces our calendar.

Although summer is nearing the halfway mark, there is still time to engage your vacationing cherubs to get on board and indulge in a good read. Here are 5 ways you can encourage some serious summer reading before those school bells begin to ring next month.

5 Ways to Encourage Summer Reading

1. Let Your Kids Read to You.

A fun way to mix it up with summer reading (and all year long) is to let your kids read to you. One idea is to create a list of your favorite childhood stories and share these with your kids. Give them brief descriptions of favorite classics such as Charlotte’s Web, Anne of Green Gables, or The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe. Have your child read the stories aloud to you and then discuss whether the book will become one of her favorites and why.

2. Write a Story Together.

Sometimes it’s a lot more fun to read something you’ve written yourself. Create your own characters and a crazy plot and have at it. You can add photos or graphic design images to your story. Penning a summer story is a great way to reinforce the five Ws of storytelling, which are usually used in school reports. Write a story together every school year and summer so you will have a special keepsake—and a great record of how your child’s writing has improved since the previous year. Get the book published at the end of the summer and continue the tradition right through until they graduate high school or head off to college.

3. Research the Summer Reading List.

The ALSC, Association for Library Service to Children, is a wonderful resource for not only summer reading suggestions but for engaging your child in the fantastic world of books all year long. Each year, the ALSC compiles an exciting list of suggested summer reads for Birth-Preschool and grades K-2, 3-5 and 6-8. Now that August is about to heat up, chill out with your child as you sit down together, over an ice cream sundae perhaps, and peruse this year’s list. Discuss the titles and why they might make an interesting choice. Now head over to your local library and check them out. It’s fun for parents to read these titles as well—a great way to stay on the same page together!

4. Create a Reading/Movie Weekend.

There are many popular, published titles that are not only in print but have also been made into bestselling movies. List out some ideas such as the Harry Potter series or The Diary of a Wimpy Kid and pick a weekend where you and your child can read the book then kick back and watch the movie. And don’t forget the popcorn!

5. Check Out Goodreads Teen Reading List.

High Schoolers leave the classroom in June knowing that they have to fulfill their summer reading list before stepping back through those same doors in September. Often, the required reads hold absolutely no interest to them and the entire summer reading experience is painful and dreary. Suggest that your teen take a look at the popular list available on Goodreads. Here they just might find a title that piques their interest and keeps them reading all year long.

For more ideas, visit the Mighty Mommy page at Quick and Dirty Tips.



Does Revenge Work? Our Minds on Vengeance

Kamis, 26 Juli 2018

Is Conversate a Word?

A while ago, I was on a call-in radio program, and one of the callers asked about the words “commentate” and “conversate.” She hadn’t even thought “conversate” was a word until a friend of hers used it, and she laughed, thinking it was a joke, only to realize her friend was using it in all seriousness. She and another caller also brought up the word “orientate.” These three words have something in common, and it’s not just that they all end in “-ate” and people wonder about their legitimacy. They also were all formed by a process called back-formation. Back-formation isn’t always a bad thing, but it can sometimes cause a problem. 

Form a New Word by Adding a Suffix: Suffixation

When you start to use a verb ending in “-ate” or “-icate,” check to see if there is a shorter verb that has the same meaning.

To understand back-formation, let’s first think about another word-formation process, suffixation. Suffixation is common. Take the verb “syndicate.” The noun “syndication” was created from “syndicate” by adding the suffix “-ion.” So you’d think the noun “donation” was created by putting a suffix on the verb “donate,” right?

Form a New Word by Removing a Suffix: Back-Formation

Surprise! It wasn’t. The noun “donation” entered the language first, in the 15th century, and only later, in the 19th century, was the verb “donate” formed by removing the suffix.

How can you tell whether one word was derived from another by adding a suffix, or the process went in the opposite direction, via back-formation? Unless you check a dictionary, or you were alive to notice the newer word entering the language, you can’t. And it usually doesn’t matter, either. Both “syndicate” and “donate” are 100% acceptable, standard English words.

Examples of Back-Formation

Back-formation can happen with other suffixes, too. For example, the word “pea” (meaning the vegetable), was created by back-formation from the word “pease,” spelled P-E-A-S-E. The word “pease” sounds plural, but it was actually a singular noun, kind of like “oatmeal” or “mush.” But “pease” sounded so much like a plural that it was interpreted as one, and people formed the singular word “pea” by stripping away what they perceived to be a plural suffix.

Another example of back-formation is the verb "edit," which comes from the noun "editor."

Another well-known example, relevant to many of my listeners, is “edit.” The noun “editor” entered the English language first, and about 100 years later, the “-or” suffix was removed to give us the verb “edit.”


Troublesome Back-formations: Commentate, Orientate, Conversate 

So when does back-formation cause a problem? Looking at the verbs the callers asked about, they were back-formed (or should I say “back-formatted”?) from the nouns “commentator,” “orientation,” and “conversation,” by removing the “-or” or “ion” suffixes. The trouble is that verbs corresponding to these nouns already exist: “comment,” “orient,” and “converse.”

When language devotees hear back-formed variants such as “commentate,” “orientate,” or “conversate,” they probably feel the way I do when someone else in the house buys and opens a new jar of mayonnaise without checking to see if there’s one already open in the refrigerator. They’ve wasted money and space in the fridge, and now we have two jars to deal with instead of one.

In the case of these verbs, there are now two verbs cluttering up the place where only one verb needs to be—and to make matters worse, these verbs have an extra syllable. The same objection applies to “administrate,” “informate,” “observate,” “imaginate,” and other back-formed verbs.

I was on that radio program again a few weeks later, and that time a caller told a story about hearing someone say “certificate” [pronounced “SERT-i-fi-KATE”]. “Certificate” is a clear back-formation from the noun “certification,” but like the other verbs we’ve been talking about, there’s an already-existing verb with two fewer syllables that means the same thing: “certify.”

Avoid Needless Back-formations

Our Quick and Dirty Tip for better writing is whenever you start to use a verb ending in “-ate” or “-icate,” make it a habit to check if there is a verb without that suffix and with the same meaning. If so, use the shorter verb. If you’re not sure, check a dictionary.

Some Odd Back-formations Have Special Uses

The key phrase is “with the same meaning.” Needless as some of these back-formations may have been when they were coined, some have gained legitimacy by developing meanings that are different from the earlier-existing verbs. “Commentate,” for example, doesn’t mean precisely the same thing as “comment.” It carries more of an idea of a continued, systematic commentary, for a political or sporting event, as it occurs (1).

