Benefits of Crossword Puzzles

Puzzle and memory expert Dr. Ann Lukits says that solving crosswords on a regular basis can “improve memory and brain function in older adults.” Such activities can also “improve mental functions in patients with brain damage or early dementia.”

Solving crossword puzzles alone is beneficial, but working in a group adds a bigger advantage to one’s brain function. One important factor of collaborative cruciverbalism is the ability to think creatively in a more strategic fashion. The other factors are fairly easy to capture. Involving yourself in such a brain-consuming activity helps you vastly by improving your verbal skills, making you solve problems, and causing you to think deeply.

Benefits of crossword puzzles:

Help Prevent Alzheimer’s – According to the Alzheimer’s Association, a daily dose of crossword puzzles is a significant way to keep the brain active and sharp, especially as you grow older. In fact, regularly solving crossword puzzles and doing cognitive exercises can make your brain 10 years younger.

Teach new words – Solving crossword puzzles helps increase your vocabulary. Through crosswords, you are learning new words constantly. If you don’t know the meaning of a new word, you can always check the dictionary and add it to your vocabulary.

Stress relief – When you are solving crossword puzzles, you tend to dig deeper into the problem at hand. This means you are less focused on your own problems. It’s a great way to relax and forget your worries for a little while. They are also a fun way to overcome boredom and negative feelings. If you are lonely, depressed, anxious, or bored, just open your newspaper and solve a crossword puzzle. This will help you to relax, keep your mind engaged, and just have fun! If you are not a puzzle person, you don’t have to be. Just give crossword puzzles a try and you’ll be hooked in no time!

Combats Loneliness – Working together in a group creates bonding. When you have stronger social ties, you are more likely to be healthier, have a better quality of life, and enjoy longevity! Meaningful relationships, which can be created by solving crossword puzzles together with others, are one of the keys to a happy life.

Antioxidants

Yesterday was National Sangria Day! Sangria is a beverage made with wine and sweetened with fresh fruit and fruit juices. Other ingredients can include herbs, spices, carbonation, and liquor. The combinations are endless, giving sangria a place in the cocktail rotation year-round. Refreshing and light during hot summer months, bright and sparkling during the winter ones, this fruity punch is quite versatile.

Sangria does indeed have health benefits, sometimes even more than regular wine! This is because the added fruit bolsters the nutritional content, as with herbs and spices such as cinnamon and mint. Sangria is traditionally made with red wine. Red wine is made by fermenting dark-colored, whole grapes. It is high in antioxidants, and drinking moderate amounts has been shown to be good for health.

We speak about them all the time, but what exactly are antioxidants? Antioxidants are molecules that fight free radicals in your body. Free radicals are compounds that can cause harm if their levels become too high in your body. They’re linked to multiple illnesses, including diabetes, heart disease, and cancer.

Free radicals are constantly being formed in your body. Without antioxidants, free radicals would cause serious harm very quickly.

When free radicals outnumber antioxidants, it can lead to a state called oxidative stress. Prolonged oxidative stress can damage your DNA and other important molecules in your body. Sometimes it even leads to cell death. Damage to your DNA increases your risk of chronic diseases such as heart disease and cancer, and some scientists have theorized that it plays a pivotal role in the aging process. Several factors, including lifestyle, stress, and environmental components, are known to promote excessive free radical formation and oxidative stress.

However, it is important to note that free radicals also serve important functions that are essential for health. For example, your immune cells use free radicals to fight infections.

Your body needs to maintain a certain balance between free radicals and antioxidants. When this equilibrium is disrupted, it can lead to oxidative stress. Prolonged oxidative stress leads to an increased risk of negative health outcomes, such as cardiovascular disease and certain types of cancer.

More About Baking Cookies!

On top of making cookies relieving stress, eating cookies also helps boost your mood and beat stress! This is because when we eat sweets, the pleasure/reward part of our brain lights up, making us feel happy. Treating yourself to homemade cookies from start to finish is sure to make your day better. Baking cookies with loved ones is also good for you because it is a wonderful way to connect. Humans are social creatures and meant to interact with each other. In fact, research has proven that those who have regular interactions with others, especially if they are meaningful interactions, enjoy better health, quality of life, and even increased longevity. Baking cookies is wonderful because anyone can participate, no matter their age or ability. Those who may not be able to partake in every step of the way, such as young children or those with certain disabilities, can help decorate or put sprinkles on cookies. And anyone can definitely help with eating them! You create special memories by baking cookies with family and making recipes that have been passed down through generations. By making a family cookie recipe, it can be a way to honor someone who is no longer living and keep them close to us. 

