Do you think leg exercises for women, hips bum and tum are too much for a woman over 50 think again!

Have you noticed women looking more like their daughters these days? How do you think Meryl Streep does it? Exercise!

Of course if you did plenty of exercise before hitting 50 that’s a really great start but if exercise didn’t feature high in your busy life till now that’s fine.  

It’s not too late to start in fact this is the perfect time to step in and stop some of those ‘age related’ issues before they start.

Here is the bad news – you can’t shape up without exercise.

Here is the good news – You can do everything you need to do at home without expensive and space-taking equipment and without heavy weight lifting or going to the sweaty gym.

You may not be interested in a ‘Fitness Program’ you may only be interested in being in great shape to wear those sexy jeans so here is the really great news ….

When you do leg exercises for women hips bum and tum you get in great shape and the big bonus is you get physically fitter too!

Over 50′s women often begin to be affected by the menopause the symptoms of which include

• Sleep problems
• Anxiety
• Depression
• Joint pain
• hot flushes

Exercise can help to control these as well as reduce the risk of osteoporosis, diabetes and heart disease.  All this and help with weight control too!

“If you could bottle it everyone would be swigging it back!”  So said the Chief Science Officer for the American Council on Exercise Cedric Bryant PhD. In fact Bryant even states that with the consistent use of  the right kind of exercise can even turn back the clock giving you a younger biological age than your chronological age

The most comprehensive fitness program includes muscle strength conditioning, aerobic exercise, and stretching for flexibility but if that seems daunting just think what it really means…

1. Aerobic exercise includes walking and dancing as excellent aerobic exercise. Just 20 minutes per session 3 or 4 days a week will do it. You don’t even have to get breathless exercising pace that lets you carry on talking to your friends.
2. Strength training includes lifting light hand weights improves your strength and posture, reduces the risk of lower back injury, and also helps you tone. 
3. Stretching: The right stretching exercises help maintain flexibility and range of motion in joints. They also reduce the risk of injury and muscle soreness. 

So who can help? A trainer? Yes – but it has to be a trainer who knows what women want and what most women want is to be in great shape so that they look fabulous and get compliments from their men folk and girlfriends

How does she do it? By working on her butt! Fix your butt – fix your body.

Grab your free download on how to get that perfect butt, shape up and get fit with Leg exercises for women, hips bum tum

Leg Exercises for Women | Hips Bum Tum is a post from: 50Plus Life Design U.S.

Share and Enjoy

If you are looking for THE garden store on line then Gardenmax.com  is for you

The sheer convenience of shopping on line is easy to appreciate with the GardenMax  garden store.

The range of products delivered directly to your door is huge….

The Ultimate Garden Store

Rain Chains, Bird Houses, Seeds and Plants, Pest Control and Garden Decor.

Candles, Indoor Planters, Lighting, Table Trays and Mirrors

Patio Furniture, Outdoor Flags, Outdoor Fireplaces, Garden Arbours,  Books, Fresh Flowers and Gifts, the list goes on and on.

GardenMax garden store delivers the best in garden essentials and luxuries combined with the soft goods of home interiors.  Helping customers build their dreams and create beautiful homes and gardens.

Together with sister companies they specialize in everything from garden tools, outdoor equipment, interior decor to landscape supply.

When it comes to providing the customer with just the right thing, they are the experts.

Working closely with manufacturers they bring you a variety of unique choices, at prices that fit every budget.

Here is the great benefit of an on line garden store, you don’t have to travel from store to store looking for what you need. You’re certain to find great products, great value, and great service at GardenMax stores online.

Visit now to enjoy a great shopping experience.

© Copyright 2012 http://50pluslifedesign.com, garden store

Garden Store Online is a post from: 50Plus Life Design U.S.

Share and Enjoy

Suffering lower back pains – or any back pains come to that?

It’s hard to shake them off even with medical help sometimes, drug solutions only mask your pain for a little while don’t they? I know I used to suffer to the extent that I wore a corset to travel. That caused some interesting moments at airports I can tell you!

Here is the good news for you, I have no problems at all now, I take no drugs  and the corset is in the bin where it deserves to be.

How did that happen? well I can’t tell you here, but I can recommend a great new book  which will help get rid of that lower back pain ( or any other back pain) in as little as 7 days from now.