“Informate” in the field of information technology has a specific meaning of extracting information from something (2). If you hear it, the speaker may have chosen the back-formed verb because it had a more precise and appropriate meaning.


Some Back-formations Are More Acceptable in Different Dialects

Also be aware that some back-formed verbs are variants from other dialects. Although “orientate” is often criticized in American English, in British English it is actually preferred over “orient (3).” “Conversate” not only is a word in African-American English, but also has a more specialized meaning than “converse”; it tends to have more connotations of small talk or flirtation. It’s also favored by rappers, as in this line I found in the Corpus of Contemporary American English (4), in a rap about AIDS: “There's no debate, conversate with your mate / And don't wait until it's too late.”

Of course, just because a word is well-accepted in one dialect doesn’t mean it’s appropriate for use in something written for work or school. I should note that even on the Urban Dictionary website (5), “conversate” is ridiculed and condemned. As with all your writing, know what kind of language your audience is expecting, and choose your words accordingly.

This article was written by Neal Whitman, an independent writer and consultant specializing in language and grammar. He blogs at Literal Minded and tweets at @LiteralMinded.

More Examples of Back-formations

  • Automate, a back-formation from "automation"
  • Burgle, a back-formation from "burglar"
  • Choreograph, a back-formation from "choreography"
  • Complicit, a back-formation from "complicity"
  • Curate, a back-formation from "curator"
  • Ditz, a back-formation from "ditzy"
  • Emote, a back-formation from "emotion"
  • Enthuse, a back-formation from "enthusiasm"
  • Eponym, a back-formation from "eponymous"
  • Greed, a back-formation from "greedy"
  • Injure, a back-formation from "injury"
  • Isolate, a back-formation from "isolated"
  • Laze, a back-formation from "lazy"
  • Legislate, a back-formation from "legislation"
  • Liaise, a back-formation from "liaison"
  • Luminesce, a back-formation from "luminescent"
  • Lyse, a back-formation from "lysis"
  • Peeve, a back-formation from "peevish"
  • Remediate, a back-formation from "remediation"
  • Reminisce, a back-formation from "reminiscence"
  • Sanitate, a back-formation from "sanitation"
  • Scavenge, a back-formation from "scavenger"
  • Sleaze, a back-formation from "sleazy"
  • Snoot, a back-formation from "snooty"
  • Statistic, a back-formation from "statistics"
  • Surreal, a back-formation from "surrealism"
  • Surveil, a back-formation from "surveillance"
  • Televise, a back-formation from "television"
  • Tweeze, a back-formation from "tweezers"
  • Upholster, a back-formation from "upholstery" or "upholsterer"
  • Volunteer, a back-formation from "volunteering"
  • Wrinkle, a back-formation from "wrinkled"

References

  1. “Commentate.” Oxford English Dictionary.
  2. Arnold Zwicky. Jan. 23, 2010. “Informate.” Post on Arnold Zwicky’s Blog, http://arnoldzwicky.wordpress.com/2010/01/23/informate/, accessed July 24, 2018.
  3. “Orientate.” Oxford English Dictionary.
  4. Mark Davies. Corpus of Contemporary American English. http://corpus.byu.edu/coca/, accessed Feb. 24, 2011.
  5. “Conversate.” Urban Dictionary. http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=conversate, accessed July 24, 2018. 

 



How to Write About Anniversaries

This week is the 12th anniversary of the Grammar Girl podcast. Yes, 12 years ago, I sat in a coffeeshop on the beach in Santa Cruz, California, jotted three episode ideas on a napkin, and went home and recorded the first shows. 

A lot has happened since then, but one thing that hasn’t changed in 12 years is confusion and irritation about the word itself: “anniversary.”

‘12th Anniversary’ or ’12-Year Anniversary’?

“Anniversary” has the meaning “year” embedded in it. The word comes from the Latin “annus” which means "year" and “versus,” which means "to turn." So an anniversary marks the turning of a year.

That’s why it’s better to say we’re celebrating our 12th anniversary instead of our 12-year anniversary. It’s our twelfth turn of the year, not our twelve year turn of the year.

It’s better to say we’re celebrating our 12th anniversary instead of our 12-year anniversary.

‘Anniversaries’ That Are Less Than a Year?

And although many young romantics talk about celebrating their 6-week dating anniversary, and although it’s cute, it’s technically not correct since anniversaries relate to years. 

Language can change and often deviates from its original literal meaning. I’m sure it won’t surprise long-time listeners when I say that people have been using the word “anniversary” to refer to things that span weeks or months for more than 100 years. Right? For 12 years, I’ve been telling you the thing that annoys you has been going on for a long time. “Anniversary” is used to describe time spans of less than a year so often that this use is included in the Merriam-Webster dictionary definition of “anniversary.” American Heritage Dictionary includes it too. The Oxford English Dictionary and dictionary.com are more restrictive in this case, limiting the definition of “anniversary” to an annual event.

Although, I doubt many of us will have much luck trying to convince lovebirds to stick with proper language for dating celebrations, the Associated Press does say to avoid using the word “anniversary” for things that aren’t a whole year. For example, they frown on phrases such as “six-month anniversary.” So if you’re a professional writer, you should still toe the line and write about only yearly anniversaries. If you need to write about shorter milestones, you can try something like “James and Sonja are celebrating 12 weeks of marriage.”

‘Monthsary’

I do find it interesting that some people have tried to create a word for shorter milestones though. It’d be convenient to have one. For example, in the Philippines, couples celebrate “monthsaries.” They can even buy monthsary cards for each other, but it hasn’t caught on in the United States yet.

That’s your Quick and Dirty Tip: Use ordinal numbers for anniversaries, for example wishing someone a happy 12th anniversary, and for professional writing or if you want to be especially proper, use “anniversary” to refer to only annual celebrations.

Image courtesy of Shutterstock.



How Bedtime Yoga Can Help You Sleep Better

Many people find that exercising in the morning can actually help to energize them and prepare them for the day. Conversely, exercising at night, especially too close to bedtime, can have a negative effect on your ability to get some deep and restorative sleep. While a vigorous workout can help ease stress, if it is done too close to your bedtime, you may have some trouble falling asleep afterwards. 

I know that there are many issues that can cause sleepless nights. We all have busy lives, heavy responsibilities, tight schedules, looming deadlines, and demanding families. We may also have more positive things in our lives that affect our sleep such as piles of new creative ideas, exciting events that we are looking forward to, or a new bike that we are itching to ride. We might also disrupt our sleep by socializing too much and too late in the day, or by simply trying to shoehorn too much into our day, which can bump rest and relaxation down the bottom of our to-do list.

