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This strawberry popsicle has just three ingredients.

(And, yes, one of them is water.)

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PLUS Dr. Jen Gunter on a happier and healthier menopause

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Contents JUNE / JULY 2021

45 BRIGHT IDEAS FOR TURNING YOUR OUTDOOR SPACE INTO AN OASIS P.41

THINGS WE LEARNED THIS ISSUE ֑ Why the new generation of CBD drinks might help you chill out.

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No. 13: This splash-proof speaker for playing your favourite tunes.

PHOTOGRAPH BY SUECH AND BECK WITH STYLING BY FRANNY ALDER

The sunny reason that nori is so protein-packed.

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How to dip a toe into the stock market, no matter the size of your investment.

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What exactly an acupressure mat will do to your back.

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How many disposable tampons the average person uses in a lifetime.

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How to make Lauren Toyota’s vegan spin on sloppy joes.

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$7.30

THE PALTRY AMOUNT OF NATIONAL FUNDING PER PERSON AFFECTED BY ENDOMETRIOSIS IN CANADA. PAG E 6 4

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On the Cover That juicy strawberry popsicle on our cover is easy to make at home. Just combine 4 cups of crushed berries with half a cup of sugar and half a cup of water, pour into a mould (see page 56 for our favourites) and freeze. Summer on a stick!

Photograph by Maya Visnyei; Food styling by Dara Sutin; Prop styling by Stacey Smithers.

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FROM THE BIG READS

Yoga and meditation educator Nancy Zagbayou PA G E 10

Essayist Meaghan Wray PA G E 2 8

“There is no life without stress. So it’s something you have to tame—in French, we say ‘apprivoiser’—understand and then work with as you navigate life.”

KEEP COOL WITH A HEMP GARDEN REFRESHER ֑ Recipe by ALFRED SIU IN PARTNERSHIP WITH QUATREAU

“My stretch marks are reminders that I let myself expand into the world with the intention of loving myself more.”

58

6 oz / 180 ml Quatreau Cucumber & Mint Sparkling Water (half a can) Peeled fresh cucumber spiral (or 5 or 6 thin cucumber slices)

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¾ oz / 35 ml honeydew syrup ⅔ oz / 20 ml fresh lime juice

Bette El-Hawary, executive director of Swim Nova Scotia (and openwater swimmer) PA G E 5 0

Jen Gunter, ob-gyn and author of The Menopause Manifesto

“One day, I’m swimming against a headwind. The next, I’ve got a tailwind. I never have a plan, because the elements change all the time.”

“Women deserve medicine.

They don’t deserve marketing.”

PA G E 5 8

Sharlene Rutherford, president and CEO of the Alberta Women’s Health Foundation PA G E 6 4

4 EDITOR’S NOTE

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“The doctor looked at my mom, pointed to her head, and said, ‘I think it’s all up here.’ There was this patriarchal attitude toward her.”

7 TREND REPORT

16 ADVICE

34 RECIPES

TIP!

If you don’t have access to a cold juicer, to make the syrup, put the water, sugar and honeydew into a blender and blend until smooth.

Pour mix into saucepan and heat it up.

Throw in the spices, turn off the heat and let it steep for 1 to 2 hours.

Strain.

To make syrup, lightly crush 5 g dried juniper berries and 2.5 g star anise with a mortar and pestle. Add spices to saucepan, then add 75 ml water, 250 g white sugar and 150 ml honeydew juice (purchased from a local juicery or made yourself in a cold juicer).

Turn heat to medium and stir often to incorporate sugar quickly. Make sure it doesn’t boil (which will throw off the water balance). Once sugar has dissolved, turn off heat and steep for 1 to 2 hours, then strain. Syrup should be kept refrigerated, where it will last for 2 to 3 weeks.

In a wineglass or goblet, place peeled cucumber spiral (or slices), then add honeydew syrup and lime juice. Add ice to fill glass. Stir to incorporate and chill. Add Quatreau Cucumber & Mint Sparkling Water. Gently lift ice from bottom of glass with a bar spoon (or regular spoon) to incorporate ingredients.

Garnish with fresh mint sprig and a reusable straw. Serves 1. Enjoy!

See page 50 for more.

41 GOODS

72 THE COMEBACK

JUNE/JULY 2021

PHOTOGRAPHS BY (GUNTER) MICHELLE YEE; (ZAGBAYOU) STACY LEE; (COCKTAIL) MAYA VISNYEI WITH FOOD STYLING BY DARA SUTIN AND PROP STYLING BY STACEY SMITHERS.

Fresh mint sprig

FROM THE EDITOR

I grew up in a tiny mill town on the northern tip of Vancouver Island where it rains approximately 360 days of the year.

THE TOWN WAS PERCHED by an inlet that

led to the Pacific Ocean, and the pebbly beach, closely guarded by hungry bald eagles and kingfishers diving for lunch, was a short walk from our house. The water was rudely cold. Still, we swam, with blue lips and chattering teeth. (Except for my mum.

She comes from Western Australia and could not recognize rocks as a beach or icy waves as swimmable water.)

Reading Danielle Groen’s story about the health benef its and surprising joys

4

֏ For a surprising fact about frozen fruit and tips to beat the heat, turn to page 50.

of lake swimming (“The Red Hot Guide to Staying Cool This Summer,” page 50), I thought, damn, it’s been way too long.

