Well, the field of genetics and the outcome of the massive human genome project that seems to have spawned a million genetic tests that can now be used to tell us everything from our tendencies toward cancers to how likely it is that we’ll live past 80 years old, has resulted in another genetic test.

This one is targeted toward men and a very particular concern that so many men have as they age. Much like women have to be more concerned about getting breast cancer as they get older, and are subjected to mammograms, thermographies, and other types of screenings, men are subjected to the infamous and increasingly criticized PSA test.

The PSA test for prostate cancer has been criticized as unreliable and even totally useless by its critics. This is because it often only tells men that they may have a small tumor on their prostate gland, and sometimes even if the PSA reading is abnormal, it may be a total miss and there may not be any tumors present. Many people are increasingly thinking it is not reliable enough to tell men if they have prostate cancer that is in a stage where it needs to be treated.

With newer genetic tests, often times Doctors can tell how aggressive certain cancers are in addition to telling how likely people are to die from the particular type of cancer and how likely they are to actually get a certain cancer in the first place. It’s pretty impressive, but some say it’s too much like “playing God”.

To be honest, I have mixed feelings about all of it especially when I hear about women getting both breasts removed simply because a test told them they are very likely to get breast cancer. It seems radical.

The new prostate cancer genetic tests will be able to tell men how aggressive their prostate cancer tumors are by taking tissue samples. This in turn theoretically gives the patient enough information to determine whether they want to treat their prostate cancer with any number of the treatments available today (which mind you, all have undesirable side effects and can be toxic in and of themselves).

The tests so far cost upwards up $3,000 and do not require approval to be marketed since they are simply diagnostic and not “treating” anything yet. The genetic profile they provide by looking at the tissue of the prostate tumor supposedly can tell the man whether he should seek treatment or whether this is a very slow growing cancer that may not require treatment for years. This can avoid months of painful treatments and recovery that often leaves men with permanent issues.

This could really prove a useful tool if utilized correctly. However, it doesn’t really consider the fact that every person is different in their reaction to this information. Even if a test showed a low likelihood of progression, some men may still want to pursue aggressive treatment – this is still up to them.

Also, another problem with the test pointed out is that the right area of the tumor or tissue needs to be biopsied in order to get a true risk profile that can help a patient decide whether to pursue treatment yet or not. If the wrong area is selected, who knows how bad the tissue is or whether the most aggressive cancer cells have migrated there yet.

There’s always the chance that the wrong area may be chosen. So as you can see, there are still plenty of errors and human issues that can enter in to the equation here. In the end, just take as good care of your prostate as you can, and help prevent any of this from happening in the first place.

I know not all guys are “cat guys”, but I’m including cats in this story because cats can really be fantastic companions like dogs can for men just as they can for women. Take the Maine Coon breed of cat. They behave very much more like dogs than cats (I hear you saying, oh everyone thinks their cat is like a dog, but it’s documented and true about this breed).

Especially male Maine Coons. They are goofy, playful and sort of stoic like a dog is. They also are incredibly loyal to the people that take care of them, and are very much in need of human companionship, not as “aloof” and “independent” as most cats are.

There are so many reasons why having a pet can really enhance your life. Not only if you live alone or are a forever-bachelor either, but also if you have a family, although the benefits may drop a bit then because you already have so much else going on in your life and having a pet may just seem like another obligation if that’s the case.

My personal benefits of having our two cats (one is a male Maine Coon by the way) are the following. The first is, they are always accepting. Even when you’ve had a terrible day of rejection and are feeling less than adequate, animals do not hold any judgments and will always love you unconditionally.

I can feel my stress melt away as I touch their fur and hear them purr because I know that there is a creature that doesn’t care what my outside achievements are and will always love me just because I’m me.

They also give me a sense of purpose.  Making sure you feed you animals, take them to the vets when they need it, take care of them if they’re feeling bad, and are responsible for their attention and emotional needs – is gratifying.

I’ve never really wanted children, so I feel like my animals are my “kids” and they give me the sense of fulfillment that I’m taking care of some defenseless creature that also enriches my life as I enrich theirs.

Now let’s talk about some of the other benefits animals impart in our life.  There is striking scientific evidence that having a pet can do many things for us in life that any diet and exercise regimen may not be able to duplicate as far as our health and wellness goes.

People with pets tend to be less depressed, suffer less heart attacks and have better heart health overall, and generally live longer than those that do not have any pets in their life.  Think about that, because once the kids are grown and moved out, those with an animal in their life still have that sense of purpose and totally fulfilled love that they got from their kids.