Our lifestyle can indeed disrupt our best intentions and disrupt our slumber, which can, in turn, disrupt our sense of well-being. So, here is a quick and dirty tip for you: try keeping a yoga mat beside your bed and spend about 15-20 minutes performing some of these yoga poses to enhance your ability to truly sleep like an extremely relaxed log.

How Can Yoga Help You Sleep?

If you set aside an area or space for your "before-bed stretching practice," you can outfit it with things like candles, incense, pillows, music, and other things that help you (and I mean you in particular, not necessarily what you see in magazines) feel more relaxed and at ease. That might be a statue of a yogi, or it might be putting on a certain song, or simply wearing a t-shirt that you have owned so long it's more holes than shirt. This is completely up to you and what makes you feel relaxed.

The 15-20 minutes that you are spending focusing on yourself is also 15-20 minutes that you are not focussing on the TV, email, or your phone.

If you have aching muscles or joint pain, gentle stretching and breath work can help work the aches out and allow you to get better sleep. It can also help release the tension you built up all day. When you go to bed feeling relaxed and at ease, you'll have a much better sleep than nights where you carry your anger and stress to bed.

The 15-20 minutes that you are spending focusing on yourself is also 15-20 minutes that you are not focussing on the TV, email, or your phone. These devices have been shown to disrupt your sleep and even impair your body's ability to secrete the sleep hormone called melatonin.

Bedtime routines are not just helpful for children, we all benefit from giving our mind and body queues that the day is over and it is time to shut down for the night.  

How to Do Bedtime Yoga

There are many different types of yoga poses that you can practice and each one is designed to activate different parts of your mind and body. So, before bed, we want to keep the poses relaxing, slow, easy, and balanced. No power yoga allowed. All the poses should be comfortable and held for a little longer than you might hold them in a regular yoga session. The focus should also be on the breath—slow and steady breathing in through the nose, out through the mouth. For more info on that, check out the article called How to Breathe More Effectively

Here is a series you can try before you go to bed tonight. 

Virasana (Hero Pose) Kneel with your knees bent and your legs folded under you. The top of your feet should be flat on the floor, your spine straight, with your shoulders and head aligned over your hips. Hero pose is a great place to start our relaxation to get your body and mind to calm down. It is a grounding pose that can help make you feel physically and emotionally more stable. Start in this pose and feel your breath get deeper and more relaxed as you settle in. 

Marjaryasana/Bitilasana Flow (Cat / Cow) Move on to hands and knees and put your spine into a neutral position. Your shoulders should be above your wrists and your hips above knees. Move slowly through a few rounds of Cat and Cow, breathing in through the nose on the Cat and out through the mouth on the Cow movement. Make sure the movement starts with the tailbone and ripples up through the spine in a relaxing and easy way. It can help to let your breath initiate the movement rather than the body. 


Bharadvaja's Twist (Winding Down Twist)

Sit cross-legged and exhale as you put your right hand on to your left knee and your left hand on to the floor behind you. Rotate and twist your torso very gently to the left, allowing your eyes and head to follow. Stay here for a few deep breaths, then relax back to center and prepare to repeat it again on the opposite side. You can do each side as many times as you need to feel a full release in your back. 

Supta Baddha Konasana (Reclining Bound Angle Pose)

Lay down like a frog on its back, with your knees bent. Bring the soles of your feet together and concentrate on letting your knees fall open, don't force them down. Let your arms rest beside you on the bed. If you feel any pain or discomfort in your hips, you can support your legs with pillows under each knee.

Balasana (Child's Pose)

Start by kneeling comfortably on your heels. Drape your torso forward, allowing your forehead to rest gently on the floor in front of you. Allow your chest to relax down, as close to your knees as you can without forcing it. Extend your arms in front of you and gently relax into the pose and breathe.

Ananda Balasana (Happy Baby Pose)

Lay down on your back and hug your knees into your chest. Cross your legs at the ankles and then wrap both of your arms around your shins. Inhale slowly and deeply and allow your body to rock up into a sitting position then exhale and roll back down. You can also rock side to side or whichever way your breath and your body takes you. 

Vipareet Karani (Legs up the Wall)

Legs up the wall pose is a wonderful way to finish the movement part of this sequence because it is the ultimate restorative pose (a great pose to use after any hard training session). It really is as easy as it sounds too. Lay down near a wall, put your legs up the wall so your body forms an L shape. Breathe deeply and let the stress of the day drain out of your legs. 

Savasana (Corpse Pose)

To anyone who is new to yoga, this one may seem too simple to be effective but it is the icing on the pre-bed yoga cupcake. For this one, you can actually get into bed and lay down on your back with your arms at your sides and a little away from your body. The palms of your hands should be facing up toward the ceiling, over or under the blanket. All you need to do is let your legs relax and allow your feet to fall to the sides. Then close your eyes, let the rest of your body fully relax and, of course, breathe.

4-7-8 Breathing

While you are in the Savasana pose, try breathing in this relaxing 4-7-8 pattern. Start by exhaling completely through your mouth so you are beginning the pattern with empty lungs. Then close your mouth and inhale quietly through your nose to a count of four (I like to use my heart beat as my metronome). Then hold your breath for seven beats and exhale slowly through your mouth, for eight beats. Start from the beginning and repeat the cycle at least three more times or until you fall asleep.

After you complete these poses and stretches, you will feel relaxed enough to sleep as deeply as you have ever slept (or your money back). Like most things in life, this will get better and more effective the more you practice it. If you do this sequence (or one similar to it) most nights for a week or two, then your sleep will get more and more restful and deep.

Wake up every morning feeling like a million bucks instead of smashing your alarm clock into a million bits.

If getting a good night's sleep is a larger issue for you, you will likely want to (or need to) make other lifestyle changes as well. Changes like reducing or eliminating alcohol before bed, not drinking caffeine in the afternoon and evening, and avoiding eating anything within two or three hours of bedtime. Making sure your bedroom is cool, quiet, and dark is also a great idea. If you do all of these things, you will be well on your way to waking up every morning feeling like a million bucks instead of smashing your alarm clock into a million bits.

For more sleep info, slumber tips, and to join the yoga conversation, head over to Facebook.com/GetFitGuy or twitter.com/getfitguy.

Also, if you like podcasts, don't forget to subscribe to the Get-Fit Guy podcast on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, SoundCloud, Spotify, Google Play or via RSS.



The Poison Chronicles: The Arsenic Poisoning of Napoleon Bonaparte

The unrelenting abdominal pain was like a knife slicing through flesh and muscle and organs, again and again, day after day, week after week, without the relief of death.

