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Period poverty affects people all over the world. These women of color are working to end it

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Period Poverty, Menstrual Health Awareness Month, Menstrual Health Equity, Black Women's Health and Wellness, Flow Initiative, Free Menstrual Products, theGrio.com

When Sabrina Natasha Browne runs out of menstrual hygiene products, she, like many people, goes to CVS and pays the $12-15 it may cost to restock. Four years ago, she didn’t realize what number of menstruating women simply couldn’t walk right into a pharmacy and walk out with the menstruation products they needed, especially in her community of Hoboken, New Jersey.

A New Jersey specialist said her eyes were opened when she participated in a volunteer produce collection event organized by The Hoboken Girl and Flow initiativea national nonprofit organization based in New Jersey.

“As a volunteer, I immediately motivated my network to donate thousands of products to those in need,” she added.

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Browne didn’t stop there. She eventually became a partner in The Flow Initiative, working with founder Eiko La Boria to end period poverty for all. In particular, she works on organizational partnerships and increases consumer awareness of period poverty across the country.

“I’m proud to be a partner with The Flow Initiative and to be at the forefront of the menstrual health movement with Eiko as we work to end period poverty,” she explained.

Browne described period poverty as “a public health problem in which women, girls and people who menstruate do not have access to products that support menstrual health, including sanitary pads, tampons and sanitary pads.”

She added that this can be a global problem, affecting adults and kids. More or less two out of five teenage girls admitted they couldn’t afford menstrual products, one in five may miss school because of their period, and one other 44% said they felt embarrassed or ashamed about not having access to products. When women do not have reliable access to high-quality menstrual health products, it can impact their ability to go to school, work and contribute to society.

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(From left to right) Sabrina Natasha Browne and Eiko La Boria. (Photo: Flow Initiative)

“Period poverty can impact a person in several ways, including disruptions to education, health problems, psychological impacts, economic mobility, and stigma and social isolation,” La Boria shared in an email. “The financial burden of purchasing menstrual products can strain limited household resources, exacerbating poverty.”

Period poverty is a public health issue that will disproportionately affect Black and Brown women and women of lower income status on this country. This may not only be access to the right products, but in addition the right tools to cope with symptoms comparable to pain from cramps.

“Even if a Black woman has access to menstrual products, the symptoms themselves can impact her education, work and personal life. But when these symptoms are compounded by period poverty, the losses can be even greater,” Browne wrote in an email.

While period poverty may accompany poverty generally, “it is not something that discriminates. I’m sitting here and I say, ‘Well, there’s a hot spot in this one particular state.’ Every state struggles with period poverty,” Browne explained.

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The Flow Initiative, launched by La Boria in New Jersey in 2018, goals to end period poverty and further promote menstrual health equity. The national nonprofit uses a three-pronged approach to get to the heart of the problem. First of all, it helps deliver products. It then provides education on menstrual health and hygiene. The final step in her approach is to influence policy.

Last 12 months, The Flow Initiative marked the anniversary of his death New Jersey Bill A1349which requires all public schools to provide students in grades 6 through 12 with free menstrual health products. The bill also requires the state to cover the costs, which Browne said “relieves the burden on schools.”

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“From my perspective, we’ve seen that women, girls and people who menstruate feel this particularly at the school level because it’s a big part of what we do,” Browne added.

She explained that students “miss school, career development, and the opportunities that come with not having access to products. And now New Jersey is one of the first states to really chart a path where hopefully other states will replicate and pass similar laws.”

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Universal laws could also potentially lead to greater public understanding of menstruation. Browne noted that half of the world’s population menstruates, yet there continues to be rampant misinformation and inadequate education.

Browne said that when organizing events, The Flow Initiative is inundated with questions, from general questions on periods to advice on the best products.

Period Poverty, Menstrual Health Awareness Month, Menstrual Health Equity, Black Women's Health and Wellness, Flow Initiative, Free Menstrual Products, theGrio.com
Sabrina Natasha Browne distributing menstrual health products. (Photo: Flow Initiative)

“In doing this work and talking to some of my peers, I learned how many of them either had periods but didn’t know what it was,” Browne noted. “I mean in each of our experiences, when you think about where (you were when) you got your first period: ‘Who helped me?’ “Who listened to me?” For some of us, these are moments of pride and excitement. For others, it may bring back pain and sadness.”

Browne, who’s of Liberian and Belgian descent, said she grew up in a house where menstruation was not shameful. She was raised with enough supplies, not stigma, and was given the number 101 by her grandmother. La Boria, a Puerto Rican woman, didn’t know the details of menstruation until her first period, when her mother, who worked as a nurse, explained to her that it would occur every month.

“I was devastated and irritated,” she said. “It inspired me to provide young people with the education to know what is happening to their bodies, the ability to properly manage their menstrual cycles and understand the enormous responsibility that comes with it.”