Nothing compares to the total bliss of bobbing around in open water. It makes me feel small, and by that I mean it helps put things into perspective. And these days I crave anything that can jolt me out of pandemic-induced rhythms and offer a novel way to just chill out.

Speaking of chilling out, in this issue Renée Reardin provides us with tips for creating an inviting outdoor oasis (the Goods, page 41) in a backyard, on a front porch or even across a wee balcony—make use of what you’ve got! Canada is creeping toward normalcy, but this summer most of us will still stick close to home, so why not zhuzh that all-too-familiar space with colourful accents and a little greenery? (Can’t keep a plant alive? We got you covered—page 72 has the skinny on super convincing fakes.)

What was true before the pandemic remains the case today, too: health-care professionals often ignore, dismiss or misdiagnose women more than they do men.

Christina Frangou speaks with the women who persevered (for years) to get proper medical treatment, and with the alliance of Canadian doctors raising money and supporting research to change that.

Elsewhere in this issue, sparks fly when the hilarious Kate Rae talks with Dr. Jen Gunter about changing how we think about menopause. Gunter tells hawkers of magic creams and special pills where to go (page 58). I’m excited for you to read about all the inspiring women in this issue, and recommend you do so in the shade with an icy drink in hand—or your feet dangling in a nearby body of water that feels outrageously cold.

PHOTOGRAPH BY SUECH AND BECK WITH STYLING BY FRANNY ALDER

REBECCA PHILPS

Editor-in-chief

JUNE/JULY 2021

REBECCA PHILPS EDITOR-IN-CHIEF NICOLA HAMILTON ART DIRECTOR DANIELLE GROEN CONTRIBUTING EDITOR RENÉE REARDIN DIGITAL EDITOR REBECCA GAO ASSISTANT DIGITAL EDITOR LISA FIELDING COPY EDITOR SYDNEY HAMILTON RESEARCHER CONTRIBUTORS Franny Alder, Zandile Chiwanza, LeeAndra Cianci, Christina Frangou, Claire Gagne, Laura Jeha, Melinda Josie, Stacy Lee, Wenting Li, Audrey Malo, Ishani Nath, Salini Perera, Bee Quammie, Kate Rae, Dani Reynolds, Jennifer Roberts, Katherine Sheppard, Stacey Smithers, Suech and Bech, Dara Sutin, Maya Visnyei, Justine Wong, Meaghan Wray, Michelle Yee, Alia Youssef READER’S DIGEST MAGAZINES CANADA LIMITED CHAIRMAN OF THE BOARD PUBLISHER AND NATIONAL SALES DIRECTOR VICE PRESIDENT AND LEGAL COUNSEL EDITOR-IN-CHIEF, READER’S DIGEST CONTENT OPERATIONS MANAGER CIRCULATION DIRECTOR

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Addictive comfort food that just happens to be vegan.

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Dead-butt syndrome: It’s a thing, and it’s the pandemic’s fault.

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Trend Report SPIKE YOUR H2O WITH A LITTLE CBD

BY R EBECCA GAO ց Since cannabis was legalized in Canada nearly three years ago, there’s been an explosion in the global cannabis beverages market, with some reports estimating it could be worth US$2.8 billion by 2025. CBD (or cannabidiol) drinks are projected to be the fastest-growing segment within that windfall.

By now, you’ve probably heard all about the supposed health benefits of CBD: It’s

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thought to help with anxiety, relieve pain and potentially reinvigorate your sex life.

And unlike its high-inducing sister, THC— which is the main psychoactive ingredient in marijuana—CBD is non-psychoactive and non-addictive, making it the star of the cannabis-drink show.

CBD drinks are made by infusing water with CBD particles. The result is a usually sparkling canned drink that’s similar to

PHOTOGRAPH BY DANI REYNOLDS

flavoured sparkling water or a spiked seltzer like White Claw. While there are some CBD-only drinks on the market, it can be hard to find one that doesn’t have a tiny bit of THC. (Veryvell’s Strawberry Hibiscus Sparkling Water, for example, contains 0.5 mg of THC, along with 15 mg of CBD.) That’s because it can be tricky to extract pure CBD from cannabis plants without THC hanging on as well, says Dr. Danilo de Gregorio, a

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post-doctoral fellow at McGill University’s Neurobiological Psychiatry Unit.

There’s not a ton of research yet into the benefits of CBD (in part because the substance has only recently been legalized in Canada). But the studies that have been done have shown some promise, bolstering CBD’s reputation as a cure-all. “Generally speaking, CBD helps to reduce the level of anxiety, to aid with sleep and sometimes to eliminate pain perception,” says de Gregorio. “Notably, when CBD binds with the TRPV1 receptor in our bodies, especially after repeated administration for multiple days, it can have a strong analgesic effect.”

But while low amounts of CBD are generally very safe, moderation is absolutely key.

“At higher doses, CBD can produce some nausea and could interact with other drugs if someone is under treatment through other medication,” says de Gregorio. He recommends people taking antidepressants or mood stabilizers should be cautious. “These drinks might affect or interact with these drugs,” he says. “If they want to take these drinks, they always have to follow their doctor’s advice.”

The CBD wary might instead want to explore hemp, a variety of the cannabis plant. While hemp’s leaves and stems do contain CBD, the rest of the plant has only trace amounts of the cannabinoid. Hemp seeds and hearts are good sources of plantbased protein because they’re rich in heartand brain-healthy omega-3 fatty acids.