It really gives people a sense of purpose to stay well and alive!  One example in studies performed found that a dog (or dogs) can provide a better social support system and relief from stressors than humans can.  This means that dogs actually have a larger capability to calm our stresses and to soothe our souls than even our family or friends can do!

They’ve also found that owning a pet seems to reduce the stress hormones and other destructive chemicals in our body that circulate when we’re stressed or chronically depressed, leading to a healthier outlook on life and not coincidentally less chronic disease and other health issues that go with attitude.

In summation, owning a pet can really enrich your life. But more importantly it can complete you emotionally and health-wise like nothing else can. Owning a pet is really something that everyone should explore. It’s good for the soul.

Durex, the brand that is best known for making some of the most popular brands of condoms and other contraceptive devices and sexual pleasure enhancement sidelines, had come up with a very fun new app that is grabbing some headlines. Kudos to them for being marketing geniuses, because I gotta say, here I am as a blogger writing about it.

It’s too good to pass up!

The company has now come up with an app that is titillating the younger generation looking for ways to spice up their relationships. It’s called the Fundawear app, and you can put it on your smart phone and your girlfriend or wive’s smart phone for some pure entertainment, silliness and perhaps even a little bit of romance before you come home and do the deed for real!

In others words, this app may not just serve as a funny party conversation, it also may actually spark some serious foreplay!  The app allows a partner to buzz his woman’s undies from far away whenever he feels a little randy, and likewise, she can do the same to him when she wants.

You simply buy the fundawear and install the accompanying app.  The underwear is adorned with a vibrating mechanism, which vibrates whenever it is activated by your lover from a remote location. You can use when you’re having phone sex, or just randomly buzz your significant other when you’re thinking about them or when you want to drop the hint that you’re in the mood for some loving when you see them.

My question, being the patrician older person I am now with a professional job and a lot of adult responsibilities, was of course, can others hear the vibration when your lover sets it off? Couldn’t this whole thing be a cause for embarrassment and discomfort if you’re sitting in an important meeting and suddenly your underwear goes off?

Of what if you’re the type of person who is easily stimulated and excited (God love you, I wish I were you!)?  Wouldn’t you not want to be suddenly sexually excited if you’re trying to concentrate on something important?

The app lets you touch in different areas based on a diagram that you can drag your fingers along to choose where to “touch” or activate the vibrator.

The product is apparently still in its testing phases, and is not officially for sale yet, but it’s already getting a lot of press obviously for the titillating nature of it and of course the novelty of one of the first “space age” sex toys out there.

No word yet on whether it will include other things like bras or other pieces of clothing that you can touch other erogenous zones with, but that may very well be in the future since they seem determined to cater to everyone, and there are a lot of different tastes out there on where people like to be touched to be aroused.

As a woman, I can tell you there are two things that are instant libido-killers for me. The first is when I’m angry with my significant other and can only see red when I look at him. The second is when I’m stressing out, and usually the main thing I stress about is money and the lack thereof.

Let’s face it, financial pressures are one of the biggest stressors that people of all ages and sexes experience as a major source of anxiety in their lives. If we were all carefree self-made millionaires (who also happened to know our money would never leave us or that we could never screw it up because believe it or not that’s a huge source of stress too), we’d probably all be having a lot more sex!

My husband and I just got done going through a period of doing a particularly complicated year of taxes. It took up quite a few weekends for us both to get our books in order to file, and there was a lot of back and forth and second guessing, so that in itself was stressful.

Even more stressful was the fact that we were not sure if we would owe taxes or not, and at this juncture, owing taxes would have been the proverbial straw that broke the camel’s back when it came to our personal finances. We just would not have been able to easily pick up another bill because we just happened to be barely making the bills that we already had standing every month!

I know everyone has been there at one point or another unless they’ve been born into money or have been blessed enough to never have to really worry that way about finances for some reason (if you know someone like that, can you tell me their secret).

This type of stress is one of the biggest reasons that married couples fight and become cold and distant with one another. Guess what becoming cold and distant and detached comes along with? Lower libido and almost a complete lack of sex drive or desire to be intimate!

This doesn’t just go for women either. People tend to generalize and think that women are such sensitive creatures that any storm in their emotional calm causes them to lose interest in sex. But men are just as affected by stress believe it or not. They may be to a lesser degree, true, but it affects them as well.

