Body & Soul

Elizabeth Saverino •

When we were little, our friends and social network influenced our choices, thoughts and behaviors. If Dave played basketball then so did Colin. If Marie wore her hair in pigtails, Andrea thought it was cool. When we grow up, we look at our friends and those who construct our social network much differently. We are led to believe who you know can lead you to opportunity and success. The number of names and phone numbers in our Blackberries are supposed to grow, especially in our nation’s capital, where building one’s social network is not only an event, pastime or lecture topic, but a way of life. We’ve all been told that “who you know” can get you in the door to a job, inside information or get you into a sold-out event. But studies say who you know and how well you know them can make a much more remarkable impact on one’s life than having an “in” with backstage security.

In recent years, sociologists, psychologists, scientists and physicians alike have shifted their attention and broadened their focus of study subjects by examining the relationships and characteristics of those closely connected to them. While an individual’s social networks have not unveiled connections resulting in lucrative jobs or insider information, they have instead revealed a profound influence and vital effect over many facets of one’s health and wellness. The characteristics of those who run in a person’s social circle and how closely connected they are to that person have proven to play a factoring role in matters diverse as belt size to coping ability.

So just how much are we influenced by our relationships? Let’s start with behaviors. It may sound rudimentary to assume that if the people you associate with are drinkers, you’ll likely follow suit. After assessing the social networks of 12,000 people from 1971 to 2003 — the subjects of the famous Framingham Heart Study — researchers from Harvard and the University of California, San Diego concluded in the Annals of Internal Medicine last month that not only do those in your social network affect your alcohol consumption, so do those in your social network’s network — this relationship held through three degrees of separation. If the people you surround yourself are heavy drinkers, it is 50 percent more likely that you will also drink heavily. If a friend of a friend is a heavy drinker, you would be 36 percent as likely to be one as well. And if that friend’s friend — the third degree of separation — is a heavy drinker, your chances of drinking heavily increases 15 percent.

It may be easy to enjoy another cocktail among your friends or share ideas of social acceptance when it comes to alcohol consumption, but what about body size? Could obesity spread from one to another just like the tendency to drink within a social circle? Take the people in your life, your friends, significant other, colleagues and family. Look at your body size in comparison to theirs, taking extra note of your closest friends. Do you find any parallels? Researchers from the Harvard/UCSD study found that it may not just be about diet and exercise, but that obesity is spread through relationships. The most statistically significant (and shocking) relationship influences were with close friendships of the same sex. A person’s chances of becoming obese increased by 57 percent if he or she had a close friend who became obese throughout the study. In pairs of people who each named one another as a close friend, the likeliness that both would gain weight if one became obese jumped to 171 percent. It didn’t matter how near or far the friends were from one another geographically, as long as the person being named was a close friend. This correlation has proved to be stronger than genetics and marriage. Between adult siblings, the likeliness that one would become obese after their brother or sister had increased by 40 percent; for spouses they found a 37 percent increased risk.

Don’t get upset just yet, not all relationships increase negative outcome. But if you are unhappy, perhaps you should find a new group of happy friends, hopefully ones with their own happy friends. Analyzing over 50,000 social ties of nearly 5,000 Framingham participants from 1983-2003, researchers concluded a key determinant of a person’s happiness lies in the happiness with whom they are connected. The degree of closeness to one’s friends and family also ascertained the likeliness of happiness in the future. In the study, happiness was found to be dependent on a person’s social connections extending (again) to three degrees of separation. What this means is that your close friends, siblings, spouse and neighbors all can impact your happiness, and if they are happy (and their friends, and their friends’ friends), there is a greater probability that you will also be happy. Luckily, happiness seems to spread much more consistently through a social web then does unhappiness. By mapping out a network of social connections, it was found that happy people are found in clusters, and the more central one is in the network of relationships, the more likely they are to be happy and stay happy in the future.