Hemp extracts and hemp seed oil don’t contain CBD either, which means neither do the drinks made from them.

But hemp drinks, like the ones from the Canadian brand Daydream, boast their own benefits, claiming to boost your focus and decrease stress. Daydream also contains adaptogens like Schisandra and ginseng, which are known to help with stress reduction, focus and memory.

Whichever sort of drink you’re trying, pay attention to how much CBD (and THC) is in each product. In Canada, cannabis is regulated by the Cannabis Act, and all products must have both the THC and CBD content displayed in quantity (by milligrams) or concentration (by milligrams per gram). When you’re at your local legal shop or ordering through an online retailer, examine the labelling to find a dosage that works for you. Start low and see how your body reacts. If you’re buying in person, tell the budtender what effects you’re looking for, and they can make recommendations.

Companies that are licensed to sell cannabis are regulated by the government, meaning their products are well-labelled and tested and the dosages are carefully measured. So make sure you’re buying the legal stuff.

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DRINK ME

EVERIE MANGO PASSIONFRUIT CBD SPARKLING BEVERAGE Tastes like: Devouring a Creamsicle and getting drowsy in the sun CBD content: 10 mg $5.90, ocs.ca

ġâ ØÄ5 â CUCUMBER & MINT SPARKLING WATER Tastes like: Sipping the cucumber water they serve in spas while chilling out with a clay mask CBD content: 20 mg $4.85, ocs.ca

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VERYVELL STRAWBERRY HIBISCUS SPARKLING WATER Tastes like: Nibbling freshly picked strawberries while lounging on a picnic blanket CBD content: 15 mg $6.65, ocs.ca

High Maintenance CBD GETS A BATHTIME GLOW-UP

BY DANIELLE GROEN

JUNE/JULY 2021

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1. Pain Stick Canada’s Bodega Wellness has been championing CBD products for nearly a decade. Its line runs the gamut from lotion to lip balm to lube, and this handy pain stick roller fortifies hemp-extracted CBD oil with soothing rosemary, peppermint, lavender and eucalyptus oils. LAMM CBD Pain Stick Roller, $39, bodegawellness.com

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2. Lotion Calyx Wellness opened its boutique in Toronto nearly six years ago with a line of pharmaceutical-grade organic CBD oils, capsules and even pet products.

Its super hydrating, lightly scented Smooth lotion contains 600 mg of CBD, while Smooth+ packs a dose of 1,200 mg.

Calyx Wellness Smooth, $65, and Smooth+, $99, calyxwellness.co

3. Shampoo & Conditioner Sensitiva makes its allnatural hemp-derived CBD products—which include après-sports balm, face serum and hand sanitizer—in an east-end Toronto lab. The hemp-oil fatty acids in its shampoo and conditioner leave hair nourished but not weighed down. Sensitiva Locks shampoo and Mane conditioner, $49 each, sensitiva.ca

PHOTOGRAPH BY DANI REYNOLDS

4. Bath Bomb Valens Company, based in Kelowna, B.C., manufactures a boatload of cannabisinfused products, from gummies to iced tea to honeycomb crumble.

In April, it branched out into CBD bath bombs with refreshing grapefruit and calming eucalyptus. Nūance bath bombs, $13 to $17, ocs.ca or bccannabisstores.com

5. Soak Vancouver-based Delush started with a sweet little heart-shaped bath bomb (it smells like pineapple) and has since expanded to CBD-spiked body butters, soap scrubs and lotions.

The bath salts will make you feel like you’re sitting on a porch swing sipping a ginger-peach cocktail.

Delush The Magic Soak, $29, delush.ca

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In Conversation

“apprivoiser”—understand and then work with as you navigate through life.

YOGINI NANCY ZAGBAYOU ON TAMING STRESS, MAINTAINING A ROUTINE AND OPENING UP THE WELLNESS INDUSTRY

BY ISHANI NATH z What comes to mind when you think of self-care? Maybe it’s scented candles and a meditation app or colouring books and a face mask. But Montreal-based wellness entrepreneur Nancy Zagbayou believes self-care is not something to be purchased. “For me, self-care is self-compassion,” she says. “And that compassion gives us the ability to be resilient.”

Zagbayou, also known as the Yogini Nancy, is a yoga and meditation educator, as well as a inclusion consultant for the wellness industry—an industry that in the past year has been called out for excluding Black and Indigenous people, and people of colour. Zagbayou says racialized women are often “made to think that caring for ourselves is a luxury when, in fact, it’s not.

It’s fundamental.”

Here, she explores the true meaning of wellness and how to create spaces that are welcoming to everybody and every body.

This feels like a loaded question these days, but how are you doing? I feel like I have the tools to manage the current situation, and I’m staying busy. That is helping me be well.

What exactly is helping you right now?

Having a routine that is set—I sleep at the same time and wake up at the same time.

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I may not be on my yoga mat every day, but I read about philosophy, meditate or focus on my concentration, do some breathing exercises or participate in acts of service every day. Any time I’m doing an element of yoga, it helps improve my mood.

Are these tools you’ve always had or ones you’ve developed over time? When I was working in my early 20s as a financial analyst on Wall Street, I had no tools. I was very stressed, and my mind was very busy.

When I moved to New York City, I was living by myself. So already, that was taking me away from my support system—and I didn’t know then about yoga or meditation. I was drinking and partying instead.