Men just might internalize that stress a little more. Think about it. Do you really have much energy left over to put anywhere else than where it is immediately demanded when you’re stressing out because you’re going through an incredibly stressful situation?

Guess what sex requires?! Energy and enthusiasm, and when you have neither, that’s when your libido takes a totally huge back burner to the more pressing issues in your life at the moment. Stress and anxiety are one of the biggest relationship killers because of this. You have to learn to really manage it, but you also have to learn to keep the lines of communication open.

Getting out your feelings, frustrations, fears and anxieties about finances with each other can actually feel great. Some couples internalize all of this and never get it off their chests with each other. You can sort of act as one another’s therapist, and you’ll find that it really feels good to get it out. It also can bring you much closer and help you understand why your partner may not be so interested in sex and affection.

It can result in less hurt feelings and misunderstandings when you know why your partner is acting distant or cold, and keep the lines of communication open between the two of you, making no topic off limits and bringing you closer.

There have been multiple studies done on the big question lingering in so many men’s minds. And let me tell you, when there is an “urban myth” type of fact out there that just won’t go away, it seems there is almost always at least a kernel of truth to it.

The idea that women are more attracted to men with larger penises is one such questioned “fact” that men and women alike, and apparently scientists too, have puzzled over for almost as long as penis size was a matter that was comfortably publicly discussed.

As a woman myself, I can tell you that many of my female friends do think that having a larger, or at least substantial, penis, is a seriously attractive attribute for men to have.  That doesn’t mean that every woman likes a larger penis, but it does mean that the commonly held belief holds some water in my opinion.

And the most recent study that has come out of Canada agrees. They took a demo group of younger women, average age of 26, which is one of the most sexually active since women and men both are still seeking out mates at this age and are very intuned to what is attractive and what is not in the opinion of both women and men in sexual partners.

They presented these women with a basically blank outline of a man in naked form, with varying builds such as broader shoulders, skinnier shoulders, varying heights and builds, and also with varying sizes of their pictures flacid penis.

The women routinely and regularly picked the male forms they saw that had the larger flacid penis. The women were totally alone in a room when they were making their choices based on sexual attractiveness, and the results were totally anonymous which helped to boost the reliability of the test results.

The overwhelming outcome was that women do prefer a larger penis size to a smaller. It is perhaps something that, like breasts are for men, that women are evolutionarily drawn to because it somehow symbolizes fertility, strength, manliness, or the fact that this larger size may be better able to provide women with more sexual satisfaction.

It’s interesting to note that there are many critics of the findings in previous studies that purported to show women preferred larger penises. They were often criticized as unfairly skewed, unreliable and even as sexist against men who don’t have large penises.

It’s a touchy subject, to be sure, because there are a lot of men who intuitively know that women are looking for this – at least a lot of women – and it has resulted in a lot of insecurity for men who don’t feel all that confident about their penis size. Hence the popularity of products like Size Genetics and others in the natural penis enlargement market.

I’ve noticed a lot of celebrities lately have taken on the vegetarian or vegan way of eating. I think there is definitely a trend toward the whole foods vegan diet, as I’ve seen a lot of people benefit from this type of diet in profound ways. I only wish I had the discipline to stick to a diet that I view as fairly restrictive day in and day out.

I actually love a lot of the foods that I would be allowed to eat on this type of diet, so it wouldn’t be torture. However, I also will still always LOVE the occasional cheeseburger or piece of pepperoni pizza. Sue me. I’m still a meat eater.

I’m just more of a carb girl at heart, which is why ultimately, when I get older and it becomes a little harder to maintain my weight or my health the way I used to be able to, I could definitely find it in me to stick to something like this when I have more at stake.

I give people who are vegan lots of props, especially if they don’t live in an area where vegan meals and foods are not easily accessible, like where I live. In places like Oregon and California, you can find a lot of these places pretty much on every street corner.

Even if a restaurant isn’t specifically vegan or vegetarian, there are always plenty of menu items that are in places like this. Here, not so much. There are lots of restaurants that have less than savory options for the vegan! This really does make it harder to stick to that type of diet in my opinion.

All that being said, I wanted to talk about how I see a growing popular trend toward the vegetarian and vegan lifestyle. I’m reading an increasing amount of celebrities are adopting this lifestyle. It could be in the name of animal rights and cruelty prevention, or it could be for health reasons (this is usually the most likely in Hollywood), or it could be due to a health problem that has dictated a serious diet change.