Favorite sweets can also help with memory. This is because memory can be closely tied to our senses, and cookie making uses all of our senses – including the smell of the cookies in the oven, seeing them being made, shaping the dough with your hands, hearing the mixer whizzing, and, last but certainly not least, tasting the cookies! For those with age related memory loss, short term memory may not be available, but they can vividly recall making cookies with their mother as a kid, and be able to recite verbatim favorite recipes. 

One of the best parts about making cookies is sharing them with others! Homemade cookies make a great, heartfelt gift that recipients will be appreciative of. Giving to others is not only a gracious and kind act, but studies show that giving can actually boost your physical and mental health. From volunteering at a soup kitchen to committing to raise money for a specific charity – health benefits associated with giving can include:

• Lower blood pressure.
• Increased self-esteem.
• Less depression.
• Lower stress levels.
• Longer life.
• Greater happiness and satisfaction.

In addition, giving has a ripple effect. One act of giving inspires others, and it makes the world a better place. For instance, if you make cookies and give it to someone, it will make them happy and they are more likely to ‘pay it forward’. A 2017 report from the Women’s Philanthropy Institute noted that people are happier overall when they give to others and that the more they do or give, the happier they tend to be. It’s simply referred to as “the joy of giving.” When you perform acts that make you and others happier, your levels of stress go down. As we know, high levels of stress can have adverse effects on health. Simply put, giving is good for your health! With the holidays around the corner, we are in the ‘giving season’. What better way to celebrate National Bake Cookies Day than to make a batch and give them to a loved one? Private Home Health Care encourages you to embrace cookies and giving today!

National Bake Cookies Day

Today is National Bake Cookies Day! This day comes just in time for the holiday season. Anyone can agree that there is nothing quite like the smell of freshly baked cookies warming up your house, especially in the middle of winter. That is why they even have cookie scented candles! Cookies have been around in some form or another pretty much forever. The earliest documented cookie goes back to seventh-century Persia. Cookies were introduced to America sometime in the 17th century, but the name ‘cookie’ was given much later. The original dutch form ‘koekje,’ meaning ‘small cake’ was altered to ‘cooky’ and eventually ‘cookie.’ Since then, cookies have been eaten all over the world. Even though there are many different types of cookies, one thing can be for sure – baking your own cookies at home is always tastier and more enjoyable than eating store bought cookies. 

Baking cookies is a wonderful activity, from start to finish! There are so many things to love about cookie making at home. Baking cookies is a known stress reliever. How is this so?

Dr. Mary McNaughton-Cassill, a clinical psychologist says some of it’s just allowing yourself to be creative—adding flavor, changing color, forming shapes. Then you’ve got the sensory triggers. “The smell of spices and vanilla are comforting, and [they] often remind us of happy times. Olfactory scents are particularly linked to areas of the brain that involve emotions and memory.” Baking is methodical, and the rhythm of it can lead to a mindful state. Mindfulness is the quality of being aware and engaged, leading to reflection rather than reaction. Many psychologists believe it’s one of the best ways to combat anxiety and depression. When you’re baking, you can’t help but be engaged because if you are not paying attention then you could seriously mess everything up (like accidentally adding salt instead of sugar…no one wants to eat salty cookies!) Being distracted when making cookies by measuring, pouring, mixing, shaping, and decorating is a great way to take your mind off stress. When you bake something, you are creating something, and the final product can make you feel accomplished. It is a great feeling when you work hard to follow the recipe and make beautiful looking cookies, it is something tangible to be proud of. Baking cookies releases serotonin and endorphins, which are two of the ‘feel good’ chemicals in your brain that give you feelings of happiness. 

Sounds pretty sweet to me! Private Home Health Care invites you to celebrate National Bake Cookies Day by, well, baking cookies! In addition to baking and eating cookies for yourself, you can also participate in a cookie exchange with friends and family. Another great idea is to bake cookies to raise money for charity. No matter what you decide to do, baking cookies is always a great idea! 

National Cupcake Day

Today is National Cupcake Day! Who doesn’t love cupcakes?! They are the perfect sized treat that people of all ages love. The earliest known documentation of the term cupcake shows up in 1828 in Seventy-five Receipts for Pastry, Cakes, and Sweetmeats. The cookbook was by Eliza Leslie. What is great about cupcakes is that they are the perfect size – a single portion that is not too big and not too small. When eating a healthy diet, there is absolutely room for sweets, but portion size is key. Cupcakes are so much fun to celebrate a special occasion with. What is more, you can pick out many different flavors, instead of just having 1 flavor with a large cake. Cupcakes are adorable, fun, and deserve to be celebrated today on National Cupcake Day!

