A hodgepodge of science and personal observation, this all-encompassing book urges women to get in sync with their bodies...
Beyond the provocative title, psychiatrist Holland (Weekends at Bellevue: Nine Years on the Night Shift at the Psych ER, 2009) does not cast aspersions but instead urges women to embrace their mood fluctuations as part of natural hormonal rhythms.
Medical history has not been kind to women’s health. “[M]alaise, headaches, irritability, nervousness, insomnia, fatigue, low libido, high libido, water retention” are just some of the complaints by women that 19th-century male physicians characterized as hysteria. Even today, women who get angry or cry in the workplace risk being labeled as “emotional and irrational.” Holland parses the science behind mood swings to explain the natural effects and functions of estrogen, progesterone, testosterone and other hormones. Sexual drive, marriage, fidelity, childbearing and bonding are all tied to hormonal activity. While the author explores a fascinating array of subjects, much of the delivery of the information is disorganized, resulting in overload and frequent shuffling of pages to review what hormone or neurotransmitter is responsible for what. Holland devotes about half the book to a potpourri of advice on achieving good mental and physical health. There’s not much new information here, and the section could have used some pruning, but the tips are worth reviewing. A top stressor for women is trying to balance job and family, and stress causes inflammation, which makes you vulnerable to chronic diseases such as heart disease, asthma, Alzheimer’s, diabetes and arthritis. Understanding what’s going on in your body and mood swings reduces stress and promotes mental health, writes Holland. Limiting inflammation with a healthy diet—light on carbs and high on fresh vegetables—exercise, sleep, good sex and communing with nature promote physical health.
A hodgepodge of science and personal observation, this all-encompassing book urges women to get in sync with their bodies and embrace their moods.Pub Date: March 3, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-59420-580-4
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Penguin Press
Review Posted Online: Dec. 18, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2015
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Sheila, the mute, abused six-year-old protagonist of Hayden's bestselling One Child (not reviewed), returns in a fast- paced, real-life narrative that rewards the reader with a happy ending. The author begins with a brief review of the five months Sheila spent in her special education class. Abandoned by her mother (who pushed her out of a car onto the highway), regularly mistreated by her father's friends and drug suppliers, the troubled child had set fire to a smaller boy. Hayden established a close relationship with Sheila, bringing her out of her silence and seeing her enrolled in a regular classroom, but then left town to attend graduate school. When she meets Sheila again, the girl is a punk fashion plate of 14, still living with her father. Sheila denies most memories of her early relationship with the teacher, but they pursue a shaky friendship, though Hayden is worried by an undercurrent of anger not really explained by Sheila's expression of hurt over her departure eight years earlier. The teen provokes a crisis in the summer school program where they both work when she disappears for several days with a young student, resurrecting fears of the earlier fire-setting incident. This leads to a startling revelation: Muddling her memories of abandonment, Sheila believes it was Hayden who pushed her out of the car. She launches a disastrous search for her mother and spends time in a high-security institution for problem children, but eventually graduates from high school and begins a successful career managing a fast-food restaurant. Her adventures occur against the background of Hayden's love affairs and work in a psychiatric clinic, revealing the author as neither the self- sacrificing saint Sheila accuses her of wanting to be, nor much of a sinner. An effective chronicle of a relationship full of potholes that nonetheless brings both student and teacher further along the road to maturity.
Pub Date: March 1, 1995
ISBN: 0-02-549150-4
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Scribner
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 1995
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Levant's practical, realistic approach to a new masculinity has little use for ``taking on animal names and dancing naked in the woods.'' Still, says Levant (Psychology/Harvard Medical School), men are at a point where they can and must redefine manhood. While he recognizes that the rise of feminism and the influx of women into the workforce have had a profound impact on traditional notions of masculinity, blaming women is simply ``wrong-headed.'' And he rejects Robert Bly and the quest for the ``wild man'' within, arguing that Bly points to the past rather than to the future. To think, writes Levant, ``that men can restore their lost sense of masculine purpose and pride'' by indulging in the rites and rituals of a culture not their own is ``a romantic pipe dream.'' What men can do, he says, through therapy and counseling, is find a middle ground between the traditional masculine role and the new, sensitive man. Among the traditional masculine traits worth preserving and reemphasizing, he believes, are the willingness to sacrifice personal desires to provide support for others; the willingness to withstand hardship to protect loved ones; the expression of love by doing things for others; and the virtues of integrity, steadfastness, and loyalty. But typically masculine traits that must be discarded are an overindulgence in anger; the propensity to ``simultaneously depend on, distance from, and take advantage of female partners''; the inability to identify or express feelings; chronic fears of failing to measure up as a man; and discomfort with sexual intimacy. Levant designs individual counseling programs by allowing men to do what they traditionally do best: identify a problem, devise a strategy to solve the problem, and then implement that strategy until the goal is reached. A refreshing departure from all the chest thumping and campfire flatulence of the recent men's movement.
Pub Date: March 13, 1995
ISBN: 0-525-93846-X
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Dutton
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 1995
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