But I learned a lot from that experience.

I learned the impact of stress on the body and the importance of family and friends.

I learned to ask for help when I needed it.

I experienced the right amount of stress so that it was a catalyst to look for the tools to cope.

A lot of people think of stress as a bad thing, but it sounds like that’s not your outlook. I don’t think all stress is bad. If you have no stress, you have no action.

You need the momentum to get you going.

There is no life without stress. So it’s something you have to tame—in French, we say

PHOTOGRAPH BY STACY LEE

At its core, wellness is about people caring for themselves. So how did the industry become so white? There is one word that can describe it all: capitalism.

When people realized they could make a profit, it changed the nature of wellness.

The wellness industry is a multi-trillion-dollar industry. So when people stand to gain something, sometimes they’re thinking of the bottom line and not enough about the people they should be serving.

What have you observed through your own experience? The wealth created by this industry doesn’t necessarily trickle down to people like me. I had an experience where I was doing the same exact position as someone else who was white. That person was paid 20 percent more, and we did the same training. The only difference between her and me appeared to be skin colour. So the wellness industry is really a microcosm for the rest of society. When we see systemic discrimination or systemic racism in society, well, the wellness industry is not really exempt from those types of behaviours.

As an inclusion consultant for the wellness industry, you engage with these issues. What has that been like? It’s been an eye-opening experience to see how much people want to know and how much they don’t know. There’s so much that needs to be done as internal work—understanding our own biases and history. One client came to me, and she wanted to do anti-racism training. However, her intention was to do one hour for all her employees. One hour is not sufficient when people are starting out at a place where they have zero information about race relations or the history of racist policies.

Last summer, we saw a long overdue racial reckoning in the wellness industry. Have you seen meaningful change since then? I have seen efforts, some performative, some sincere—but often still without the resources to back them up, or treating racialized people as tokens but not paying them what they’re worth or having anti-racist policies. Studios, gyms and institutions need to put more resources towards the things they say they are committed to.

How do you create inclusive spaces in your classes? I think it starts with inviting people into the practice. That notion of “good vibes only” is dangerous. We all have a range of emotion, and allowing people to come to class with that range of emotion is healthy. Mental health is essential, and

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there is no shame in taking care of yourself and your health. Showing vulnerability and being open gives people permission to be themselves as well.

And I like to remind my students that there’s nothing to be achieved in the class.

Every where else in the world, they’re being told to perform. Having, in that one hour or 45 minutes, permission to just be instead of do—I feel like that’s freedom.

Have you adjusted how you teach yoga to meet people’s needs right now? I really take the time to ask how they’re doing, how they’re arriving today and then how we can use those emotions in our practice.

So if someone had a tough day, what would you do? I ask my students about their energy levels and then, with that,

I adjust the level of intensity of the class— so I know not to give them a power vinyasa class when they’re depressed. I also adjust my narration so I can say things that are nurturing for where they are at that moment.

This past year has been a time of immense challenge but also change. What do you hope the wellness industry looks like in the future? Beyond just representation, we need meaningful conversations where everyone is involved and we are given not just a seat at the table but the power to make decisions that impact our health and the health of people like us.

Yoga originated in India. Do those who practise or teach yoga have a responsibility to honour its roots? Definitely.

Otherwise, it’s cultural appropriation. If

you are stripping yoga from the spirituality and the philosophy, and you’re only teaching movement, then you’re doing a disservice to the practice.

COVID-19 is devastating India. Why is it important for those who benefit from yoga to give back right now? I don’t subscribe to the rule of calling people out. I’m an educator, and I think what is important is to bring awareness to the situation so more people can be moved to act—whether it’s fundraising, giving donations or lobbying the Indian, U.S. or Canadian governments. As Martin Luther King said, “In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.”

This interview has been edited and condensed.

“THAT NOTION OF ‘GOOD VIBES ONLY’ IS DANGEROUS. WE ALL HAVE A RANGE OF EMOTION, AND ALLOWING PEOPLE TO COME TO CLASS WITH THAT RANGE IS HEALTHY.”

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PHOTOGRAPH BY STACY LEE

JUNE/JULY 2021

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Eat More

BY LAURA JEHA z Nori is the Japanese word for dried edible seaweed, and it’s been consumed for thousands of years. Nori was eaten as a thick paste until the 1700s, when the Japanese developed a way to dry it in sheets, applying the same method they used to make writing paper.

Today, nori is made from strands of edible red algae that are shredded, pressed into ultra-thin sheets and then dried and toasted. Bak ing at a low temperat ure dehydrates the seaweed, while roasting enhances its briny flavour. The best algae for making nori grows in cold, nitrogenrich water and is cultivated in both the

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northern and southern hemispheres.

Though nori is strongly associated with Japanese cuisine, it’s long been a popular item in Scotland, where the unpolluted, cool waters along the coast offer ideal growing conditions. The Scottish regularly use the mineral-rich seaweed as fertilizer but have also traditionally included it in dishes such as oatmeal.

Why it’s good for you The algae used to make nori is a true superfood. Algae contains up to 50 percent protein by dry weight and all nine amino acids, which puts it on par with other vegetarian

PHOTOGRAPH BY CHRISTIE VUONG

SEAWEED SWAP

Interested in other kinds of seaweeds?

Try kombu, a type of kelp that’s high in vitamins and minerals and is the basis for dashi, a savoury broth that’s the foundation of both ramen and miso soup.