How can you get rid of lower back pain in just days?

Send for this e book issued FREE by The Healthy Back Institute it’s a download and also the portal to a huge Internet resource of information about back pain of all sorts.

If you have lower back pain or any sort of back pain or know someone who does visit  The Healthy Back Institute NOW and grab The 7 day Back Pain Cure No Charge!

Prefer a paperback? that’s on offer here FREE too, inside or outside the U.S  you pay only  for shipping.

I like the price ‘Free’ don’t you and this is highly recommended!

© copyright 2012 http://50pluslifedesign.com, lower back pain

Lower Back Pains is a post from: 50Plus Life Design U.S.

Share and Enjoy

Have you ever been interested in a network marketing opportunity?

Hi, here I am again, looking after your health, wealth and happiness – particularly your wealth.

This series of articles is intended to help you understand Network Marketing better.  Why?  because if you’re over 50 it could be a way for you to earn extra pension.  After all, you may now have much more time on your hands.  Would you like to travel the world?  Are you keen to set up an education fund for your Grandchildren?  Would you love a new car?  Or would it be useful to have just a small trickle of income for those little extras?

There are many promises made by Network Marketing Schemes of the “get rich quick” nature and I want to help you to choose wisely so you can make a more logical and considered decision about what’s right for you and what to avoid.

Today we’re investigating : Is it a Pyramid in Disguise?

Let’s start with a web site www.mlm-thetruth.com  which details 5 ‘Red Flags’ you should explore to find out if the MLM offer you are considering may be what they call an ‘Exploitive Product-based Pyramid Scheme’, or ‘Recruiting MLM’s.’

However, a word of caution; their 40 page report by Dr. Jon M. Taylor, President, Consumer Awareness Institute and Director, Pyramid Scheme Alert is evangelical.

Dr Jon is an ex distributor for Nu Skin and his report should itself be viewed critically.  However the report also links to other sites which claim that 99% of all participants received less than $10 a week in commissions from major names in the network marketing industry.  In my experience this is quite probable.

They also claim 60-90% of all participants leave the schemes and stop purchasing the MLM products after suffering financial losses. These statistics are analysis from major company names, quoted on the stock exchanges in the USA.  They call this the ‘churn rate’, the schemes maintain the myth of income opportunity partly by convincing the churned victims that their financial losses were their “own fault” thereby making it possible to replace them with new hopefuls, who are unaware of the loss rates and the unworkable structure that lead to this attrition.

Network Marketing Due Diligence

So pyramid or not, there is reason for what lawyers call ‘due diligence’ before you invest your time and money in this way.

What are the tell tale signs which ring alarm bells? 

If a company breaches all of these it is a definite no-no. I do know of reputable companies who pay commissions to 7 layers down but pass all the other tests so individually these red flags should warn, guide and inform rather than veto.

So it’s not a Pyramid – so that’s ok then?

Nope – there’s more to think about yet!

Think again – your due diligence doesn’t end there!  My next posting will have a few more checks and balances for you to consider before you put your money down.

1.     Ask first: Would I buy this product?  Is it good value for money?  Would I recommend it to my best friend?  If you can’t say yes to these questions walk away without bothering with the rest.

2.     Will a large part of your income come from sales of actual product to your established customers or will it depend on incentives paid to you to find a never ending chain of new recruits who will themselves become recruiters – so that the effect is an endless chain of recruiters recruiting recruiters?” The opportunity should be product led, not recruitment led. 

3.     Will you only achieve a higher position or discount rate mainly by recruitment, rather than by selling more product.   If the only way a person can profit significantly in the scheme is through recruiting more people to advance to higher payout levels (or to buy another’s downline), this strongly suggests a pyramid scheme.

4.     Do you have to make a sizable investment in ‘incentivized purchases’ in order to take advantage of the ‘business opportunity,’ Watch out for ‘minimum quantity’ purchases of products or services over time – where you must buy product every week to qualify for commissions or advancement.  Be wary when you are asked to sign up for continuing product purchases on auto-ship through an automatic bank draft, rather than making occasional purchases as needed.  Such “pay to play” or “incentivized” purchase requirements may be disguised investments in a product-based pyramid scheme, or a clever system of laundering pyramid investments in the form of product purchases. Few make sufficient commissions to cover the cost of these expenses.

