Antidepressants Blog

Dressing Successfully: The Ten Commandments 8

Avoid fancy dress

Clothes you see being worn in pop shows on television by rock stars or in discos and clubs by young swingers are fun and look great on the guys wearing them, but once you are over twenty-five resist the temptation to dress like them. It may work for the older men of pop like Rod Stewart and on a beach holiday it may be fun to dress ethnic or like the rest of the gang on the beach, but after forty these clothes can make you look as if you are dressed for a carnival party. Or, as bad, as if you are dressing-youiqf.

If you have any doubts or think the clothes might be too young, too fashionable or too amusing, do not wear them.

*175/153/1*

Treatments carried out in hair clinics will certainly clear up scalp problems and keep the remaining hair in excellent condition but where the hair roots are dead (which is what baldness is, the dying off of roots) no amount of massage, potions, creams, injections and infra-red treatments will revive them and bring them growing back to life. The day a cure for baldness is medically proven the news will make international headlines (again, no pun intended) and the discoverer will make his fortune.

Unless a man loses his hair through trauma or illness, in which case the loss may only be temporary, all baldness is hereditary. This in the textbooks is known as MHB, male hereditary baldness. Every man inherits a growth pattern from the genes-dominant side of his family. His hair could be similar to his father’s, or to that of his grandfather or great-grandfather on either the paternal or maternal side of the family. Which side he inherits from is a matter of luck and nothing can be done to change it.

The best solution to the problem is to come to terms with being bald, not to fight it, and to ask your barber or hairdresser to change the style of your cut. This is not so they can disguise the baldness however. You should never tug, grease, pull or borrow hair from the side of the head so that it covers the bald spot with whirling fronds. This kind of ridiculous trickery only looks like the camouflage it is and fools no one. It only heightens the impression that underneath there is a scalp as bald as a billiard ball.

*140/153/1*

Of course it goes without saying that in your self-analysis you should avoid using alcohol or drugs as an aid, thinking that only through their help can the real you come to the surface liberated and stimulated. It does not. Alcohol and drugs may create a cosy sense of wellbeing and a rosily enhanced view of your life but as a New York therapist points out to his patients, neither illusion is likely to be accurate or be any longer lasting than the effects of the drink or drug.

Do not fall into the trap either of examining yourself through a jaundiced eye so that all you see is failure. Seeing yourself as a failure is one of the most common reactions to the male-menopause and it affects all areas of life; sex and health as much as work. So take a positive and, if possible, optimistic attitude and see through the gloom.

Advice therapists offer their patients at this time is: concentrate on yourself. This applies to all men during M-M and if it sounds like selfish consideration contrary to everything we have been taught since childhood, it is. It is only by concentrating on yourself that you can improve your life.

*104/153/1*

Not only do we put on weight as we age, we shrink.

At thirty a man is at his tallest but as muscles weaken through lack of exercise so his posture stoops, he no longer stands erect. And, the cushions between the bones of the spine wear thin. In the forties he will shrink a sixth of an inch, by the time he is sixty he will have lost over three-quarters of an inch.

But while he shrinks he also puts on weight. The reason is, simply, fat.

It is a sad fact that just when food becomes one of the major pleasures of life so we should be cutting down on the amount we eat. And drink (alcohol).

The older we get, the less exercise we take. The less we exercise, the less fat we burn up for energy so the more we put on weight — mostly around the waistline with fatter stomach and thicker hips. At forty we should be eating less quantity and less rich foods than we did in our twenties. On average most men put on seven to ten pounds between the ages of thirty and forty. Many doctors believe that unless a man was already overweight at thirty this is the weight he should aim to keep for the rest of his life.

Too much good food and drink and not enough exercise result in one thing: fat.

*67/153/1*

Because of frustration with himself and with his life a subconscious internal fury can build up and belligerence become a serious problem. For no reason tempers can fray and if the fists don’t fly, certainly the tongue does the lashing. Short temper and poor tolerance become the norm. Pedestrians in the way on a sidewalk, shop assistants, bank tellers, waiters, barmen and people generally supplying a service catch the brunt of the raging ire. Bad service can bring violent displays of temper to the surface.

During M-M a normally calm and pleasant man can turn almost overnight into an intolerant, short-tempered person. Psychiatrists explain this as aggression brought on entirely due to a man’s frustrations with himself. As his life evens out so his tolerance will return to normal and his temper back to its original state.