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Since its inception, the Flow initiative has made quite a few advances. To date, the organization has distributed over 1.3 million menstrual health products, conducted just over 300 workshops, and, as well as to successfully supporting the passage of Bill A1349, helped organize New Jersey’s official Menstrual Health Equality Day on May 28.

They also had the opportunity to partner with major players in the menstrual health market, including U by Kotex and Period.org. Other partners include Horizon Blue Cross Blue Shield of New Jersey, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and more.

Browne said that from White House meetings to influencing local policy, the Flow Initiative has managed to establish itself as a “credible national player” in the mission for menstrual health equity.

“We are credible, we are compassionate. We are on the front lines of this work. And that is what the brands which have worked with us appreciate,” she said.

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The initiative can be all the time relevant. As part of a social media campaign called ‘Voices for Change’, the organization is organizing a period products drive to secure £100,000 in funds to support students over the summer months. La Boria said they are also preparing for more initiatives.

“The Flow initiative is in an era of innovation and diversification of solutions. We are preparing exciting initiatives,” she said.

To learn more about period poverty and the way you possibly can support its efforts, visit the website Flow Initiative website.


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This article was originally published on : thegrio.com

Health and Wellness

Four ways to get out of bed in the morning – and defeat Groggread

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If you are feeling like “Waking up is the most difficult thing I do all day” Then you will not be alone. The experience was defined as “sleep inertia” and although that is a traditional part of sleep sensations, it could be frustrating Wake up, feeling drained.

A big part of the research on sleep inertia focuses on reducing the risk of performance impairment, and we have now not yet found clear empirical evidence to support the use of one single reactive antihypertensive agent.

The most promising evidence concerns use of caffeine: It has been shown that before a brief nap of lower than half-hour, it has been shown to reduce the effects of sleep inertia. Although this is useful, if you have got to get better after resting during the day, returning to bed on a nap immediately after waking up isn’t practical for many of us.

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Here are some more practical suggestions that you could use to aid you get out of bed.

Get alarm clock

If you are trying to get out of bed in the morning, the very first thing you need to ask about is where your smartphone is? Do you retain him next to the bed as an alarm clock? Make an old -fashioned alarm clock with a priority.

The mere presence of the phone is close to you when sleep reduces the quality of sleep – whether it is nearby, it’s too difficult to resist. This isn’t only through destructive notifications (exercising it in silence isn’t adequate). Having a phone next to you, because a dream could cause anxiety and emotional anxiety stimulation. Only knowing that he’ll keep you at the level of vigilance, which isn’t conducive to falling right into a deep sleep.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5-W0U76JG4K

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Holding the phone away from the room has an extra profit: it’s less likely that you’ll check it first. There are many reasons to avoid this habit, one of the most convincing centers around the problem of micro-tailing dopamine, before we get sufficient motivation to get out of bed.

Dopamine plays a central role in Motivation and hunger. Evaluates the peak and troughs all the time, dopamine declines are functional because we feel discomfort that drives us to search for relief. Think that men and women in the cave need motivation to leave the safety of the cave to find food, water or partner. Leaving the cave was a high risk, and pushing our discomfort with dopamine drops could be crucial to raise and go out.

We forget how much our brain still works in these ancient ways. People still depend on the same system to get out of bed. When we reach for the smartphone, we met with a fast, size of a bite Dopamine hits – Notifications, beautiful people, likes, modern information. These micro-stimulas can mock natural immersion in dopamin, celebrating the discomfort that we want to motivate us to move. Instead of experiencing the growth of the drive, we feel artificially satisfied, making it easier to curl under warm covers.

Don’t hit the nap

You have devices from the bedroom – but now you have got to work in your relationship with the alarm clock. Do not hit the nap.

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The nap hit increases the likelihood that back into the deep phase of sleep and causes regular sleep interference and unwanted sleep transitions. All these Increase the impact of sleep inertia and reduce vigor.

If you actually try to avoid a seductive nap button Available alarm clocks This normally involves wheels that may come out of your range. Some movement that may aid you get out of bed as a bonus.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J8J16T914HG

Or take into consideration obtaining an alarm clock that opens the curtains to let in the morning light. The short exposure of brilliant light has been shown Vigilance and energy

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Do you remember when your parents pulled off bed covers?

Everyone who had older siblings or parent or guardian involved in pulling them out of bed once you were an adolescent will experience when the lid pulled off the bed as the last ROW to move you. It turns out that this method could have some wisdom.

Limb cooling Immediately after waking up, it’s a promising way to speed up Recovery from the sleep of the INERITA. And while we’re an old skool, if all the pieces else fails, Wash your face.

Maybe you have got to stay in bed?

Most importantly, possibly you’re just drained and you have got to stay in bed. This isn’t an ethical failure or the fall of your will. You could need more rest.