Napoleon Bonaparte had risen from nowhere to become the most powerful person on earth. He had ruled an empire of his own making which, at its apogee, stretched from the Atlantic Ocean to Russia, from the icy Baltic to the sapphire-blue Ionian Sea, and comprised some seventy million souls. But, having lost the great battle of Waterloo in June 1815, he became emperor of two rooms in a rat-infested, mildewed house on a rock in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, the island of St. Helena, a 70-day sail from France. Soon, his empire would shrink even further, to a wooden box six feet long, two-and-a-half feet wide, and two feet high.

British army surgeon Walter Henry said St. Helena was “the ugliest and most dismal rock conceivable of rugged and splintered surface, rising like an enormous black wart from the face of the deep.”
The island was a port of call for ships traveling to India or South Africa to take on fresh water and supplies. In 1815, it had a population of 4,000, including a garrison of 1,000 men. Napoleon’s flotilla brought an additional 2,000 soldiers to guard him. His new home, Longwood House, was a sprawling, one-story building of pale yellow stucco and twenty-three rooms. About fifty people lived there, including Napoleon’s servants and British guards.

Now, his biggest enemy wasn’t the duke of Wellington or the czar of Russia; it was the stultifying boredom. Though he had brought 1,500 books with him, he remarked that he needed 60,000 to keep him occupied. Up to six hours a day, he dictated his memoirs to a secretary.
Every evening at eight, a servant in an embroidered green coat and black silk knee breeches announced, “His Majesty’s dinner is served.” Napoleon, his aides, and their wives sat down to a formal dinner on silver platters and Sèvres china. Periodically, a giant rat skittered across the room as the diners politely ignored it. After dinner, everyone played cards. Then they listened as Napoleon relived his greatest battles or read out loud. If he managed to stay up until eleven, he would say, “Another victory over time.”

Perhaps his wisest step in staying healthy, however, was keeping far away from doctors.

Throughout his life, Napoleon had enjoyed excellent health. He exercised regularly, drank alcohol in moderation, and scrubbed himself in a hot bath every morning. Perhaps his wisest step in staying healthy, however, was keeping far away from doctors. Whenever he met a physician, his first question was invariably, “Monsieur, how many patients have you killed in your practice?” He rarely, if ever, took medication or submitted to bleeding, purging, and puking.

His first year on St. Helena, Napoleon was allowed to ride around the island and walk into the port of Jamestown, conversing freely with those he met. However, a new British Governor, Sir Hudson Lowe, arrived in October 1816, fretting day and night about the dishonor he would suffer if the most important prisoner in the history of the world escaped on his watch. He placed more and more insulting restrictions on Napoleon. Refusing to be guarded by babysitters in red coats, Napoleon stopped riding and walking all together. With the sudden cessation of exercise, he rapidly gained weight and began to suffer swollen feet, headaches, bleeding gums, and a cough.


On September 20, 1817, for the first time he complained of a dull pain in the area of the torso roughly parallel to his right elbow. From that day forward — other than a period of remission from October 1819 to June 1820 — he was never completely free from the symptoms, which included nausea, vomiting, sleeplessness, constipation, and depression.

In July 1820, he grew fatigued from the slightest exertion. His pulse was irregular, his hands and feet freezing cold. By the spring of 1821, he could no longer walk without assistance and could barely eat, merely sucking the juice out of meat. The pain in his right side had spread over his entire abdomen.

Indeed, many powerful people wanted Napoleon dead.

The emperor lost at least twenty pounds in a few months. When his Italian doctor, François Carlo Antommarchi, urged him to take medications, Napoleon snorted, “Keep your medicines, I don’t want to have two diseases, the one I have already and the one you’ll give me.”

On April 2, he told his English physician, Archibald Arnott, “I have here a sharp pain that, when I feel it, is like being cut with a razor; do you think the pylorus [the bottom of the stomach connected to the duodenum] is affected? My father died of that. Is it not hereditary?” In 1785, the physician who performed Carlo Buonaparte’s autopsy had found in the stomach a “tumor of semi-cartilaginous consistency, which was of the shape and size of a large potato or a large elongated pear."

Dr. Arnott reassured him that it was merely gas, and if he took his medication it would go away. The emperor refused.

On April 15, 1821, he wrote in his will, “I die prematurely, assassinated by the English oligarchy and its hired killer: the English nation will not be slow in avenging me.”

After two more weeks of agony, he added, “After my death, which cannot be far off, I want you to open my body...I recommend that you examine my stomach very carefully, make a precise, detailed report on it...I bequeath to all the ruling families the horror and shame of my last moments.”

Indeed, many powerful people wanted Napoleon dead. King Louis XVIII of France — the old, cowardly, unpopular brother of Louis XVI — sat uneasily on a sagging throne. Many Frenchmen longed for Napoleon to come back with the energizing spirit of the Revolution.

Britain, which had taken custody of Napoleon, feared he would escape the island, round up another army and attack England, despite the fortune they spent annually on keeping him in exile. And the ruler of Germany, Austria, Spain, Italy, and Russia would have loved to see him safely buried — if, that is, his death seemed natural. News of his murder would surely cause revolutions to spring up in Napoleon’s name.


By the end of April, he was delirious and vomiting material that looked like coffee grounds—a sign of what we now know to be gastro-intestinal bleeding. Periodically, he fell into comas.

On April 26, he saw his beloved first wife Josephine, who had died of pneumonia seven years earlier. “She told me that we were about to see each other again,” he said, “never more to part; she assured me that — did you see her?”

On the night of May 4, he mumbled about France, the army, and Josephine. The following day he fell into a coma and died at the age of 51.

Louis Marchand, the emperor’s faithful valet who had been by his side every day on St. Helena, washed the body with eau de cologne and, with two assistant valets, laid it out on a trestle table in the billiard room where the emperor had studied maps.

This was, perhaps, the most important autopsy ever performed. At three p.m., Napoleon’s physician Dr. Antommarchi, in the presence of seven other surgeons, all British, and ten French followers of Napoleon, sliced open the body. 

So how did so much arsenic get into the emperor’s hair throughout his life?

The postmortem report stated, “An ulcer which penetrated the coats of the stomach was discovered one inch from the pylorus sufficient to allow the passage of the little finger. The internal surface of the stomach to nearly its whole extent was a mass of cancerous disease, or hard tumorous portions advancing to cancer, this was particularly noticed near the pylorus…The stomach was found nearly filled with a large quantity of fluid, resembling coffee grounds…”

Months earlier, Napoleon’s stomach ulcer had burst open, causing a hole through which a man could fit his finger. But his liver had glued itself to his stomach, acting as a kind of cork and preventing the stomach acids and food from flooding his body and killing him within hours, as a ruptured gastric ulcer normally would. Though his rupture had sealed, the ulcer developed into cancer. Modern research has shown that untreated gastric ulcers become malignant in about six to nine percent of cases.

