International Self-Care Day

"This volume is uncontestably the most comprehensive and authoritative work on the subject of self-care available to date. It should set the stage for a new policy perspective on building a health care system that incorporates self-care at its core."--Lowell S. Levin, Yale School of Public Health Practitioners and researchers who work with older adults are challenged to find ways to strengthen an elderly person's capacity to cope wiht age-related changes that threaten independence. This volume assesses the efficacy of self-care in maintaining autonomy. It applies a broad definition of self-care that includes a range of behaviors undertaken by individuals, families, and communities to enhance health, prevent disease, limit illness, and restore health.

Self-help is big business, but alas, not always a scientific one. Self-help books, websites, and movies abound and are important sources of psychological advice for millions of Americans. But how can you sift through them to find the ones that work?Self-Help That Works is an indispensable guide that enables readers to identify effective self-help materials and distinguish them from those that are potentially misleading or even harmful. Six scientist-practitioners bring careful research, expertise, and a dozen national studies to the task of choosing and recommending self-help resources. Designed for both laypersons and mental-health professionals, this book critically reviews multiple types of self-help resources, from books and autobiographies to films, online programs, support groups, and websites, for 41 different behavioral disorders and life challenges. The revised edition of this award-winning book now features online self-help resources, expanded content, and new chapters focusing on autism, bullying, chronic pain, GLB issues, happiness, and nonchemical addictions. Each chapter updates the self-help resources launched since the previous edition and expands the material. The final chapters provide key strategies for consumers evaluating self-help as well as for professionals integrating self-help into treatment. All told, this updated edition of Self-Help that Works evaluates more than 2,000 self-help resources and brings together the collective wisdom of nearly 5,000 mental health professionals. Whether seeking self-help for yourself, loved ones, or patients, this is the go-to, research-based guide with the best advice on what works.

In The Language of Strong Black Womanhood: Myths, Models, Messages, and a New Mandate for Self-Care, Black women of the Baby Boomer generation and Hip Hop generation share messages communicated and models witnessed in their socialization for strength revealing how this mandate endures in Black women's lived experiences. They also express concern that self-care was not presented as critical for sustaining life as a strong Black woman--a concern shared by Black women bloggers who advocate resisting the myth and redefining strength for self-care. This Black feminist exploration of strong Black womanhood provides an alternative to harmful perceptions, constructions, and representations of Black women and suggests a mandate to move toward the revolutionary act of Black women's self-care.

His "black dog"--that was how Winston Churchill referred to his own depression. Today, individuals with feelings of sadness and irritability are encouraged to "talk to your doctor." These have become buzz words in the aggressive promotion of wonder-drug cures since 1997, when the Food and Drug Administration changed its guidelines for the marketing of prescription pharmaceuticals. Black Dogs and Blue Words analyzes the rhetoric surrounding depression. Kimberly K. Emmons maintains that the techniques and language of depression marketing strategies--vague words such as "worry," "irritability," and "loss of interest"--target women and young girls and encourage self-diagnosis and self-medication. Further, depression narratives and other texts encode a series of gendered messages about health and illness. As depression and other forms of mental illness move from the medical-professional sphere into that of the consumer-public, the boundary at which distress becomes disease grows ever more encompassing, the need for remediation and treatment increasingly warranted. Black Dogs and Blue Words demonstrates the need for rhetorical reading strategies as one response to these expanding and gendered illness definitions.

Self Care for Nurses will take you on a journey to explore proven self-care tactics, including over two-dozen wellness practices that tend to your mind; bite-sized exercises, giving you practical inspiration and food for thought in applying the latest in self-care research; helpful vignettes and guidance from nurses and wellness experts; and special challenges to help you claim the peace and balance you want in all aspects of your life.

Teachers face many challenges. Despite these, they give much of themselves to their students. This book is about taking care of oneself in simple, yet scientific ways. On an airplane, you are told to put your own oxygen mask on first and the other person's after that. You cannot assist others unless you are fully ready to go yourself. This book is about being ready to go by taking care of yourself. All ages of teacher, and teachers of all levels and subjects, can employ these tips that collected from the authors'own lives and research. It will serve to encourage all teachers to develop into the most joyful and healthy people possible. Its main purpose is to provide modern ‘life hacks'in order improve self-care, a concept which includes navigating preventative care, harnessing yoga and meditation, following good nutrition tips, and understanding media depictions of them.