*31/153/1*

But it would be irresponsible for a woman to choose not to use any form of contraception and rely on repeated abortions to end her unwanted pregnancies. A single abortion poses little danger to a woman, but repeated abortions increase the danger of damage to her body. This is why abortion cannot replace contraceptive use and should remain as a ‘backstop’ for contraceptive failure.

On the other hand, the couple may decide that it is more appropriate for them if the man uses a condom. It may be that the woman does not want to, or cannot, use oral contraceptives, and does not like the idea of using an I.U.D., or perhaps there is a

medical reason why she should not use either of these methods. After considering the choices the couple may agree that they would prefer it if the man prevented the pregnancy by using a condom or practising withdrawal.

The couple may decide that they have completed their family and want no more children. In this case they may choose a permanent method. The woman can have a tubal ligation, or the man can have a vasectomy. Again, after considering the information available, they may agree that the man should have a vasectomy as this is a simpler operation than tubal ligation and is as effective.

*153/16/1*

In a community, about 7 per cent of men and 9 per cent of women aged 40 to 49 have high blood pressure; and in older age groups the proportion increases. The more overweight you are the more likely you are to have high blood pressure.

In most cases, you feel perfectly well and you are unaware that you have high blood pressure. But unless you take action in middle age, by changing your life-style and, perhaps, by taking prescribed drugs, you have five times the chance of having a heart attack or a stroke before you reach the age of 65, and an even greater chance of one of these disasters occurring after that age.

The higher the blood pressure, the harder the heart has to work to overcome the increased resistance of the arteries to the flow of blood through them. Over the years, unless you are treated, the muscle wall of the heart thickens and the coronary blood-vessels cannot supply sufficient blood to it. If this happens, you may develop heart failure. The high blood pressure may affect the smaller arteries of your body as the blood pounds along their inner surface, day in, day out. It may hasten the onset of atherosclerosis, the hardening and thickening of the arteries which, if it affects your coronary arteries, may cause a heart attack, or if this occurs in the brain, may lead to a stroke.

*340/16/1*

The number of exclusively male homosexuals in the U.S.A. is not less than 5 million, in Britain more than 1 million, and in Australia more than 300,000. The prevalence of female homosexuality has been investigated less fully, but it appears that exclusive homosexuality among women may be less common. This may be because female sexuality has been ignored until recently, and in our society men are expected to have, and to need, sex more than women. As well, men are more likely to talk about their sexual exploits than women. Because of these facts, the difference in the proportion of male and female homosexuals may be less than has been reported.

If female homosexuality is half as common as male homosexuality, then, by addition, in the U.S.A. 8 million, in Britain 1.5 million, and in Australia half a million people are homosexuals. This large number of people cannot be treated with contempt. They should not be persecuted because of the fear of, and disgust for, homosexuality showed by many heterosexual people.

I have stressed the psychological causes of impotence, but I must also stress that these should not be accepted until an impotent man has been checked physically to make sure that he has no disease which may cause impotence. A physical check and a careful history will exclude diabetes, high blood pressure, alcoholism, drugs, and those nervous diseases which cause impotence; and impotence resulting from extensive pelvic surgery. Tests on the blood and urine will exclude diabetes, liver damage, and low levels of testosterone, or perhaps raised levels of another hormone called prolactin. In most studies of impotent men between 10 and 20 per cent have a physical cause, but the majority of men are found to be free from disease or drugs.

Another way of differentiating between impotence due to disease d that caused by psychological problems is to find out if a man gets nocturnal erections. In men who normally get erections and men who are impotent for psychological reasons, erections occur about every ninety minutes during sleep. The erections coincide with rapid eye movements (REM sleep). Men whose impotence is due to physical disease get no or few erections during REM sleep. If an impotent man is prepared to be investigated in this way, it can be established if his impotence is due to physical disease or to psychological problems, and this knowledge makes treatment easier.

For the first fifteen minutes one partner pleasures the other. If the man has the sexual problem (for example, if he is a premature ejaculator) he massages, fondles, and kisses the woman, with the sole objective of making her feel good and of giving her pleasure. He may stroke her hair, nibble her neck, lick her ears, kiss her hands, or massage her back or legs. While he does this, she responds by telling him how she feels, on a five-point scale of ‘marvellous’, ‘good’, ‘neutral’, ‘don’t like it much’, ‘hate it’. She also guides him by telling him how to stroke or fondle, so that they can enjoy the feeling of each other’s bodies without this being a prelude to be hurried

through so that they can have sexual intercourse.

At the end of fifteen minutes they change roles. The woman does the pleasuring and the man tells her how he feels. Even if he gets the most magnificent erection, she must avoid touching his penis. Genital touching is prohibited!

*201/16/1*