Napoleon was buried in his favorite spot on St. Helena, a tranquil grove, but in 1840, he was exhumed in preparation for his return to France. Oddly, though his uniform had decayed, the emperor’s body was perfectly preserved, and he looked as if he was sleeping, which many believed was a sign of arsenic poisoning.

In the 1960s, a Swedish dentist and Napoleon buff, Dr. Sten Forshufvud, studied Napoleon’s illness and recognized twenty-two out of thirty symptoms of arsenic poisoning. Though the French were reluctant to lift the thirty-five tons of highly polished porphyry covering their emperor in Les Invalides in Paris and submit the body to testing, Dr. Forshufvud found numerous locks of Napoleon’s hair from his time on St. Helena. Over the years, Napoleon’s staff, residents, and visitors to St. Helena had begged for them as keepsakes. When he died, his valet, Marchand, had shaved his head and made many more gifts of Napoleon’s hair.

Dr. Forshufvud obtained strands of hair from a variety of provenanced sources and submitted them for testing, which revealed arsenic content up to one hundred times the normal amount—proof of poisoning, he believed. But since Dr. Forshufvud’s research, Napoleon’s hair from his pre-St. Helena days has been tested by research institutes around the world, going back to his earliest years in Corsica. Always, he had arsenic levels about one hundred times normal. So did his first wife, Josephine, and his son, Napoleon II.

People of Napoleon’s time ingested arsenic in several ways that had nothing to with poison. Many medications contained arsenic, but Napoleon kept as far from doctors as possible and, as far as we know, never took any medicine until his final weeks. Arsenic was a popular ingredient in cosmetics, which may account for Josephine’s high levels, but Napoleon would never have worn cosmetics.

Napoleon’s green wallpaper on St. Helena contained arsenic, sending bits of the stuff into the air with every breeze, but his levels did not increase on the island.

So how did so much arsenic get into the emperor’s hair throughout his life?

I believe the arsenic came from Napoleon’s hygiene regimen. Unlike most men of his time, especially soldiers, Napoleon bathed every day, carting around a bathtub on campaign. He was an absolute stickler for cleanliness. Since lice were a perennial problem of an army on the march, he may have used an arsenic-based hair tonic to prevent infestations; tiny bits of the toxin are fatal to insects. Over time, regular use of such a hair tonic may have killed someone else, but Napoleon’s genetics and lifestyle were such that he had excellent health until he developed stomach cancer.

Thank you for listening. I hope you have enjoyed the discussion from The Royal Art of Poison, which is available at booksellers everywhere.



The Poison Chronicles: The Arsenic Poisoning of Napoleon Bonaparte

The unrelenting abdominal pain was like a knife slicing through flesh and muscle and organs, again and again, day after day, week after week, without the relief of death.

Napoleon Bonaparte had risen from nowhere to become the most powerful person on earth. He had ruled an empire of his own making which, at its apogee, stretched from the Atlantic Ocean to Russia, from the icy Baltic to the sapphire-blue Ionian Sea, and comprised some seventy million souls. But, having lost the great battle of Waterloo in June 1815, he became emperor of two rooms in a rat-infested, mildewed house on a rock in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, the island of St. Helena, a 70-day sail from France. Soon, his empire would shrink even further, to a wooden box six feet long, two-and-a-half feet wide, and two feet high.

British army surgeon Walter Henry said St. Helena was “the ugliest and most dismal rock conceivable of rugged and splintered surface, rising like an enormous black wart from the face of the deep.”
The island was a port of call for ships traveling to India or South Africa to take on fresh water and supplies. In 1815, it had a population of 4,000, including a garrison of 1,000 men. Napoleon’s flotilla brought an additional 2,000 soldiers to guard him. His new home, Longwood House, was a sprawling, one-story building of pale yellow stucco and twenty-three rooms. About fifty people lived there, including Napoleon’s servants and British guards.

Now, his biggest enemy wasn’t the duke of Wellington or the czar of Russia; it was the stultifying boredom. Though he had brought 1,500 books with him, he remarked that he needed 60,000 to keep him occupied. Up to six hours a day, he dictated his memoirs to a secretary.
Every evening at eight, a servant in an embroidered green coat and black silk knee breeches announced, “His Majesty’s dinner is served.” Napoleon, his aides, and their wives sat down to a formal dinner on silver platters and Sèvres china. Periodically, a giant rat skittered across the room as the diners politely ignored it. After dinner, everyone played cards. Then they listened as Napoleon relived his greatest battles or read out loud. If he managed to stay up until eleven, he would say, “Another victory over time.”

Perhaps his wisest step in staying healthy, however, was keeping far away from doctors.

Throughout his life, Napoleon had enjoyed excellent health. He exercised regularly, drank alcohol in moderation, and scrubbed himself in a hot bath every morning. Perhaps his wisest step in staying healthy, however, was keeping far away from doctors. Whenever he met a physician, his first question was invariably, “Monsieur, how many patients have you killed in your practice?” He rarely, if ever, took medication or submitted to bleeding, purging, and puking.

His first year on St. Helena, Napoleon was allowed to ride around the island and walk into the port of Jamestown, conversing freely with those he met. However, a new British Governor, Sir Hudson Lowe, arrived in October 1816, fretting day and night about the dishonor he would suffer if the most important prisoner in the history of the world escaped on his watch. He placed more and more insulting restrictions on Napoleon. Refusing to be guarded by babysitters in red coats, Napoleon stopped riding and walking all together. With the sudden cessation of exercise, he rapidly gained weight and began to suffer swollen feet, headaches, bleeding gums, and a cough.


On September 20, 1817, for the first time he complained of a dull pain in the area of the torso roughly parallel to his right elbow. From that day forward — other than a period of remission from October 1819 to June 1820 — he was never completely free from the symptoms, which included nausea, vomiting, sleeplessness, constipation, and depression.

In July 1820, he grew fatigued from the slightest exertion. His pulse was irregular, his hands and feet freezing cold. By the spring of 1821, he could no longer walk without assistance and could barely eat, merely sucking the juice out of meat. The pain in his right side had spread over his entire abdomen.

Indeed, many powerful people wanted Napoleon dead.

The emperor lost at least twenty pounds in a few months. When his Italian doctor, François Carlo Antommarchi, urged him to take medications, Napoleon snorted, “Keep your medicines, I don’t want to have two diseases, the one I have already and the one you’ll give me.”