JUNE/JULY 2021

PHOTOGRAPH (KOMBU) CHENGYUZHENG/ISTOCK

NORI

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protein sources like tofu and eggs. Why is this sea plant so protein-packed? It’s all thanks to photosynthesis, the process by which algae converts sunlight into energy. This ability to produce its own food, coupled with algae’s naturally high growth rate, generates more protein than other plants.

Seaweed is also often touted for its high mineral content, which is 10 times greater than that of plants grown in soil. This is due to the large concentration of minerals in sea water, which makes dried nori a good source of micronutrients like vitamins A and C, iron and iodine. Iodine is a mineral that’s important for a well-functioning thyroid, a gland responsible for regulating metabolism, and reduced levels can lead to hypothyroidism. Maintaining healthy iodine levels has also been shown to stimulate immunity and may help mitigate symptoms of fibrocystic breast disease.

E ver wonder where fat t y f i sh, l i ke salmon, get their omega-3 content from?

It turns out the origin is their algae-heavy diet. Nori is a source of polyunsaturated fatt y acids, such as DH A and EPA, t wo important fatty acids the body is not able to produce itself. Polyunsaturated fatty acids from algae are well-absorbed by humans and are cardioprotective, helping to lower blood lipids and improve cholesterol levels.

How to use it Another great thing about nori is that it’s readily available in most grocery stores, in the international aisle. When buying nori, look for sheets that are dark green, smooth and uniform in texture, and avoid those with splotches or a reddish tint. (You can also find smaller sheets in snack-size packages for a quick salty bite.) To keep nori in top form, store it in airtight packaging, and if you won’t get to it within two weeks, pop it in the freezer, where it’ll maintain its freshness for about six months.

You may not be up for rolling your own sushi, but there are many equally delicious ways to use nori that require less time and effort. Nori imparts dishes with the same savoury flavour as bacon or anchovies, courtesy of one of the amino acids it contains: glutamate, the same compound used in MSG. Harness that umami in your cooking by incorporating nori into seasonings, dips and noodle dishes or using it as a garnish for soups and stir-fries. In Japan, ground-up nori is made into an all-purpose topper called furikake, a blend of seaweed, sesame seeds and other seasonings that’s excellent sprinkled on rice and eggs.

Laura Jeha is a registered dietitian, nutrition counsellor and recipe developer. Find out more at ahealthyappetite.ca.

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TIP

Don’t worry if the nori crackers aren’t completely crisp out of the oven. They’ll firm up as they cool.

Cook This NORI CRACKERS 4 tbsp maple syrup 2 tbsp tamari or soy sauce 1 tbsp canola or other neutral-tasting oil 2 tsp sesame oil ¼ tsp garlic powder ¼ tsp sriracha ¼ cup slivered almonds 2 tbsp sesame seeds 27 g nori sushi sheets Step 1 Preheat oven to 250ºF. In a medium bowl, whisk together maple syrup, tamari, canola and sesame oils, garlic powder and sriracha.

Add in almonds and sesame seeds, and stir to combine.

PHOTOGRAPH BY LAURA JEHA

Step 2 Stack nori sheets and cut in half lengthwise. Spread stacks of 2 or 3 layers onto 2 large parchment paper– lined baking sheets. Drizzle maple-soy mixture over top of nori and spread evenly using your hands, making sure each stack is wellcoated. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes, until nori is crisp and almonds are golden. Allow to cool completely on baking sheets before storing in an airtight container.

Crackers will keep for up to 1 week in a container.

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Quick Question HOW DO I GET INTO THE STOCK MARKET?

BY ZANDILE CHIWANZA z Anyone else currently have a severe case of FOMO when it comes to investing in the stock market?

From the GameStop frenzy to folks on the Internet encouraging everyone to “buy the dip,” it seems like now—right now!—is the best time to invest. But while some experts might say the process is as simple as calling your bank to open an investment account or signing up for a roboadvisor, I’ve found there are several steps you might want to take before you dip a toe into the stock market.

“There’s a checklist you need to create and run through before you start investing,” says Saijal Patel, founder and CEO of Saij Elle, a financial wellness consulting firm. “So many people look to their friends or other family members for tips and investment advice. But how you create your investment portfolio has to make sense for you.”

In other words, just because the stock market is on sale doesn’t mean it’s a good time to invest. Rather than wondering if it’s

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golden rule on this so that doesn’t mean you have to wait until you’re debt-free to start investing.

Identify your risk tolerance Almost every investment entails some level of risk—the degree of uncertainty about how much money you’ll make or lose. The greater the potential return, the greater the risk. And your tolerance for that risk will be inf luenced by your age, income, investment goals and level of comfort. (Ask yourself: What would I do if the value of my investments declined? How would I feel?)

There’s no way to eliminate risk entirely when investing in stocks. To handle risk, you need to embrace the fact that the market will go up and down, put a plan in place that aligns with your tolerance and goals, and nurture the habit of investing.

the exact right moment to enter the market, consider whether you are in the best place financially and mentally to do so.

Start small (really!)

A common misconception about investing is that you need to be making six figures to start. In fact, the earlier in life you begin, the more time you have to take advantage of compounding—the process of money multiplying itself, which is how investors earn interest on their interest. “That’s actually going to create wealth far more than what you invest,” says Patel.