Need more reasons to embrace friendships? Want to live longer? Keep your friends, make new ones and continue your relationships in your old age. While having a spouse had little impact on survival, a study of 3,000 nurses with breast cancer published in the Journal of Oncology found that women without close friendships were four times as likely to die then women with 10 or more friends. Another study, this time focused on longevity, found that when people aged 70 and above maintained close friendships and social ties, they had a 22 percent higher survival time. Australian researchers in this study also found no correlation between relationships with their children and relatives, just the friendships the subjects maintained.

Maybe it is all about who you know in life that makes a difference when it comes to attaining health and happiness. It’s not just a mind and body connection we need to be aware of. There is a third component, a person’s social ties, which can play a major role in one’s wellness, thus unveiling the mind-body-social network connection. It turns out, in one way or another, we are all influencing one another, spreading cheer or weight gain, and not only is it important to choose friends wisely and rekindle old friendships, it’s never too late to make new friends. It’s also important to remember you are part of larger phenomenon, influencing and leaving your mark in others’ lives.

Katherine Tallmadge •

Getting reliable nutrition or diet information is a challenge in today’s information super-highway. Out of the thousands of diet books out there, I have found maybe a handful which merit recommending. My specifications?

• The content is based on verifiable facts and good science
• The recommendations, if followed short or long term, will improve your health, rather than damage it
• It advocates a variety of foods, and doesn’t cut out important, nutritious food groups
• It promotes a positive attitude toward food and eating
• It’s practical and doesn’t require special drugs, diet foods, packaged foods or supplements which would be impossible to maintain
• It doesn’t advocate a way of eating with unacceptable side-effects
• It advocates a well-balanced existence, including physical activity, which is known to be essential to good health
• The reading is interesting, while the recommendations are simple and easy to follow.

My choices for some of the best diet books out there, authored by academic researchers and dietitians:

“The Volumetrics Weight-Control Plan,” Barbara Rolls
Hands-down, “Volumetrics” is my favorite diet book. Barbara Rolls is a respected Penn State University nutrition researcher and the first to recognize the importance of high volume foods for weight loss and weight maintenance. Her philosophy is “Don’t deprive yourself — lose weight while eating more!” and it works. I live by this rule and have taught countless clients to do the same. I feel so positive about this approach I’ve adopted the “Volumetrics” concepts, among others, for my own book, “Diet Simple.” “Volumetrics” is full of practical ideas which work, and are proven by science and my own experience. The author treats the reader with respect by explaining the science behind the theories. It essentially includes 60 recipes, which my clients have found to be excellent.

“Thin for Life,” Anne M. Fletcher
Anne Fletcher is another author who knows her stuff. “Thin for Life” is based on highly respected research which has followed and studied people who have lost weight and kept it off for many years — the real pros. The chapters are divided into ten “keys to success.” “Thin for Life” refutes the oft-quoted claim that it’s impossible to lose weight and to keep it off. One of my favorite “keys” to success in the book, which I try to drill into my own clients, is “nip it in the bud.” Research has found that everyone experiences the same number of “slips” and stressors in their lives. The difference is the weight-relapsers let the slips turn into prolonged relapses and re-gain their weight. Successful weight loss maintainers view the “slip” as natural, as something to learn from, and get right back on track.

“Mindless Eating,” Brian Wansink
“Mindless Eating” is written by Cornell researcher Brian Wansink, an eating “behaviorist” who specializes in the passive ways people eat too much and how to change them. He’s discovered that we’re basically clueless about how much to eat (and if it’s in front of us, we’ll eat it!). If you’ve ever wondered why you ate all the popcorn at the movies or the whole serving of nachos for dinner — and have felt terrible — this book is for you. Wansink does ingenious experiments where he rigs bowls of soup to keep re-filling (with an apparatus under the table the subject knows nothing about) and finds the person keeps eating, and eating, and eating. He has found if food is less convenient, we are 10 times less likely to eat it. If the label announces “fat free,” we’ll eat more! If our food is on a smaller plate, we’ll eat less without realizing it. You get the idea. I use his research every day to improve my own eating habits and those of my clients.