On April 2, he told his English physician, Archibald Arnott, “I have here a sharp pain that, when I feel it, is like being cut with a razor; do you think the pylorus [the bottom of the stomach connected to the duodenum] is affected? My father died of that. Is it not hereditary?” In 1785, the physician who performed Carlo Buonaparte’s autopsy had found in the stomach a “tumor of semi-cartilaginous consistency, which was of the shape and size of a large potato or a large elongated pear."

Dr. Arnott reassured him that it was merely gas, and if he took his medication it would go away. The emperor refused.

On April 15, 1821, he wrote in his will, “I die prematurely, assassinated by the English oligarchy and its hired killer: the English nation will not be slow in avenging me.”

After two more weeks of agony, he added, “After my death, which cannot be far off, I want you to open my body...I recommend that you examine my stomach very carefully, make a precise, detailed report on it...I bequeath to all the ruling families the horror and shame of my last moments.”

Indeed, many powerful people wanted Napoleon dead. King Louis XVIII of France — the old, cowardly, unpopular brother of Louis XVI — sat uneasily on a sagging throne. Many Frenchmen longed for Napoleon to come back with the energizing spirit of the Revolution.

Britain, which had taken custody of Napoleon, feared he would escape the island, round up another army and attack England, despite the fortune they spent annually on keeping him in exile. And the ruler of Germany, Austria, Spain, Italy, and Russia would have loved to see him safely buried — if, that is, his death seemed natural. News of his murder would surely cause revolutions to spring up in Napoleon’s name.


By the end of April, he was delirious and vomiting material that looked like coffee grounds—a sign of what we now know to be gastro-intestinal bleeding. Periodically, he fell into comas.

On April 26, he saw his beloved first wife Josephine, who had died of pneumonia seven years earlier. “She told me that we were about to see each other again,” he said, “never more to part; she assured me that — did you see her?”

On the night of May 4, he mumbled about France, the army, and Josephine. The following day he fell into a coma and died at the age of 51.

Louis Marchand, the emperor’s faithful valet who had been by his side every day on St. Helena, washed the body with eau de cologne and, with two assistant valets, laid it out on a trestle table in the billiard room where the emperor had studied maps.

This was, perhaps, the most important autopsy ever performed. At three p.m., Napoleon’s physician Dr. Antommarchi, in the presence of seven other surgeons, all British, and ten French followers of Napoleon, sliced open the body. 

So how did so much arsenic get into the emperor’s hair throughout his life?

The postmortem report stated, “An ulcer which penetrated the coats of the stomach was discovered one inch from the pylorus sufficient to allow the passage of the little finger. The internal surface of the stomach to nearly its whole extent was a mass of cancerous disease, or hard tumorous portions advancing to cancer, this was particularly noticed near the pylorus…The stomach was found nearly filled with a large quantity of fluid, resembling coffee grounds…”

Months earlier, Napoleon’s stomach ulcer had burst open, causing a hole through which a man could fit his finger. But his liver had glued itself to his stomach, acting as a kind of cork and preventing the stomach acids and food from flooding his body and killing him within hours, as a ruptured gastric ulcer normally would. Though his rupture had sealed, the ulcer developed into cancer. Modern research has shown that untreated gastric ulcers become malignant in about six to nine percent of cases.

Napoleon was buried in his favorite spot on St. Helena, a tranquil grove, but in 1840, he was exhumed in preparation for his return to France. Oddly, though his uniform had decayed, the emperor’s body was perfectly preserved, and he looked as if he was sleeping, which many believed was a sign of arsenic poisoning.

In the 1960s, a Swedish dentist and Napoleon buff, Dr. Sten Forshufvud, studied Napoleon’s illness and recognized twenty-two out of thirty symptoms of arsenic poisoning. Though the French were reluctant to lift the thirty-five tons of highly polished porphyry covering their emperor in Les Invalides in Paris and submit the body to testing, Dr. Forshufvud found numerous locks of Napoleon’s hair from his time on St. Helena. Over the years, Napoleon’s staff, residents, and visitors to St. Helena had begged for them as keepsakes. When he died, his valet, Marchand, had shaved his head and made many more gifts of Napoleon’s hair.

Dr. Forshufvud obtained strands of hair from a variety of provenanced sources and submitted them for testing, which revealed arsenic content up to one hundred times the normal amount—proof of poisoning, he believed. But since Dr. Forshufvud’s research, Napoleon’s hair from his pre-St. Helena days has been tested by research institutes around the world, going back to his earliest years in Corsica. Always, he had arsenic levels about one hundred times normal. So did his first wife, Josephine, and his son, Napoleon II.

People of Napoleon’s time ingested arsenic in several ways that had nothing to with poison. Many medications contained arsenic, but Napoleon kept as far from doctors as possible and, as far as we know, never took any medicine until his final weeks. Arsenic was a popular ingredient in cosmetics, which may account for Josephine’s high levels, but Napoleon would never have worn cosmetics.

Napoleon’s green wallpaper on St. Helena contained arsenic, sending bits of the stuff into the air with every breeze, but his levels did not increase on the island.

So how did so much arsenic get into the emperor’s hair throughout his life?

I believe the arsenic came from Napoleon’s hygiene regimen. Unlike most men of his time, especially soldiers, Napoleon bathed every day, carting around a bathtub on campaign. He was an absolute stickler for cleanliness. Since lice were a perennial problem of an army on the march, he may have used an arsenic-based hair tonic to prevent infestations; tiny bits of the toxin are fatal to insects. Over time, regular use of such a hair tonic may have killed someone else, but Napoleon’s genetics and lifestyle were such that he had excellent health until he developed stomach cancer.

Thank you for listening. I hope you have enjoyed the discussion from The Royal Art of Poison, which is available at booksellers everywhere.



Rabu, 25 Juli 2018

The College Student's Guide to In-Text Citations

Regardless of your college major, you’ll likely encounter assignments that require the use of in-text citations. Learning how to use in-text citations is an important part of academic writing because it helps you master the balance of correctly crediting your sources without interrupting the flow of your writing.

Various majors and courses will require a specific citation style. This guide will provide the basics of the three most commonly used styles: APA, Chicago Manual of Style, and MLA.

Why should you use in-text citations?

The term “in-text” refers to the use of a brief notation within the body of your document each time you refer to or quote outside source material. The purpose of in-text citations is to provide your reader with an idea of where your information originated and to direct them toward a full citation in your list of references at the end of the work.