There’s also a myth out there that the stock market is scary. I get where that comes from. There are no guarantees, and the market can (and will!) crash again. But the good news is that you don’t have to take excessive risks. You can choose from different investment products that vary on the risk spectrum: mutual funds, guaranteed investment certificates (GICs), government bonds and equities, to name a few. Diversifying your portfolio can be far more helpful than focusing on what you are investing in.

Set your goals “Ask yourself why you are investing in the first place,” suggests Patel. “Then you can allocate a dollar amount to each target and establish a timeline to achieve your objectives.” If you have long-term goals like retirement, you’re not going to need to access that money for a while—in which case, it doesn’t make sense to leave it in the bank earning very little interest. If you can afford not to touch the cash, you can invest it and better ride out the stock market’s ups and downs. But if you might need the money in a year or two, Patel warns, “the market could crash, and then you’re pulling it out at a loss.”

Most exper ts recommend hav ing at least three to six months’ living expenses saved in an emergency fund before you invest. They also suggest paying down high-interest debts first. But there’s no

Learn what you can “Nobody can predict what’s going to happen in the market because there are so many factors you have to consider,” Patel says. “You can look at a company and say the fundamentals are great, but then something happens, like a pandemic or geopolitical risk, that throws everything out.”

That’s why she emphasizes that investment is a long-term game. And even if there are no sure things when it comes to investing, there are lots of ways to learn more: Watch YouTube, listen to podcasts, join free online communities or pay for a course.

We all have to start somewhere (including me), so the only way to gain confidence is to take control and educate yourself. If you’re still on the fence about investing in the stock market, investigate why you might be feeling that way and then seek advice from a source you trust.

ILLUSTRATION BY SALINI PERERA

JUNE/JULY 2021

VITALS

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ILLUSTRATION BY JUSTINE WONG

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Women need to get enough of six key minerals and vitamins for optimal health.

The good news? It’s easy to do.

IN PARTNERSHIP WITH NATURAL CALM

BY CLAIRE GAGNÉ ¬ Everywhere you turn, there’s advice on what, how and when to eat. It can feel totally overwhelming—but it doesn’t have to be all that complicated.

The first step to achieving a balanced diet is to eat plenty of fruits, vegetables, protein and whole grains, says Crystal Karakochuk, assistant professor at the University of British Columbia’s department of food, nutrition and health. Then be sure to get enough of the minerals and vitamins that will help you feel vibrant through mid-life.

Calcium is a mineral we store mostly in our bones and teeth to keep them strong and healthy. Some calcium is also needed for muscle function and to help our nerves send messages from the brain to other parts of the body.

It ’s i mpor t a nt for a l l women to get enough calcium in their diet. “You want to make sure you keep your bone integrity healthy,” says Shauna Lindzon, a registered dietitian in Toronto. Health Canada recommends women under age 50 get 1,000 mg of calcium per day and women over 50 get 1,200 mg of calcium per day.

Calcium is often associated with a glass of milk—that’s because 250 mL of milk has 300 mg of calcium in it, or almost a third of your daily requirement. But if drinking milk is not your thing, you can turn to other

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types of dairy, like cheese and yogurt, for a quick calcium fix.

If you avoid dairy, it’s a bit harder to get enough calcium, but not impossible, Lindzon says. Milk alternatives like almond, soy and oat milk are typically fortified with calcium at the same levels you’d find in the equivalent amount of cow’s milk. Other foods, like canned sardines and canned salmon, vegetables like bok choy, and nuts, seeds, legumes and lentils all contain calcium. But with these foods, says Lindzon, you really need to focus on making sure you get enough into your diet on a daily basis to meet your calcium requirement. “I recommend that people who aren’t drinking cow’s milk explore the milk alternatives, because it makes it a lot easier to get up to the 1,000 milligrams.”

Vitamin D is a nutrient our bodies produce when exposed to sunlight; it’s found naturally in and added to some foods. It helps your body absorb calcium, to keep your bones strong, and also supports your immune system. “It’s such a complex nutrient—it’s doing so many things on so many different levels,” says Karakochuk.

Samara Felesky-Hunt, a registered dietitian in Calgary, adds that vitamin D may also reduce your risk for certain cancers, like colon, breast and prostate cancer.

Health Canada says adults under 70 years of age need 600 IU of vitamin D a day. Lindzon, however, says the amount each person needs can vary based on factors like age and skin colour. “As we get older, the absorption of vitamin D in our gut goes down,” she explains.

How much vitamin D you get from the sun will also dictate how much you need to make up in food or supplements, but that’s hard to judge. “For instance, people with darker skin or people who cover their skin will be getting very little from sun absorption,” says Lindzon, who adds that you can ask to have your vitamin D levels checked as part of a routine blood test.

Your body naturally makes vitamin D when the sun hits your bare skin, but most people don’t get enough of it this way. “Especially in Canada, we do not get enough vitamin D between October and March,” Lindzon says. Milk and milk alternatives are typically fortified with vitamin D, and you can often get as much as you need by consuming these—in Canada, 250 mL of milk is required to contain 100 IU of vitamin D. Other than that, there aren’t that many food sources people eat regularly that are high in vitamin D, says Lindzon, although fatty fish, fish oils and eggs do contain some.

Hea lt h Ca nada recom mends ever yone over the age of 50 take a vitamin D

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supplement of 400 IU; however, women of any age should talk to their doctor or a registered dietitian about whether they should be taking a supplement.

