Regular exercise not only helps to provide a healthy lifestyle to an individual but also keeps him protected from several diseases. Any kind of exercise which is performed on a daily basis offers a long term benefits.

Aerobic exercise is a special type of exercise that helps to rejuvenate and energize your body. Let us know some of the basics and benefits of this wonderful form of exercise.

Literal meaning of the term aerobic means “with oxygen”.   the simplest way aerobic exercises provides an efficient mode of oxygen flow throughout our body parts. While exercising aerobically, the breathing and heart rate increases and the muscle cells demand a steady flow of oxygen.

Oxygen is very much essential component of our body which is involved in converting the fat into energy. Although glucose and protein are used as energy sources, a moderate aerobic exercise also helps to encourage the use of fats for fuel. Regular aerobic exercise helps the body to become a real burning fat machine.

Some of the good examples of aerobic activities are:

Aerobic exercises are associated with repeated movements of large muscles in arms, legs and hips. Once you start the aerobic exercises, you will soon experience the responses from the body.

Aerobic exercises allow you to breathe faster and more deeply. This results in the steady flow of oxygen in your body. As the heart beats faster, there is an increase flow of blood to the muscles and back to the lungs.

The blood vessels gets widen during the process and deliver more oxygen to the muscles and also helps in discarding waste materials like carbon dioxide and lactic acid.

Aerobic exercises also help to release endorphins in the body which acts as natural pain killers.

New data shows that breastfeeding isn’t only good for the baby, but can also benefit the mother. Mothers who breastfeed may benefit from lower risks of heart attacks, heart disease, and stroke because of reduced fat stored in the body.

Though breastfeeding had been losing steam for many decades with the migration of more women in the workplace, it seems over the past several years the trend is actually gaining in popularity. Research has shown many positive effects of breastfeeding for a baby, such as lowering risks for infections in the gastrointestinal, urinary, and respiratory tracts, reducing instances of ear infections, diarrhea and the risk of SIDS (sudden-infant death syndrome). Breastfeeding has also shown to potentially ward off allergies, diabetes, and even obesity later in life for breastfed babies. According to Audrey Naylor, “Even if a mother breastfeeds for just a few weeks after giving birth, she is giving her baby an enormous health boost with positive effects that can be seen almost immediately, as well as long- term benefits that may help her child remain healthier clear into adulthood.” Now there is research emerging showing the benefits of breastfeeding on mothers who nurse.

This means that breastfeeding has some pretty significant benefits for the long-term health of mothers. According to Dr. Adam Aponte, chairman of pediatrics and ambulatory care at North General Hospital in New York City, “In the short term, breastfeeding increases the production of oxytocin, a hormone that not only encourages milk production, but also helps a mother feel more relaxed and calm.” Previous research has shown that breastfeeding for as little as a month may reduce a mother’s risks of breast, uterine and ovarian cancer, and can potentially lead to stronger bones. Breastfeeding helps a mother’s uterus to contract even after birth and return to its pre-pregnancy state and preventing postpartum hemorrhaging.

Based on research, breastfeeding seems to be a win-win situation, benefiting both mother and baby. The longer a mother nurses her baby the better for both of them. It is recommended by the American Academy of Pediatrics that mothers breastfeed their babies with no supplementation of other liquids, only mother’s milk, for six months, but to continue breastfeeding along with liquid supplementation if desired, throughout a baby’s first year of life and beyond.

Habitual tea drinkers revel in the beverages’ likely health benefits. Hot or cold, green and black tea, brimming with disease-fighting antioxidants, trumps coffee for protection against heart disease, cancer, and possibly osteoporosis. But if you prefer your tea extremely hot, you may actually end up increasing your risk for throat cancer.

The team, led by Reza Malekzadeh of the Digestive Disease Research Centre at Tehran University of Medical Sciences, studied the tea-drinking habits of 300 people who had been diagnosed with OSCC and a matched group of 571 healthy people who lived in the same area. Participants answered questions about how they usually drank their tea (very hot, hot, warm, or lukewarm) and how long they let the tea brew before drinking it. Nearly all participants, 98 percent, said they drank black tea regularly, consuming an average of more than one liter each day.

These findings lend support to the notion that scorching liquids may cause damage to the throat’s epithelial linings and lead to cancer. “In South America, especially Argentina, there is a well established relationship between esophageal cancer and drinking very hot mate, a kind of tea which is usually consumed when it is almost boiling and is sipped through a metal spoon. The problem is not the tea but the chronic inflammation from drinking it hot,” Michael Thun, MD, the American Cancer Society’s vice president emeritus of epidemiology, told WebMD via email.

Women who are in stressful marriages may be suffering with heartaches, in more ways than one. Not all marriages are “made in heaven,” resulting in some very stressful situations. It seems these stressful marriages are not only causing depression, but also resulting in women having higher risks of heart disease, stroke and diabetes.

Many women hope for the perfect marriage with a loving husband, nice home, a family, peaceful dinners,  and joyful vacations together. However, we do not always get what we sign up for. Many marriages have rocky times, especially when partners cannot seem to agree on things such as goals in life, parenting, money issues, and time spent at home. In today’s economic environment, many families and couples are facing new challenges and hard times that we haven’t before, which may lead to some stressful relationships that in years past had not been troubled. Based on new research, stress from a trying marriage may lead to even bigger health problems, in addition to stress and depression.

Marriages are many times trying and it seems based on the new research, those trying times may cause more harm to women than men. According to Nancy Henry, “Women seem to be more relationship oriented.” She said, “We know by research that women tend to base their self-concept on relationships, how they are doing, how things are going for them and we think that’s the reason we’ve shown that negative relationship issues seem to take a greater toll on women emotionally and physically.” Nancy also added, “The gender difference is important because heart disease is the number-one killer of women as well as men, and we are still learning a lot about how relationship factors and emotional distress are related to heart disease.” According to Tim Smith, Ph.D., a professor of psychology at the University of Utah, who is heading a larger University of Utah study on the role of marriage quality in heart disease, says it is too soon to say that stress could make women more vulnerable to physical problems compared to men, even if the latest research suggests it.

Women, work to remove stress from your life and marriage, try to avoid controversy if you can, exercise and eat healthy, it could help you live a longer healthier life.