5.     Ask: “Does the company pay overrides (commissions and bonuses) to distributors in a hierarchy of more levels than are functionally justified; i.e., more than five levels?” Even in major corporations, the entire world marketplace can be covered in five levels of sales management – branch, district, regional, national, and international sales managers. Paying commissions and bonuses on more than five levels in an MLM program primarily enriches those at the top at the expense of those at the bottom.  You would be wise to avoid any program that pays overrides on more than five levels. Breakaway compensation systems are particularly exploitive as payments are on a hierarchy of “breakaway” organizations of whole groups of participants, not just individuals – creating an extraordinarily high loss rate, except for those at the top of a “mega-pyramid of pyramids.”

6.     Does the person making the sale make less commission than total of all up-line participants, creating inadequate incentive to sales and excessive incentive

© Copyright 2012 http://50pluslifedesign.com, network marketing

Network Marketing | Money earner or money down the Drain is a post from: 50Plus Life Design U.S.

Share and Enjoy

Seniors meet seniors in many different places.  At age 58 I met my 61 year old love and we married just 20 months ago.  So how did I find him?

Tony and Bee 5th June 2009

I certainly wouldn’t have found him in a bar because neither of us go to bars, clubs, dances or parties very much.  I wouldn’t have found him in a club because we have different tastes.  He was a member of a poetry society and a writers’ club and I go to art classes and gardening club.

I’m self-employed and don’t come into contact with many men day to day.  I lived alone for 12 years before I found my life-partner and during some of that time I also worked in a big organisation but men don’t wear “I’m single” badges so I didn’t do any propositioning there.  The only men who ever propositioned me were married! To be successfull offline you have to be where seniors meet seniors and I wasn’t so what could I do?

OK, I won’t keep you in suspense any longer.  I met him on an on-line dating site.  It’s true that seniors meet seniors this way far more often than you would expect.  The percentage of happy relationships that begin on line between seniors is growing every year and long may it reign.

Seniors Meet Seniors Online, That’s The Modern Way

You may be very lucky and have friends who know of an eligible male or two.  You may find someone of the right age at your club, society or group or at work.  If not, starting an on-line relationship can seem daunting if you’ve never tried it truly is the most common place seniors meet seniors these days.

Here’s just a little advice to get you started.

1. Be honest with your picture and make it a good one that’s just head-and-shoulders – and smile.
2. Be honest in what you write in your profile because it is so hard to have to tell someone later that you told a lie.
3. Always meet someone in a public place like a coffee bar where you don’t have to spend long with them if you don’t like them.  Don’t start with a dinner date because you could be stuck for hours with a total bore or a loud know-it-all.
4. Take a chance!  If you are prepared to risk a few hours of your time and kiss a few frogs (not literally) it really is the only way you’ll find your prince(ss).  They probably won’t be the first or even the tenth person you date, so be aware right from the start that you really to have to go through some disappointment at first.
5. Have FUN.  Enjoy each date for what he or she is.  Don’t spend time criticizing them in your head.  Just enjoy whatever they have to offer and move on fast if you need to.
6. Don’t date someone a second time if you are sure that they are not right the first time.  Learn to say NO if they want more and you don’t.

© Copyright 2011 http://50pluslifedesign.com seniors meet seniors

Seniors Meet Seniors – But Where? is a post from: 50Plus Life Design U.S.

Share and Enjoy

Changing Circumstances seem to change our lives daily as we grow older so how can we 50- or 60-somethings cope with the common occurrences of our age?

For the last year there have been various circumstances that have completely wrecked my normal routine – changing circumstances many people of my age are going through at this time of life; sometimes earlier or later than me.

Both my husband and I have suffered a couple of health challenges each that affected our ability to keep fit for months at a time; there have been injuries too and uncomfortable diagnoses relating to our ageing bodies. Tony’s Mum suffered for a couple of years with dementia, then alzheimer’s which kept him busy and caused him to reduce to a 2 ½ day working week (if he was lucky). His Mum passed on in January but in the previous November my Mother was diagnosed with terminal lung cancer so we have been up and down the motorway visiting and helping however we could, reducing our hours even further.