If you’re someone who is actually deprived of sleep or lives with a disease that sets energy or a life event that takes all of your resources, you might have to make room for stay in bed. Critical disabled scholar Ellen Samuels writes about “Crip Time”. Sometimes illness or disability change our relationship with time and we must go at a special pace. Samuels and other scholars are desirous about the paradox of needs Slow down to sustain.

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Sometimes the problem is to wait that we force our minds and bodies to unrealistic results of competence and performance – and sometimes it should have to be fantastic in order not to get out of bed.

This article was originally published on : theconversation.com
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Health and Wellness

We have to talk about Viola Davis weapons

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Mike Marsland/Wireimage

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That’s all. Never more fun.

Never again tokens and sweets, Lord. It’s time to throw snacks and get into the gym, because Viola Davis once more serves a serious arm inspiration and we feel motivated. You will too.

The 59-year-old Oscar winner, who turns 60 in August (Come Leo Twin!), Ws. The red carpet for the London premiere of his latest film in a black two -piece band that put her hands and looked amazing. Trapezia, deltoid, trice and biceps muscles were Poppin, identical to her smile.

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We have to talk about Viola Davis weapons
London, England – April 1: Viola Davis and Julius Tennon attend Photocall for “G20” at Trafalgar Square on April 1, 2025 in London, England. (Photo Shane Anthony Sinclair/Getty Images)

Stroke has at all times been functional and wonderful. But she looked like her strongest role, in a project that allowed her to accept a “muscular and thicker” body that she once regretted was gible and thin while playing General Nanisca.

“Suddenly with this role, my muscles, my arms, my thick legs, my hard voice was perfect. I felt unanimous. I celebrated it physically in every respect,” she said PEOPLE In 2022.

If you follow Davis, you already know he doesn’t play within the gym. He often works along with his husband, Julius Tennon, who’s 71 years old (but can never be said). In one clip, which she had previously made available this yr, integrated lots of arm movements, including the chest press, Tricep EXTensions and hitting the small weights of the dumbbell during a session along with her man.

“Just keep up with my 71 -year old love !!!!” She wrote as a signature of the clip. “I say seriously … and I feel good.”

Tennon is an incredible training partner for her because they’re consistently using themselves. They have been married for over 25 years. She shared a movie by which he got it on their home gym after a double replacing his knee with the signature “My child training like boss !!!”

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She also said that age is nothing, however the number when it comes to health and condition. Her trainings should not a joke, because her commitment in motion increased only as she aged, evading and tilting type 2 diabetes, which was common in her family. She once said Prevention That he works “really, really hard”, in his mind, tougher than most 20 years.

“I take many boards, many steps, many exercises with a medical ball like 15 to 20 pounds. I run. I have a peloton bike. I have a Boflex machine. What am I not doing?” She said the publication.

Everything pays off, because Davis still appears on every red carpet, looks healthy and comfortable. We love to see it. Where are these dumbbells?

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This article was originally published on : www.essence.com
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Health and Wellness

The woman’s body rejects the kidney of pigs, returns to dialysis

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kidney, pig, transplant,Towana Looney


A girl from Alabama returns to dialysis after receiving a breakthrough relief of the pig, which her body later rejected.

When the Stepped Looney finished the operation in November, she was considered a breakthrough medical feat for alternative organ transplants. The procedure took place at NYU Langone Health Center in New York, where Dr. Robert Montgomery surgically placed a genetically modified kidney in Looney.

Looney lived with the organs in it for months, so long as her body began to reject this role. However, doctors assured that the problem didn’t result from the origin of the organs. Instead, Looney had to reduce the consumption of anti -rejection drugs after obtaining an infection.

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AccoRing to NPR, doctors still think their time for the success of the organ. Dr. Montgomery also thanked Looney for her courage and contribution to medical progress.

“Genetically kidney engineering, Looney pigeons worked well for over four months and for the first time in nine years was able to enjoy life without dialysis,” explained Dr. Montgomery in a press release.

He added: “The willingness to an unknown undertaking to help solve the national crisis of organs deficiency will affect her rather more. We have fun her great courage and sacrifice. She lived with a pig kidney longer than some other man in history, and the field learned an amazing matter from her. Her contribution and promise genetically genetically engineer engineering.

While Looney was able to skip dialysis And get better your return time, it now also has the longest swine organs transplant in the world. She also expressed gratitude for participating in medical history.

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“For the first time since 2016 I hung out with family and friends without planning dialysis treatment.

Looney’s relative success will pave the way for future and current receivers of pig organs. Considering the shortage of donations available in the United States, from over 100,000 patients currently sitting on waiting lists, the implementation of alternative methods could cause more saved life. The world’s first recipient of the pig kidney transplant, Richard Slayman, died in May last 12 months, two months after surgery.

While questions on safety and bioethical fears of pig organs transplants remain, Looney’s journey proves the potential of these procedures for future trial operations.

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(Tagstranslathe) organs transplant

This article was originally published on : www.blackenterprise.com
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