Even athletes are getting into this type of lifestyle. A popular professional wrestler, CM Punk has recently opened up about his mostly vegan diet (I think he may still eat white meat occasionally), and he looks fantastic. His skin looks so much better, and you can just tell that he looks overall healthier.

Bill Clinton famously went vegan and whole foods based after he had some health scares, and he’s dropped a lot of weight and kept it off. Mike Tyson and Jouaquin Phoenix are also vegans.

Kelly Ripa is a vegetarian. Connie Britton is a vegan. Olivia Wilde is a vegan. Pamela Anderson is a long-time vegetarian. Alicia Silverstone is a long time vegan. This one surprised me, but explains why he lost so much weight and looks so much healthier (and happier) than he used to (ok maybe it’s the beautiful woman he recently married too) – but Alec Baldwin!

Demi Moore is a vegan, and so is Jessica Chastain. This is just a small list of some of the Hollywood-ites that are vegan eaters! There are a lot more. It explains how they keep in such great shape. Keep in mind though, that being vegan also means that you have to choose healthy vegan foods still.

Vegans can still choose unhealthy foods, they just have a more limited pool of bad choices to choose from. For example, you wouldn’t want to eat nothing but bread and pasta or French fries. You’d still want to make sure you’re including plenty of filling, whole foods so that you can still be eating wholesomely.

There is so much controversy and rhetoric spouted about issues that are close to the human heart, and issues that have to do with the conception of human life and where life actually begins that it gets hard to figure out where you actually stand.  I already know that I’m a pro-choice woman, and my husband is pro-choice as well, so there really is no conflict in this household over that matter.

However, rightfully so, many people feel that abortion is wrong.  I think they are entitled to their opinion, just as I am entitled to mine. However, I don’t think that the government has a right to tell a woman what she can and cannot do with her body. It becomes almost like your body is not your own “property” when the government begins to be able to legislate the things you can and cannot do in a medical sense.

I also think that the government should allow women, and younger women, use a birth control that can be used as a safety backup if a woman has had unprotected sex (haven’t we all at some point, and had a pregnancy scare that we knew we didn’t want at the time?)

This brings me to the point I’m talking about today, which is the approval of the Plan B backup birth control pill that was recently approved to be prescribed to women of all ages instead of having an age restriction as it previously had. This Plan B is different from a drug that is also well known and controversial which actually aborts a fetus that has just started to grow after unprotected sex.

Plan B instead prevents the egg from implanting in the uterus, or may actually prevent the egg from even releasing after unprotected sex. Remember, after unprotected sex, it still takes the sperm quite a while to swim to the egg and fertilize it, so there is still time even after unprotected sex to prevent the unwanted pregnancy.

There is a very limited window of time however, and this is why it is so important to not discriminate against one of the highest at-risk groups for unwanted pregnancy, which is younger teen women.

With this lifting of the age restriction, even women who are younger and in their teens will have access to the morning after pill after they’ve had sex and fear they may become pregnant. This can prevent thousands of pregnancies, heartache, and broken dreams of young women who get pregnant when they are far too young to fully realize the impact it will have on the rest of their lives and how much it will stall their lives at a very young age.

Not that this is the right path for every woman to take. Some may find that an unplanned pregnancy is a blessing. However, if a woman doesn’t want to be pregnant she alone has the right to say what she wants to do about it – even if she is young.

And…..drum roll please.  STRESS and WORRY.  That’s right, I said it.  But you, if you’re a guy at least, are reading this and thinking well I get really stressed out too, so why aren’t I suffering such a low libido too?  It’s not to say that men don’t also have a lot of stress in their lives too.

The thing is that women tend to feel stress and worry more than men do. It’s just a fact, and it’s a fact that I’ve observed over and over again in many of our friend’s relationships and in my own relationship as well. My husband for example, worries a lot less about finances and bills when we start to see the money fall short of our monthly financial obligations.

I, on the other hand, tend to stew and worry over things a lot more than he does. I’m actually really jealous of him that he can go about his daily life without giving so much obsessive thoughts to where his life might be falling short while I tend to worry my days and nights away if something isn’t going my way.

I wish I had that same knack for not worrying as much about the little stuff, but alas I do not. I try to live vicariously through him at times, but it just doesn’t work!

Participants in a recent study validated what most married couples already know – women statistically tend to be more of the worriers in the relationship. In fact, they might do enough worrying for both parties!  A significantly higher portion of women in the study said that they felt worried once a week or more, while the men tended to shrug this off and say they didn’t worry as much.