“Weight Loss Confidential,” Anne M. Fletcher
This is a great book for teens (and their parents) that proves teenagers have the resources, with the proper support, to eat healthy, achieve appropriate weights and enjoy it.

“How to Get Your Kid to Eat…But Not Too Much” and “Child of Mine: Feeding with Love and Good Sense,” Ellyn Satter
A registered dietitian and clinical social worker, Ellyn Satter has written the best books to teach you how to raise your children to love healthy food and live healthy lives, without adverse side-effects of eating disorders or weight problems. Some of her topics include: “Is Your Toddler Jerking You Around at the Table?” “The Individualistic Teenager,” “How Much Should Your Child Eat?” “What is Normal Eating?” and “Nutritional Tactic for Preventing Food Fights.”

“Red Light, Green Light, Eat Right,” Joanna Dolgoff
This is a great book with simple techniques for teaching children healthy eating and how to lose weight healthfully. I recently heard the author, Joanna Dolgoff, give a presentation about her book and found her very practical and insightful — she advocates strategies I’ve used and know they work. Her philosophy: no food is off-limits, but she divides foods into three categories to make it easier for children to make decisions without being hung up on calories. Green light foods mean: Go! (unlimited, first choice foods), yellow light foods mean: Slow! (caution, eat in moderation), and red light foods mean: Uh oh! (an occasional treat).

Katherine’s favorite healthy cookbooks:
1) “The French Culinary Institute’s Salute to Healthy Cooking,” Jacques Pepin, et al.
2) “Mediterranean Light,” Martha Rose Shulman
3) “The New American Plate,” American Institute for Cancer Research
4) “Provencal Light,” Martha Rose Shulman

Katherine Tallmadge, M.A., R.D. will customize an easy, enjoyable nutrition, weight loss, athletic or medical nutrition therapy program for you, your family or your company. She is the author of “Diet Simple: 192 Mental Tricks, Substitutions, Habits & Inspirations,” and national spokesperson for the American Dietetic Association. Contact her at katherine@katherinetallmadge.com or 202-833-0353. [gallery ids="99128,102659,102700,102691,102682,102675,102668" nav="thumbs"]

Charlene Louis •

Georgetown is known for having many gems and specialty stores, and Alchimie Forever is not one to be forgotten. Located at 1010 Wisconsin Ave., tucked away next to Poltrona Frau, Alchimie Forever provides women and men with a line of noninvasive yet effective skin care products. Dr. Luigi Polla, a leader in the field of cosmetic laser therapy, with the help of his wife Barbra Polla, a biomedical researcher, realized the benefits of antioxidants and stress proteins for many of his patients. In the winter of 1997, Dr. Luigi converted his practice into the Forever Laser Institute. With the combination of spa-like services and medical treatments, Forever Institute became the center of having visibly improved skin results without the need of extreme skin care procedures.

In 2000, the Alchimie Forever skin care line was born. With the lack of harsh chemicals and use of natural products such as blueberries, grapes, and synthetic acids, (all extremely beneficial for their antioxidant properties) all helped in the maintaining and clarifying of one’s skin.

In 2003, surrounded by the knowledge of skin care and maintenance, their daughter Ada Polla made it her mission to develop the line’s brand and visibility. To further the spa’s mission, the family launched Alchimie Forever in 2003. Becoming the CEO of a successful skincare line at the age of 25, Ada took on the challenge with a team of eight who’ve made the products available and used in popular spas like Hela Spa (3209 M St.), Somafit (2121 Wisconsin Ave.), Grooming Lounge (1745 L St.) and various locations throughout New York and overseas. ?

When asked why she decided to open the flagship location in Georgetown, Polla explained that she “felt like a big fish in a smaller pond in the world of skincare” in the District. She goes on to explain that D.C. was such a niche market, and besides her love of the city, she feels this was the perfect market for her products.