Needless to say there has been a lot of stress involved and because of this constant stream of changing circumstances and  problems, finances deteriorated in our household causing even more stress. We’re both self-employed and found we couldn’t put in the hours to keep up with the bills.

Changing Circumstances ARE Normal

Back in January I kept hearing myself say “when we’re back to normal” and realised we hadn’t been able to function normally for over a year. This made me wonder about the idea of “back to normal” and I realised that normal is whatever is going on right now. It’s not abnormal for people of our age to have these problems. So we began to look at each day – whatever chaos it brought – as “today’s normal”. We stopped looking for some nirvana in the future and decided that “normal” doesn’t mean only the easy days when things are going right.

Since then we’ve had even more stress and disruptions and our changing circumstances, though better than many others in the world, were becoming increasingly difficult.

Someone asked me this morning how things were and I found myself saying for the tenth time this week “we seem to be lurching from one crisis to another”.  I heard myself say it and realised it had become a mantra. Time for a rethink.

I decided that I could change my language yet again; this time I could perhaps try out as an answer to that question “we’re gliding from one challenge to another” or “we’re managing our challenges very well, thank you” or “changing circumstances have opened so many new doors for us, it’s very exciting”.

Of course I could answer “fine” or “just great” but my friends know what’s going on in my life and wouldn’t accept that anyway. If you’ve read other articles on my blog you’ll know I decided long ago that “constructive thinking” beats “positive thinking” hands down when one is in a pit. Positive thinking is often a way to pretend nothing’s wrong or gloss over and bury problems whereas constructive thinking admits there is a problem and encourages you to take action. They both have their place but in the most difficult of situations positive thinking – when you use it to pretend what’s bad is really good – can seem so false to the subconscious (and the conscious) that it can make us feel even worse.

So when changing circumstances throw up problems for you to deal with how can you use constructive language to change those problems to challenges or your despair to some glimmer of hope?

Good luck with your quest and I’d really appreciate your ideas on how I could change my thinking and languaging to move me further forward too.

Bee

© copyright 2011 http://50pluslifedesign.com changing circumstances

Changing Circumstances | Watching My Language is a post from: 50Plus Life Design U.S.

Share and Enjoy

Its Christmas again! Do you hate general knowledge games; avoid them whenever you can; claim you have a headache or offer to make the tea whilst the others play?  It’s Christmas time and I hate Trivial Pursuits!!!

I used to think that everyone who was able to answer the questions in pub quizzes was soooo clever and that I was the one who was a complete klutz; had no memory rentention, no education or just no sense. 

Perhaps you’ve played those games with the type of person who seems to look down their nose at you or even refuses to have you on their team (is it a game or is it a war???).   Maybe you’ve been made to feel small or slow-witted.  Well I am here to help you.

Fact gatherers

Sorry, I can’t help you answer any of the sports questions and I know little about history and less about geography but what I can tell you is that there are various types of intelligence in the world and the hand you’ve been dealt didn’t include a detailed memory of lots of irrelevant facts. 

Let’s think about thinking.  There are those who are detailed thinkers and those who are conceptual thinkers (and you may be a mixture of both but then you’ll probably hold your own at Trivia).

Detailed thinkers are great at organisation, planning, controlling – I say ‘great’ but the thin end of this particular wedge is a control freak who wants everything their way.  The overly perfectionist type who is never wrong – it’s always someone else’s fault.  The up-side of these qualities is that they get the job done and in record time and accurately.

Conceptual thinkers

So, back to you and I – conceptual thinkers.  We’re better at creativity; at seeing the bigger picture; at understanding both, or all, sides of the story; at being spontaneous.   This particular wedge has a thin end too – conceptual thinkers in the extreme never settle to anything, constantly move from one idea to another and sit on the fence.  On the plus side they are the Walt Disney’s of the world in that their creative flair gives the organisational types something to organise and we certainly tend to have better relationships because we’re more open to hear all views … but we’re rubbish at trivial pursuits.

Merry Christmas
Bee

It’s Christmas | Hands Up If You Hate Trivial Pursuits is a post from: 50Plus Life Design U.S.

Share and Enjoy

Dinner Invocation: Laughing at old age

This lady, a resident of a retirement community, was asked to give the invocation at a dinner/convention of retirement community managers. She does so, but then decides to add a few words of her own as a part of her invocation. Enjoy her laughing at old age!