In-text citations: APA style

APA (or American Psychological Association) style is commonly used for social and behavioral sciences. The main rule of APA in-text citations is that they generally include the author’s last name followed by the year of publication.

A basic in-text citation looks like this:

  • More than 10,000 people participated in the march (Smith, 2012).

If you use the author’s name within the text, only the date is placed in parentheses:

  • Smith (2012) noted that more than 10,000 people participated in the march.

If there are two authors, the in-text citation looks like this:

  • Police estimated that nearly 35 people suffered heat exhaustion (White & England, 2012).

Additional examples of how to cite various types of sources using APA style can be found here.


In-text citations: Chicago Manual of Style

Another common style that uses in-text citations is the Chicago Manual of Style. This is closely related to Turabian, which was created as a version of Chicago style for students. Chicago/Turabian style is typically used in the disciplines of business, history, and fine arts.

The first way to cite using this style involves an author-date system to briefly cite sources within the text. With this system, the full references are listed alphabetically in a references list. For your in-text citations, you will add a shortened version that includes the author(s), year of publication, and page numbers.

For example, your in-text citation for a quotation from page 187 would look like this:

  • (McCullough 1992, 187)

Here you can find many examples of how to use Chicago/Turabian style when crediting various types of publications, including journal articles, news articles, and website content.

The second way to cite using Chicago/Turabian style is through the notes and bibliography system. This style involves numbered endnotes and footnotes that align with the bibliography at the end of the paper.

For example, if you were citing a book, the note would look like this:

  • Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice (New York: Modern Library, 1995), 111-13.

The corresponding bibliography entry would look like this:

  • Austen, Jane. Pride and Prejudice. New York: Modern Library, 1995.

Note that bibliography entries are always listed in alphabetical order. You can find more examples here on how to cite using footnotes and bibliographies with Chicago/Turabian style.

In-text citations: MLA style

MLA (or Modern Language Association) is commonly used for humanities and liberal arts subjects, including literature. Unlike the two styles listed above, MLA style leaves the year out of the in-text citation and instead uses the author’s last name followed by the relevant page number.

Here’s an example of two different ways to format the same in-text citation:

  • According to Smith, more than 10,000 people participated in the march (122).
  • One researcher observed that more than 10,000 people participated in the march (Smith 122).

If there is no known author, use keywords from the title for your in-text citation. If you’re quoting an online article titled, “The Impact of Incarceration on Preschool-Age Children,” you might use:

  • More than half of the children who had incarcerated parents were under 10 years old (“Impact of Incarceration” 17).

Citing sources is a practice you will encounter often while in college, so it’s important to set aside time to understand the styles you will be using. If you’re unsure or looking to gain confidence in a particular style, don’t hesitate to reach out for help.



Selasa, 24 Juli 2018

What Insurance College Kids Need and Tips to Save

What Insurance College Kids Need and Tips to SaveLynn M. says, “I’m a weekly listener and have learned so much while logging miles on my runs! I love getting financially and physically fit at the same time! I’m a divorced mom and my three children will all be in college starting in the fall. Ouch! Fortunately, I’ve saved in a 529 plan, have liquid savings earmarked for college, and will split tuition with their dad. But when it comes to cars for the children, how should I handle titles, insurance, and shopping for competitive rates when they go to school out of state?”

Thanks so much for your question, Lynn. You get the mom-of-the-year award for being financially prepared to send three kids to college with vehicles, and still having time to stay in shape!

Most parents spend a lot of time agonizing about how to pay for a child’s education, but completely overlook their insurance needs. In some cases, your existing policies won’t give your family enough protection after a kid goes off to college.

In this post, I’ll review a variety of factors that affect the additional insurance your college-bound kid needs. Plus, you’ll get tips to cut insurance costs and make college more affordable.

Free Resource: Ready to save more, eliminate debt, and reach big financial goals? Join Laura in the Dominate Your Dollars community now!

Auto Insurance Rate Increases for Teen Drivers

If your student is already driving, I don’t have to tell you that your auto insurance rate goes through the roof after you add a teen driver to your policy. Young drivers are extremely expensive to insure because statistics show that they get into accidents more frequently than older drivers.

A study I helped created about how much auto insurance rates go up when you add a 16- to 19-year old driver to a policy revealed that rates rise 78% on average nationwide! Rhode Island residents see the highest spike, with a 153% increase, and Hawaii has the lowest increase at 8%.

Yup, one more reason moving to Hawaii might seem like a really good idea. It’s the only state where insurers are banned from using a driver’s age or years of driving experience as a rating factor. So that small increase is the same as adding an adult driver to an auto insurance policy.

The good news for residents of the other 49 states is that girls cost less to insure than boys, and both get less expensive every year, if they keep a clean driving record with no moving violations or accidents. If you don’t see your rates for a young driver come down, be sure your auto insurer knows when your teen celebrates a birthday.

Insuring Your College Kid

Unlike other types of insurance, there’s no rule that you must take your child off a family auto policy at a certain age. Parents can keep a child on their insurance for as long as they like.

College students are typically covered under their parents’ car insurance, as long as they live at the same address as their parents when not at school. Esurance says, “If a student starts out listed on a policy and will be temporarily attending school at another address, we allow them to remain on the original policy as long as their vehicle is still registered at the original address.”

Unlike other types of insurance, there’s no rule that you must take your child off a family auto policy at a certain age. Parents can keep a child on their insurance for as long as they like.

Assuming you want to maintain coverage for your college student, you need to let your insurer know. If he or she will be driving out of state, your policy may need to be adjusted because auto insurance varies dramatically from state to state.

For instance, if you live in Florida, where the state minimum liability limit is $10,000 and your student attends school in Texas where the limit is $30,000, your policy won’t meet the requirement.

Auto insurance rates even differ down to the ZIP code, so the address of the college or the location where a car is typically parked is important. Rates for city drivers tend to be higher than for those in rural areas.

So, depending on where your college kid lives, having an insured vehicle in a different location could cause your rate to go up or down. But don’t be tempted to avoid telling your insurer. They can deny claims or cancel your policy if they discover that you misrepresented where an insured car is garaged.

You don’t need to notify your insurer when a student makes a short trip home for school breaks or between semesters, just when he or she moves to a new location for most the year.

Another consideration is how your child plans to use a vehicle while at college. If he or she has a job, such as delivering pizza or groceries, make sure it’s covered for commercial auto activities. Some auto policies won’t cover claims for accidents that happen while you’re driving for any business use, other than commuting to work.  