When asked about Alchimie’s philosophy, Polla was quick to stress the importance of care for the entire self. As she quoted her father, “you can always tell a woman’s age by her hands and her décolleté (chest).” It is clear that one must care for more then just the face. Though they specialize in facial care, Alchimie’s body care products are clearly meant to nature and heal the skin. Alchimie will not make promises (and no product can) of creating a face 10 years younger or giving you the skin of a 16-year-old, but will promise to improve and make the best of what you are giving. By making the best of what you have and “achieving the best skin possible,” a person can not help but to be beautiful.

To learn more about Alchimie Forever, visit
www.alchimie-forever.com,
1010 Wisconsin Ave., Suite 201. [gallery ids="99129,102669,102683,102677" nav="thumbs"]

Stacy Notaras Murphy •

Dear Stacy:
I’m a divorced, 43-year-old mother of two teenage boys. I pay attention to my appearance, still enjoy playing sports and am often mistaken for someone much younger. I suppose that makes me the proverbial “cougar,” a term that truly makes my skin crawl. My dating life following my divorce has been pretty stilted; I’ve been on a few dates here and there, but mostly my life has been devoted to raising my sons and advancing my PR career. But recently, I’ve found myself attracted to a much younger man. He’s 31 and our firms share office space. He flirts with me, even though I’ve been very up front about my age and the fact that I’m a mom, and I really enjoy the conversations we’ve had. He invites me to happy hours and has suggested we have lunch together, too. Each time I make an excuse and end up feeling embarrassed. Is it acceptable for me to be attracted to a younger man?
— K Street Kougar

Dear K Street:
First, congratulations on getting to the holy-grail place of being able to balance raising two teens, holding a job and keeping up with things you enjoy on your own. You ask, “Is it acceptable” be attracted to this person, but I don’t think that’s your real question. I think what you are actually wondering is if you can handle the possible consequences of following your heart (or, since it’s early in the attraction, at least following your flirt-instinct).

Your aversion to the “cougar” label makes some sense. Despite the Ashton/Demi pairings of the world, reality TV seems to be taking a mocking approach to the younger-man/older-woman dynamic right now. Still, your frustration with the title suggests that you are concerned about how other people will view the relationship, no matter how great the relationship itself might be. Tasking ourselves with spending time inside other people’s brains is a 24-hour-a-day job, with very little payoff. Yes, it’s too simplistic to say, “Who cares what others think?” But still, is that really where you want to put your energy, particularly when you’ve got kids, work and other responsibilities? Instead, channel it into the potential for a rewarding relationship with a new person who already clearly enjoys you. That’s a much healthier use of resources.

I’d also suggest that you give yourself time to consider what you are looking for in a relationship right now. Do you want something casual to ease you into the process of getting back out there? Do you want something more? Even if this doesn’t lead to a long-term relationship, it might be a fun, healthy, self-esteem-building experience — who would say no to that?

Dear Stacy:
I don’t know what to do. I just graduated from college and my parents have just informed me that they are no longer able (or willing?) to keep helping me financially. There was no hint that they might do this; all along they paid my credit card bills and student fees. Because of them I’ve never had to have a job, so I have no job experience and I can’t even get a job waiting tables. If I had known about their plans, I would have worked harder to find a job right after school ended. Instead, I’ve been putting my efforts into starting a business with a classmate and planning a post-grad trip abroad this fall. I am so angry that they are abandoning me like this. It really ruins everything I’ve worked for. I’m not speaking to them until I have a game plan. It’s been almost two months. What can I do to convince them that they are making a mistake that will permanently impact my future? I thought they had my best interests at heart — I guess I was wrong about them.
— 31st and On-My-Own

Dear On-My-Own:
I’m going to give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you didn’t have a chance to reread this question before sending, and therefore you may have no idea how ungrateful it sounds.

If I hear you correctly, you are complaining that your parents put you through college and gave you the chance to make the most of your studies so that you could … keep spending their money after graduation? Even before the financial meltdown, that would have sounded far too entitled. Today, it sounds ludicrous and humiliatingly arrogant. The good news is that your parents have cut you loose at an age when most of your peers feel like they’re flying blind — you’re in good company and will blend in. (This kind of awakening is less tolerable when you’re say, 38 and whining that Daddy won’t cover your car payment.)