Absolutely hilarious!

Bee

© copyright 2012 http://50pluslifedesign , laughing at old age

Laughing at Old Age is a post from: 50Plus Life Design U.S.

Share and Enjoy

Alz disease is a horrible condition  which can strike at any age but particularly affects the elderly. How can we avoid it? Are there things we can do in our everyday life which would reduce the chances of suffering later?

Alz disease or Alzheimer’s disease to give it its full title is preventable for many and if, like me, you have personal experience of the condition affecting a loved one you will know these simple measures are not too high a price to pay to avoid it.

There has been excellent research done in this field and here is a list of 10 steps we can all take to avoid ending our lives in an institution where we have no control over our lives and little idea of where we are or what we are doing.

Avoiding Alz Disease – Things to Do

1. Stay Alert: Studies suggest that the mental stimulation given by work, continuing education, reading regularly, playing games to challenge your mind, learning a foreign language or taking up a musical instrument—can all help prevent loss of short term memory.

2. Vary Activities: Enjoying social or leisure activities may also diminish your risk of Alz disease. Researchers have found that seniors who engaged in a variety of leisure activities—such as hobbies, trips, visiting their folks, volunteering, or taking part in social events— have a lower risk of alz disease.  Go on, have some fun!

3. Stay Physically Active: Physical Exercise helps to keep your brain in good shape.  Exercise improves mental alertness and keeps you agile mentally as well as bodily.  It improves blood flow to the brain.  It also reduces Alz disease risk factors such as hardening of the arteries and elevated blood pressure.

4. Reduce Stress: In excess, cortisol, the stress hormone, can damage the part of the brain most affected by Alz disease.  Stress can be reduced with meditation techniques like, yoga, relaxation and breathing exercises.  Getting the care you need to combat chronic stress, depression, insomnia , and other emotional issues may also help prevent AD. (an informative post on avoiding stress here)

5. Good Nutrition is Vital: Keeping your weight down and eating only healthy fats, eliminating saturated trans-fats that increase the risk of AD is really important to your health both mentally and physically.

Be proactive and take charge of your diet

* include, B-Complex vitamins —folate, B6, and B12, and leafy green vegetables which help reduce levels of a substance called homocysteine which is specifically linked to linked to AD.
* Use good quality Olive Oil, or better still coconut oil for cooking.
* Take Omega-3 fatty acids in flax oil, flax seeds and oily fish.
* Ramp up the Antioxidants – include vitamins C and E by eating fruits such as blueberries and vegetables such a spinach and seaweed.
* Drink at least 1 ounce of water a day for each 2lbs of your body weight
Green Juicing is fantastic, possibly the single most effective thing you can do (see my delicious recipe here)

6. Herbs and spices have a beneficial effect on memory for instance Turmeric, the yellow curry spice.  In India people have an unusually low rate of Alz disease which is thought to be linked to the regular use of this spice.

7. Prevention Better than Cure:  Protect your head.  Head injuries promote the onset of AD Wear seat belts, use bike helmets, and wear bright or reflective clothing at night.

8. Avoid tobacco and excess alcohol; they can damage your memory. Research suggests that modest drinking may actually help but not more than two drinks each day for men; only one for women

9. Other Drugs: The jury is out on this one.  Daily low doses of aspirin may prove helpful in preventing AD, but please talk to your doctor about possible side effects.  For those with elevated cholesterol levels, statin drugs may help but improving your diet always beats taking drugs.

10. Control Chronic Conditions:

1. Keep an eye on the world by getting regular sight and hearing tests and wearing your hearing aids and glasses.  This enables you to engage more with your surroundings and keeps you mentally more alert.
2. Catch medical disorders like heart disease, diabetes and high blood pressure or elevated cholesterol early to reduce the chance that they will damage your mind.

In short, keep active mentally and physically, look after your general health, protect your head – there is a powerful computer in there, avoid substances which may poison you and feed your body and your mind on the best food you can find.

_______________________________________________________________________________________

This information on alz disease is not intended to replace the care provided by your own Doctor. It is not intended nor can it be a replacement for qualified medical advice.

Always seek the advice of your medical advisor or other qualified health professional before starting new treatments and ask any questions you may have about a symptom or medical condition.

