My Daily Domestic Clips 10/29/2010 (a.m.)

• Sisters and Happiness – Understanding the Connection – NYTimes.com – Annotated tags: family sisters
  • An example is Colleen, a widow in her 80s who told me that she’d been very
    close to her unmarried sister throughout their lives, though they never
    discussed their personal problems. An image of these sisters has remained
    indelible in my mind.
    Late in life, the sister came to live with Colleen and her husband. Colleen
    recalled that each morning after her husband got up to make coffee, her sister
    would stop by Colleen’s bedroom to say good morning. Colleen would urge her
    sister to join her in bed. As they sat up in bed side by side, holding hands,
    Colleen and her sister would “just talk.”
  • An example is Colleen, a widow in her 80s who told me that she’d been very
    close to her unmarried sister throughout their lives, though they never
    discussed their personal problems. An image of these sisters has remained
    indelible in my mind.
    Late in life, the sister came to live with Colleen and her husband. Colleen
    recalled that each morning after her husband got up to make coffee, her sister
    would stop by Colleen’s bedroom to say good morning. Colleen would urge her
    sister to join her in bed. As they sat up in bed side by side, holding hands,
    Colleen and her sister would “just talk.”
    That’s another kind of conversation that many women engage in which baffles
    many men: talk about details of their daily lives, like the sweater they found
    on sale — details, you might say, as insignificant as those about last night’s
    ballgame which can baffle women when they overhear men talking. These seemingly
    pointless conversations are as comforting to some women as “troubles talk”
    conversations are to others.
    So maybe it’s true that talk is the reason having a sister makes you happier,
    but it needn’t be talk about emotions. When women told me they talk to their
    sisters more often, at greater length and about more personal topics, I suspect
    it’s that first element — more often — that is crucial rather than the last.
• Akron Ohio ballot issues explained. explanation of the local ballot issues – finally! tags: currentevents
• Breastfeeding and preventing breast cancer. – Annotated tags: breastfeeding cancer health
  • Breastfeeding protects the mother?  While we generally
    focus on the positive benefits of breastfeeding for the infants, there are
    additional benefits for the mother as well.  Breastfeeding has been found
    to provide a measure of protection against uterine, cervical and ovarian cancers
    as well as breast cancer.  

    A study by Yale University researchers
    showed that women who breastfed for two years or longer reduced their risk of
    breast cancer by 50 percent.  The researchers studied the medical history
    of 808 Chinese women in the rural Shandong province from 1997 to 1999.  The
    women were aged 30 to 80 and half had breast cancer and half did not. The study
    was published in the American Journal of
    Epidemiology.  Although the study did not explore the reasons why
    breastfeeding appears to lower the risk of breast cancer, some researchers say
    it could be because breastfeeding reduces exposure to estrogen, and yet another
    theory is that fat-soluble pollutants and carcinogens are not stored as much in
    lactating breasts than in non-lactation breasts.

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.