Worrying may be built in to a woman’s psyche and being. It may be the way we’re hardwired because we often times are the caretakers of our offspring, and the need to protect and nourish is a greater need in women, so they often feel “responsible” for others in a more grandiose way than men do.

Women also tend to feel guilty about things more than men do. I look at worry and guilt as emotions that pretty much go hand in hand. Neither is particularly useful or productive, and yet they are the hallmark emotions of someone who has a conscience and who has integrity and cares about other people, so at least it means you’re a good person I suppose.

These increased feelings of worry and stress are definitely a huge part of why women often don’t have as high of a sex drive as their male counterparts do.  They put these other emotions ahead of sex because that’s how women tend to prioritize things.

Remember, women aren’t hardwired to have sex and procreate as much as men are either, so combine that with the fact that women worry much more than men and you’ve got a recipe for a much lower, seemingly less important sex drive.

A large percentage of American men are circumcised, as you most likely well know.  The portion of men who are not circumcised here are likely not because of religious purposes or for some other personal belief reason or preference of their parents. You see, most men are circumcised when they are small babies, so they really don’t have much of a say in the matter.

The procedure was instituted over here as a matter of sanitation and cleanliness. It is thought to help reduce the incidence of STD’s and also to help reduce the incidence of urinary tract infections because it helps ensure that the area covered by the foreskin of the penis is always kept open and clean.

The area is usually shrouded from air when it is not removed and pulled back as it is in circumcision.  So, the medical community decided it would be in the best welfare to make it a common practice to have male babies circumcised when they are young so it’s an easy and relatively less painful process than when they are older and understand that they don’t want someone touching their private area, let alone cutting it with anything!

The debate has always been around whether doing this to babies is really ethical. Some say that men should have a chance to have more of a say as to whether they will have the procedure when they are old enough to understand it. Also, there is concern that circumcision may actually reduce the sensitivity of the penis, and make for a lesser sexual experience for grown men.

There are others that say this is complete hogwash, that men do not suffer any loss of feeling or sexual sensitivity from being circumcised vs. uncircumcised.   The thought is that the removal of the foreskin also removes some feelings in the area. However, some say that it may actually do the opposite, since it is actually exposing more of the shaft of the penis and perhaps exposing even more nerve endings.

As you can see, there are two distinctly different schools of thought on the subject.  Where you land likely depends on your personal and religious beliefs. You do have a choice whether to get your child circumcised these days, however most people who do not have a religious reason not to do so usually still have the procedure done on their boys since it is just the accepted norm now.

Hey guys, it’s Jill here again. Wanted to talk a bit about relationships, mostly long term relationships actually. That’s because so many people find it hard to keep the spark and respect alive after years of being together. This can be a real challenge for married couples, especially for people who have expectations of marriage being a fairy tale from beginning to end. Which as all of us marrieds know, it isn’t.

Marriage means sacrifice sometimes and it almost always means that you have to compromise with one another, because you’re not going to always agree on everything nor are you going to have the same ideas about what’s fun.

Let’s face it, living with someone day in and day out can get old. No matter who it is! So in order to keep your love alive and to make sure you keep finding reasons to like eachother and stay together, it’s really imperative that you do things that are fun, new and exciting together every once in a while.

They don’t have to be extravagant or expensive things. They can be a simple weekend getaway on a Groupon that you bought. It doesn’t really matter – as long as you’re away from your house and the “norm” and you’re both experiencing something new for the first time. What I mean by new can be a new city, a new hotel room, a new experience, or whatever. It doesn’t have to be really exciting, it just has to be different.

If you think back to when your relationship first started, why did it seem so exciting? It’s because it’s all new. You met this incredible person who you really enjoyed being around and happened to also find wildly attractive. That really is rare, and I think you realize how rare that kind of chemistry is the older you get.

So when you find it, it’s almost like you go into a state of disbelief and temporary euphoria. Statistics show that the “love” molecule which equates with that euphoria and feelings of giddiness and happiness tend to fade within one year, mostly because the newness of the relationship has worn off and you in turn settle into your same old routines with eachother.

Vacations bring up those old feelings of adventure and excitement. My husband and I always return from fun vacations and trips with a renewed bond. It not only fans the flames of love, but also of lust again since you tend to feel more uninhibited when you’re away from home.

The best part is that when you return home, you have a renewed sense of appreciation for your routines and for the home that you share. You begin to love having dinners every night in front of the TV, or working out together, or yelling over to one another while working on your computers at night.

It’s basically the fabric that keeps a marriage together – trying new things together.