Auto Insurance Discounts for Teen Drivers

While young drivers are expensive to insure, the good news is that insurers offer different types of discounts. Here are some popular discounts to ask for:

  • Distant student discount – could save up to 30% when your student doesn’t have a family car at a school and lives more than 100 miles away from home (even if the school is in the same state).  
  • Good student discount – could save up to 35% when your high school or college student has a “B” average or better. Parents do have to submit report cards to qualify, but it’s well worth the hassle and another great reason to make sure your student stays focused on getting good grades.  
  • Driver safety course – offered by some insurers if your young driver completes an approved driver education or defensive driving course.  
  • Bundling discounts could save an average of 16% nationwide when you combine your auto insurance with a home or renter’s policy. Checkout state-by-state bundling savings data.  
  • Pay-as-you-drive programs use technology to monitor how you drive and reward you for safe behavior. You may also hear these programs called usage-based insurance, telematics (a hybrid of telecommunications and informatics), and pay-as-you-go insurance. Each insurer’s program is different and may not be offered in every state. They may collect data including how fast you drive, how hard you hit the brakes, where you drive, the times of day you drive, and mileage driven.  Enrolling one or all your vehicles allows you to qualify for discounts when the driver stays within safe ranges set by the insurance company. But if not, your rate doesn’t go up, you just don’t get the benefit of a safe driver discount.

See also: 5 Ways To Save Money on Car Insurance

Should You Title a Vehicle in Your College Kid’s Name?

State laws vary, but parents can be held liable for injuries or other damage a child causes in an auto accident when driving a vehicle registered in a parent’s name.

A question that Lynn brought up is how to title a vehicle that a child takes to college. If a vehicle and the insurance is in a child’s name only, is it less expensive or give parents more legal protection?

The answer is that state laws vary, but parents can be held liable for injuries or other damage a child causes in an auto accident when driving a vehicle registered in a parent’s name. If your son or daughter is over 18 years old, he or she can register a car in his or her own name. That’s one way to limit your liability if your child accidentally hurts someone.

In some states, you can purchase auto insurance for someone else, even if your name is not on the car’s title. So, it may be possible to keep a vehicle that’s titled in your student’s name on your family policy.

In general, it’s more expensive for a young person to have their own insurance compared to staying on a parent’s auto policy. That’s because they don’t have the benefit of a higher credit rating or various discounts that parents might enjoy, such as loyalty, multiple vehicles, and bundling with a home or renter’s policy.

However, it’s always worth shopping since there are so many variables at play. Lynn, if you have lots of assets to protect, then registering a vehicle in a child’s name may be a wise idea. But insurance premiums on the vehicle may or may not be higher, depending on what insurers in your state will allow.

See also: 10 Financial Products to Make Money and Create Security

How to Protect Liability When You Have a College Kid

If you don’t have many assets or can’t afford higher insurance premiums, another option for parents of young drivers to limit liability is to purchase an umbrella liability policy. These policies supplement the liability coverage you may already have on auto, home and renter’s insurance.

Umbrella policies are sold in million-dollar increments and typically cost less than $300 per year for $1 million of coverage, which is an extremely inexpensive safety net.

If you don’t have many assets or can’t afford higher insurance premiums, another option for parents of young drivers to limit liability is to purchase an umbrella liability policy.

Let’s say you get sued for medical bills after your child accidentally injures a pedestrian while driving. If you have $100,000 in liability coverage, but are found guilty for $500,000 in damages, an umbrella policy kicks in providing the additional $400,000 in protection.

Parents should also warn kids about lending their car to friends or roommates because insurance follows the car, not the driver. That means when you lend someone your car, you’re also lending them insurance to cover any damages they cause.

If a friend drives your car and causes a serious accident, your insurance would pay up to your coverage limits, and then the injured party would turn to the driver’s insurance for the rest. But if the driver doesn’t have insurance, you could be fully responsible as the car’s owner.

Having a claim or at-fault accident on your record causes your insurance rate to increase dramatically, even if you had nothing to do with the accident. Due to this huge financial risk, I don’t recommend lending your car to anyone except drivers who are specifically named on your insurance policy.

Likewise, if your child drives someone else’s car that isn’t insured or is underinsured, getting into an accident could mean trouble. Even if your student doesn’t take a vehicle to school, consider getting him or her a non-owner auto policy. That would protect you if your child borrows a friend’s car or gets into an accident as a passenger and the car owner’s policy falls short.

See also: 5 Surprising Insurance Facts and Savings Tips


Does a College Kid Need Renter’s Insurance?

Now that you know the most important considerations for auto insurance, let’s review what to do about home or renter’s insurance before your child goes off to school.

Some policies provide a percentage of the family’s personal property limit for registered students. For example, if you have $50,000 in personal belongings coverage on a home or renter’s policy, your student may have 10% or $5,000 in off-premises insurance.

However, many categories of home and renter’s insurance—such as computers, electronics, sports equipment, and jewelry—come with coverage caps. And some policies won’t cover a student in certain cases, such as when they reach a certain age or move to off-campus housing.

See also: 4 Major Disasters Homeowners and Renters Insurance Won’t Cover

If your student lives on campus in a dormitory, they’re usually covered by your home or renter’s policy (assuming you have one) for disasters like theft, fire, or storm damage. But if he or she moves out of student housing, they’re no longer covered under your home or renter’s policy, and needs their own coverage.

Having a renter’s policy for your off-campus student is inexpensive and would help pay to repair or replace any expensive items—such as computers, phones, furniture, bikes, musical instruments, and clothes—if they were destroyed, lost, or stolen.

Having a renter’s policy for your off-campus student is inexpensive and would help pay to repair or replace any expensive items—such as computers, phones, furniture, bikes, musical instruments, and clothes—if they were destroyed, lost, or stolen.

Renter’s insurance also gives your college kid liability coverage if a visitor gets hurt or a party guest has a little too much fun and gets hurt. It also provides funds for living expenses if a student’s off-campus apartment or rental home becomes uninhabitable while repairs are made after a natural disaster.

See also: 5 Ways to Save Money on Home Insurance

How to Shop Insurance for Your College Kid

Shopping for insurance takes a little time, but can really pay off. I always recommend getting at least three quotes so you can make an apples-to-apples comparison of different insurers.

Check out sites like insuranceQuotes.com and netQuote.com for auto, home, renters, health, and life insurance policies. These companies match you with a network of nationwide insurers, agents, and brokers who do business where you live and give quotes and advice for free.

Insurers evaluate you differently and offer different discounts, so no two policy quotes will ever be the same. So, the best way parents of a teen driver or college student can save on insurance is to make sure they understand how insurance works, have the skills to stay safe, and shop around every year to compare multiple quotes.

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