©copyright 2010 http://50pluslifedesign.com Alz disease

Alz Disease |10 Steps For Prevention is a post from: 50Plus Life Design U.S.

Share and Enjoy

You have Alz disease. Hundreds of 50 somethings receive the same sad news each year. In my case it was Mother-in-Law who was diagnosed with dementia (loss of short term memory) and later with Alz disease (Alzheimer’s).  She was around 85 then and began struggling to remember quite simple  things like the name for some every day item or where she had put something that was, in fact, in front of her nose.

Loss of short term memory is the first symptom

Mom lives on her own and had been managing very well for a number of years since her husband died.  Around 6 years ago her physical abilities were becoming shaky.  She fell over in the street a couple of times and then didn’t venture out on her own again.  At that time Tony and I were not married and he lived with her so could help out but he worked full time and at weekends was courting me so a cleaner was employed to help with the vacuuming and dusting and gardeners to help mow the lawns.

After we were married and as she lost more of her previous fitness and stayed in her chair watching the TV, her loss of short term memory was becoming apparent.  She began forgetting what she had already asked us or that we had visited or ‘phoned.  People’s names and the names of familiar objects would escape her.  Dementia was diagnosed at first.  She mourned the loss of her ability to do anything for herself and felt powerless to control her own life.

Alz disease diagnosed

She was assessed after a few months during which time the loss of short term memory was even more marked  and now Alz disease was diagnosed.

It didn’t rush at her; just chipped away slowly.  As her physical body gradually lost tone and muscle; her bones began getting brittle and by this time she needed  four social care visits a day to help her wash, dress, take the right medication and ensure she ate.  Tony and I live some distance away and he would go to visit her for a day twice a week at least, staying overnight and run his business throughout the rest of his evenings and weekends  in a failing effort to catch up.  He’d take her shopping or out to the park to keep her fresh.  Her elderly brother and sister visited and took some washing and checked up on her and Tony filled in any gaps left in her care.

Dilemma, what care is needed and when?

Due to her Alz disease we had the dilemma of if and when to offer her the opportunity to go into a care home – or insist that she did.  We knew that Mom-in-Law didn’t want to leave her own home and that we did not have the facilities or a downstairs room to care for her in our little home.  Alz disease – and the loss of short term memory cause the patient to repeat themselves endlessly and can cause them to become very frustrated so another consideration had to be our own health, our sanity, and the loss of all income if we couldn’t work at home.

We left the decision until it became imperative that she had 24 hour care.  Many of our friends had suggested that it would be better for her to have gone into a home sooner but I figure that if I was in my 80s and all control over my domestic chores and personal care had been lost, I wouldn’t want someone to take away the one thing I had left – my own home.

Professional Care Becomes Essential

For us the conclusion to this dilemma and of many weeks of running back and forth to help her when she became upset was that she actually asked to go into respite care whilst we were on holiday.  When she came out of that care she had forgotten much of her former life and couldn’t cope at all.  She was frail of body and mind.  We found the most wonderful care home for her and she thrived for a short while although her mind is now beginning to deteriorate and she’s hallucinating – It’s more than loss of short term memory, Alz disease is horrible robbing the sufferer of their identity.

If you have a parent with Alz disease or loss of short term memory there are some tactics you can adopt.  Changing the subject often takes them out of a ‘groove’ they’re stuck in.  Using humour to distract them; my lovely patient husband asks his Mum if she recognises people in her family photographs but even if she doesn’t we then remind her of incidents from her life relating to those people and she often remembers, very briefly, some happy time.

Lesson Learned

Seeing your nearest and dearest in this state is a wakeup call. Tony and I have turned our mind to how we might avoid the same fate; how can we avoid Alzheimers?

Certainly the risk increases with age, gender and poor general health; heredity, poor nutrition in childhood and poor education all play their part but can we prevent or postpone the development of Alz Disease?  It seem s we can.

Is Alzheimer’s avoidable?  Yes – see the 10 steps for reducing your risk of Alz Disease here.

©copyright 2010 http://50pluslifedesign.com, Alz disease, loss of short term memory

Alz Disease | Loss Of Short Term Memory is a post from: 50Plus Life Design U.S.

Share and Enjoy