Vitamin B12 supports the nervous system and DNA production, and helps the body form red blood cells. Because it is found mostly in animal products, people who are vegetarian or vegan can develop vitamin B12 deficiency or even anemia, which occurs when there aren’t enough red blood cells to carry oxygen throughout the body.

Adults need 2.4 mcg of vitamin B12 a day, although that goes up to 2.6 mcg if you’re pregnant and 2.8 mcg if you’re breastfeeding.

Vitamin B12 is found in animal products, and people who eat adequate amounts of animal products typically get all they need from their diet. “Things like beef, clams and trout are all high in B12,” says Lindzon. Eg gs and dair y also contain B12, since they come from animals, and milk alternatives like soy, almond and oat milks are often fortified with it. Nutritional yeast, which you can find at most grocery stores, is a cheesy-flavoured seasoning you can sprinkle on foods like kale chips, popcorn or potatoes—and it is high in vitamin B12.

If you’re vegan, Lindzon notes you’ll likely need to supplement with a vitamin B12 pill. Women over 50 can have lower stomach acidity and be unable to absorb B12 as well as they could when they were younger, so may also need to supplement.

Vitamin B12 shots are pretty common now, says Karakochuk, who recommends speaking with your doctor or dietitian.

Iron is a mineral your body uses for growth and development, and to make hemoglobin, a protein in red blood cells that carries oxygen from your lungs to other parts of your body.

“Iron is so important for women during the years they’re menstruating,” says Felesky-Hunt. That’s because you’re continuously losing iron through blood loss every month; it’s also why the amount of iron a woman needs (18 mg per day) is significantly higher than a man’s requirements (8 mg). Felesky-Hunt says this often surprises women in her practice, whose male partners tend to eat much more red meat than they do. Pregnant women need even more iron: 27 mg per day. Women’s needs drop to the same level as men’s after menopause.

There are two types of iron: heme iron, which comes from meat (particularly red meat), and non-heme iron, which is found in plant-based sources, like lentils, legumes, nuts and seeds. “Heme iron is absorbed

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nuts and seeds,” says Lindzon. Magnesium is also found in dairy products, fish like halibut and wheat bran. “You can add wheat bran to any baked good you make,” Felesky-Hunt says.

THE AMOUNT OF IRON A WOMAN NEEDS DURING THE YEARS THAT SHE’S MENSTRUATING IS SIGNIFICANTLY HIGHER THAN A MAN’S REQUIREMENT

better than the plant-based iron,” says Lindzon. This means if you’re a vegetarian or tend not to eat a lot of red meat, you might need to consume more iron-rich foods to meet your daily requirements. You can also increase the absorption of iron by adding vitamin C to your meal. “For instance, you could combine spinach, which has iron in it, with strawberries in a salad,” she says.

Magnesium is a mineral that, along with calcium and vitamin D, helps maintain bone health. “Magnesium is also really important for muscle and proper heart function,” says Felesky-Hunt.

Adults over the age of 30 need 320 mg of magnesium a day, and that goes up to 360 mg a day during pregnancy.

Thankfully, magnesium is found in many of the foods we eat. “Foods that are high in magnesium include dark, leafy greens,

ILLUSTRATION BY JUSTINE WONG

Folate is a B vitamin that makes DNA and helps your cells divide. Many people know it by the name of its synthetic form: folic acid. Taking folic acid supplements in pregnancy is known to reduce the risk of neural-tube defects in babies. “Even later on, women need folate for healthy red blood cells and for reducing homocysteine [an amino acid produced when proteins are broken down], which reduces our risk for cardiovascular disease,” says Felesky-Hunt.

Health Canada recommends women who are planning to get pregnant take a folic acid supplement of 400 mcg for at least three months before conception and continue to take it (or a prenatal multivitamin) throughout pregnancy.

If you’re not pregnant or planning on getting pregnant, you can generally get all the folate or folic acid you need from your diet.

Vegetables like asparagus, Brussels sprouts and dark, leafy greens contain folate, as do nuts, beans and peas. In Canada, folic acid is also added to many f lours, pastas and cereals. “For the most part, nobody’s really folate deficient unless, for example, you’re making your own bread and you’re not adding any fortified flours,” says Karakochuk. In that case, you should talk to your doctor about adding a supplement.

Experts emphasize that when it comes to good nutrition, it’s not just about the vitamins and minerals we consume—it’s the whole package. “One of the focuses now in Canada’s Food Guide is on more protein from plant-based sources,” says Karakochuk, who encourages women to add more plant-based proteins to their diets. Felesky-Hunt notes that in her practice, she finds many women aren’t eating enough calories for energy during the day and aren’t meeting their daily nutrition needs. “It’s just so important, with hectic lifestyles and dealing with kids and work schedules, to eat enough to provide the specific nutrients women need at a very important stage of life.”

If you’re having trouble getting enough magnesium into your diet through food, try Natural Calm Raspberry-Lemon Ionic Magnesium Citrate Powder. naturalcalm.ca

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VITALS

We Tried It AN ACUPUNCTURE FACIAL

BY RENÉE REARDIN z As a beauty writer, I’m invited to try all sorts of new treatments.But I also get a bunch of inspiration through Instagram scrolling—and that’s where I found my latest task. French influencer Mathilde Lacombe posted a filterfree selfie highlighting her ridiculously smoot h forehead, wh ich she cla i med wasn’t the result of Botox. Instead, she said her ironed-out guise was thanks to cosmetic acupuncture.