You are right, this is going to “permanently impact your future,” but in a good way. It may not be easy, but this is your opportunity to start taking responsibility for your own life. You should know that adjusting to a change in expectations is hard for everyone. But like many things, the difficulty doesn’t mean it can’t be done. Blaming others may be cathartic in the short term, but it’s like downing a candy bar at 3 p.m. — the sugar high soon expires, leaving you feeling tired and with no energy to change your circumstances. Get a job, any job, and work hard on your entrepreneurial dreams in the off hours. You have the chance to use all of that family support for what it was meant to be — a launching pad.

Dear Stacy:
My husband and I have been married for four years and things are not going well. We don’t spend much time together because we both have demanding jobs. We also are in constant conflict about his family’s expectations (they want us to spend all our free time and vacations at their beach house in Easton). Adding to it, we have credit card debt and bought our one-bedroom condo at the peak of the market, making it impossible for us to sell anytime soon. It feels like the walls are closing in on us and I don’t know what to do. I have asked him to go to counseling, but he completely rejects the idea, saying we can’t afford it and won’t discuss it further. Just yesterday he told me to never bring it up again, yet we spent the whole night not talking to each other after another major fight. I’m so embarrassed and feel like a failure, and I don’t want any of our friends or family to find out what’s really going on. I feel like my only option is divorce, but this is a person I truly love and don’t want to lose.
— At a Crossroads on Corcoran

Dear Crossroads:
Thank you for writing such an honest and personal letter, but also one that is so universal. It’s not uncommon for early-stage marriages to face many bold-faced issues all at once: money, work pressure, family stress, communication struggles. I hope you are being gentle with yourself for not necessarily having all the answers just yet — I guarantee your friends and family already have or will face similar challenges in their own relationships. We spend a lot of time fantasizing about the fairytale of marriage, but most of us aren’t immediately equipped with the tools to survive it.

As a couples counselor, I have to make a small plug for going to therapy. Yes, it can be pricey, particularly if your insurance plan won’t reimburse you. But the cost of divorce is astronomically higher. When you include attorney fees (sometimes as high as $500 an hour), custody battles, moving expenses, and the cost of setting up separate households, the price tag could reach $50,000 or more. Even if you are unable to settle your differences, investing in some counseling can help improve communication, making it possible to choose a mediator instead of an attorney-directed separation, if it comes to that.

One part of your letter that stands out to me is your husband’s unwillingness to discuss therapy. It’s a red flag when one partner flatly refuses to do something the other is asking for (assuming it doesn’t qualify as unsafe). This can be a sign of rigidity and control that’s likely to only grow more powerful if it’s allowed to languish.

But his reluctance to try counseling is most likely based in fear of the unknown, fear of truly being seen, even fear of failure. You can’t force someone to confront their fear through intimidation — that’s when our defenses get even stronger. Patience, calm, and speaking from your own point of view (“I want us to go to therapy because I think I will be able to understand you better with the help of a third party…”) is the key to making him feel comfortable and open to the process.

At the same time, don’t discount the value of trying therapy by yourself. We all know every marital problem has two sides, and you might learn more about your own needs and how you contribute to the household stress. At the very least, you will find some healthy coping strategies that could help maintain and even strengthen the nourishing parts of your relationship.

Stacy Notaras Murphy is a licensed professional counselor and certified Imago Relationship therapist practicing at the Imago Center of DC in Georgetown. This column is meant for entertainment only, and should not be considered a substitute for professional counseling. Please send your relationship questions to stacy@georgetowner.com.

Dr. Dorree Lynn •

My boyfriend is really sweet and sex has been pretty good, but I don’t like the way he kisses. Is there anything I can do?
— Cora, 62

You know how “they” keep telling you not to try to change someone, to just love them as they are? Well, that’s mostly true, but who says you can’t teach an old kisser some new tricks? In many ways, we do teach partners (and they teach us) to make love in a new way that is a melding of the two.