Cupcakes evoke sweet childhood memories – bringing cupcakes into school on your birthday was a highlight of the year! Studies have shown that eating sweets can actually help with memory, especially when consuming baked goods that were your childhood favorites. Taste and scent are both interconnected and they are strongly linked to long term memory, which remains largely intact despite cognitive decline. Not only eating them but making them with loved ones also evokes special moments in life.

Lately we have explored stress relief. There is the cute saying ‘you can’t spell ‘stressed’ without ‘desserts’! This is certainly true, and desserts can be a great stress reliever – in moderation of course. Stress causes increased cortisol levels in the body, and when you experience chronic stress, your cortisol levels become too high and lead to inflammation. Inflammation is essentially the root cause of illness and disease because it undermines your body’s immune system. In addition, when you eat a dessert with antioxidants such as a double dark chocolate cupcake, it helps combat inflammation as well! Because cupcakes are so customizable, you can make them healthy as well! Swap out white flour for wheat or an alternative such as oat flour, white sugar for coconut sugar or banana, and butter for olive oil or applesauce. You can even add JuicePlus Complete to up the amount of protein and nutrients in your cupcakes. Check out this delicious (healthy!) chocolate cupcake recipe!

So eat cupcakes for your health and join Private Home Health Care with celebrating National Cupcake Day!

Meditation and the Brain

Study after study has shown what practitioners have known for thousands of years – meditation is good for the body, mind, and soul. The mind-body connection is critical for health, and meditation bridges and enhances both. Stress Meditation is one of the best tools we have to counter the brain’s negativity bias, release accumulated stress, foster positive experiences and intentions, and enjoy the peace of present moment awareness. Years of research has established that practicing meditation regularly had tangible health benefits including:

-Decreased blood pressure and hypertension

-Lowered cholesterol levels

-Reduced production of “stress hormones,” including cortisol and adrenaline

-More efficient oxygen use by the body

-Increased production of the anti-aging hormone DHEA

-Improved immune function

-Decreased anxiety, depression, and insomnia

Meditation can help you tap into your brain’s deepest potential to focus, learn, and adapt. While scientists used to believe that beyond a certain age, the brain couldn’t change or grow, we now know that the brain has a quality known as plasticity, enabling it to grow new neurons and transform throughout our lives. Meditation is a powerful tool for awakening new neural connections and even transforming regions of the brain. This means that meditation can help protect against and even reverse cognitive decline. Simply put, meditation is good for the brain and helps promote brain health. Meditation can improve the aging brain and body, which is why at Private Home Health Care we encourage mindfulness and meditation for our clients, their loved ones, within our agency and the community at large.

Meditation helps combat the symptoms of dementia and Alzheimer’s, and can prevent and delay the onset of this disease. A recent Harvard study found that after only eight weeks of meditation, participants experienced beneficial growth in the brain areas associated with memory, learning, empathy, self-awareness, and stress regulation (the insula, hippocampus, and prefrontal cortex). In addition, the meditators reported decreased feelings of anxiety and greater feelings of calm. It is truly one of the greatest tools for brain health and to support the aging brain.

Another wonderful thing about meditation is that it is available to everyone – including the young, elderly, healthy, ill, differently abled, men, women, and from any walk of life. Chances are that you have practiced meditation in your life without knowing it. Have you ever closed your eyes while taking deep breaths, and counting to ten? That is a form of meditation! The beauty and simplicity of meditation is that you don’t need any equipment. All that’s required is a quiet space and a few minutes each day. What is more, there are many different forms of meditation, which means that there is a practice for everyone.

Meditation comes in many forms, including the following:

-Concentration meditation teaches you how to focus your mind. It’s the foundation for other forms of meditation.

-Heart-centered meditation involves quieting the mind and bringing the awareness to the heart, an energy center in the middle of the chest.

-Mindfulness meditation encourages you to focus objectively on negative thoughts as they move through your mind, so you can achieve a state of calm.

-Tai chi and qigong are moving forms of meditation that combine physical exercise with breathing and focus.

-Transcendental Meditation is a well-known technique in which you repeat a mantra—a word, phrase, or sound—to quiet your thoughts and achieve greater awareness.

-Walking meditation turns your focus to both body and mind as you breathe in time with your footsteps.

Like any skill, meditation takes practice. You can start with just one minute a day and build up to twenty, thirty, or even forty minutes. You can even meditate for a minute in the shower. Private Home Health Care encourages you to embrace this simple practice that will bring many benefits to your health, well being, and life.