How about telling your boyfriend that you love having sex with him and you’d like to make it even better by trying new ways to kiss? Maybe make it a game and try a new kind of kissing each day. Or ask him to experiment with changing one particular thing, such as holding his breath or keeping his lips too rigid. The key here is relaxed experimentation and feedback. Talk about what you each like. For example, do you know if your boyfriend likes the way you kiss?

After touching, kissing is high on the list of what makes sex mysteriously work. Whether it’s your first kiss ever or your last kiss with your current love, kissing can be magical. Or it can become boring and routine. There are a million good ways to kiss. With the passing years, why stay with the same old, same old? Maybe you’ve always preferred a peck on the cheek, or perhaps deep, tongue “French” kissing got lost along the way while you were raising children or chasing a career. Many times, especially in long-term relationships, people can forget how much they used to like kissing and may become complacent lovers. There may be other reasons as well. For some people, kissing may be more intimate than intercourse and they are holding themselves back from feeling too vulnerable.

It’s never too late to change how you kiss. Play with kissing to see what works for you. Pecks, deep soul-kissing, the quickie, butterfly kiss — what do you like? If you always kiss in just one or two ways, try something new and see what happens!

Dr. Dorree Lynn is a Georgetown-based psychologist and life coach committed to helping people have better relationships fulfilling sex lives. She has appeared on “Good Morning America,” MSNBC, CNN, PBS and other major programming. She is the author of “Sex for Grownups,” available from Amazon.

Dr. Dorree Lynn • September 13, 2011

Living in D.C. is a lot like living under a rock and living in the public eye, all at once. It is eight square miles surrounded by reality and brimming with some of the most talented people in the world. And while many of the people in D.C. are definitely boyfriend/girlfriend material, finding the one that’s right for you is possible but not necessarily easy.

The catch is that most of the people in this city are so focused, so business-minded, and so dedicated to their jobs that they rarely have opportunities to get out and socialize. Not to mention the fact that, because of the nature of some of the occupations in this city, some people can’t/don’t drink in order to not get sloshed and spill national security secrets. In some cases just being seen out in social bar-type environments can be detrimental to one’s public image (we won’t even discuss the risk of being caught tweeting pictures or cruising Craigslist!).

Now, not everyone in D.C. has a public image. I’d imagine that half of the staffers and interns on the hill can be found on U St. or H St. or prancing around Dupont Circle in the late hours, and you’d never know who they were or what they did. But generally speaking, at least 80 percent of the people in this city are quality people, even though they may be hard to find at times.

Like a strong company looking to hire the perfect employee, there is someone out there looking for someone like you. The downside is the same for both dating and job hunting: competition is fierce and you may have to go through a lot of interviews before you land that dream job…I mean boyfriend/girlfriend.

The keys to finding the perfect partner are the same you would use to find the perfect job: dress for success, get your name out there, and call in favors from friends. Also, do what you love to do and you’ll meet people with similar interests. If you like to bike then join a bike group, if you enjoy museums then visit museums, etc.

Start by meeting new people, even if just for fun. There are TONS of online resources for groups to join and things to do in this fabulous city. Ask your friends and coworkers for suggestions on social events, happy hours, and networking opportunities. And don’t be afraid to start a conversation with someone at the grocery store or on the Metro. Your two-second interaction could lead to dinner and a bottle of wine!

Dr. Dorree Lynn is a psychologist and life coach committed to helping people have better relationships & fulfilling sex lives. Dr. Lynn is a contributing author for The Georgetowner, AARP’s “Sexpert” and has appeared on “Good Morning America,” MSNBC, CNN, PBS, & other national programming. Her book, “Sex for Grownups” is available on Amazon. Follow Dr. Dorree Lynn online: www.DrDorreeLynn.com or www.Facebook.com/DrDorreeLynn.