Acupuncture is an ancient Chinese medicine practice in which a skilled practitioner inserts metal needles into the skin at pressure points believed to affect different parts of the body. Activating these pressure points is thought to help balance the body’s flow of energy, known as chi or qi, and stimulate nerves, muscles and connective tissue to relieve pain and ease tension.

In cosmetic acupuncture, also known as an acupuncture facial, the needles are

placed primarily in the face to relax muscles and smooth out lines and wrinkles, as well as sculpt and de-puff. “Common areas would be the frown lines and the vertical lines between the eyebrows,” says Sarah Kreitzer, owner of Acupuncture Center Toronto. “And we use sculpting points that are found below the cheekbones.”

Needles are tucked under the bone, she says, which can help give cheekbones a more lifted look.

Don’t do it for the ’gram: “I quickly abandoned the idea of taking a selfie once I imagined dropping my phone onto my needle-spiked face.”

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PHOTOGRAPHS BY (FACIAL) RUSLAN DASHINSKY/ISTOCK; (MAT) FRANTIC00/ISTOCK

VITALS

Need les a re a lso placed i n a reas of the body thought to indirectly address cosmetic concerns on your face. “These points in the body have a reflex zone function,” Kreitzer says. With water retention in the face, for example, she says they would probably stimulate points that strengthen the spleen and help disperse swelling or edema.

Before my appointment, I filled out a lengthy form with questions about everything from my cosmetic concerns (breakouts and fine lines) to what I thought about my body’s circulation (I always have cold hands and feet). I’m asked if I’ve had Botox or filler, because acupuncture needles can botch a previous job. “If you’ve had work done with injectables, we can still do the treatment, but we wouldn’t be able to work directly on that part of the face,” says Kreitzer. Since I’m free of injectables, pretty much every square inch of me is fair game.

At the appointment, I lay on the table, and Kreitzer placed needles from my head to my toes. She inserted tiny thumbtack-size needles around my mouth and forehead, and longer needles under my cheekbones.

She’s teaching cosmetic acupuncture to a few registered acupuncturists, so she had them place some needles around my knees, ankles and wrists. Tackling my health and beauty woes is a three-person job.

Left alone to lie in the room for 15 minutes, I contemplated taking a selfie—but I quickly abandoned that idea once I imagined dropping my phone onto my needlespiked face. After Kreitzer and her trainees took out the needles, she rubbed my face.

“Massaging the skin after acupuncture really helps prevent bruising,” she says.

The face bruises more easily than any other area of the body, so she also encourages her patients to massage their skin at home for a few days post-treatment.

Most people notice results after just one acupuncture treatment, Kreitzer says. But, I thought to myself, I’m not most people.

My skin throws temper tantrums at the introduction of any new product or technique, so I expected to see red dots or even some swelling from the needles. But when I looked in the mirror, I saw super-glowing skin and an overall slightly lifted look—like I just woke up from a 12-hour sleep and had magically become a toddler again. My skin looked plump, in a well-hydrated, wrinkleless way, and truly luminous.

The following day, my skin still looked good, but not quite as luminous as the day before: It was a solid-night’s-sleep sort of good, rather than toddler good. I’m inclined to go back for more treatments to see if, as Kreitzer says, I can get longer-lasting results. But since each session is $120 a pop, I might space them out a bit.

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HAND PRESSURE POINTS

1

THE PALM ӤN ÄԡÍØÄ5ÍÍӥ Make a loose fist.

Press on the spot just below where your pinky touches your palm for five deep breaths.

2 ØZ5ԡe 5ÄԡąÄeÍØԡ ӤN ÄԡÍ 55Àӥ With your palm facing up, place two fingers on your wrist, directly below your pinky finger.

Apply pressure for five deep breaths.

3

THE HAND VALLEY ӤN ÄԡZ5 + $Z5Íӥ With your palm facing down, find the firm skin between your thumb and pointer finger.

Apply pressure or massage the spot in small circles.

We Also Tried This AN ACUPRESSURE MAT Would I like to relax on a nylon bed of little plastic needles that will dig into my entire back? Sure, I thought, when I heard about acupressure mats. Compared to the year we’ve had, it didn’t sound so bad.

I ordered a mat from Tomshoo off Amazon. My first reaction: The needles on the mat are sharper than I expected. Like kittenclaws sharp. Stepping lightly onto the mat took my breath away—not in a bad way, but not in a good way, either. Then, wearing a long-sleeved cotton T-shirt (which is recommended for your first time), I laid down slowly. I tried to stay as still as possible for the recommended 20 to 40 minutes. But I didn’t feel relaxed, didn’t feel like I would relax and couldn’t stop thinking about the needles digging deeper into my spine. So I quit after five.

Acupressure mats haven’t been studied extensively for their potential health benefits, but they’re said to reduce stress, relieve tension, increase circulation and ease minor aches.

“The acupressure mat can stimulate the many nerves in your back, which feed all the way up into your central

ILLUSTRATIONS BY LEEANDRA CIANCI

nervous system, through the spinal cord and into your brain,” says Henry Claflin, registered acupuncturist at Mindful Maelstrom Wellness Clinic in Toronto. That stimulation can increase blood flow and get your body into a relaxed state. “Plus, you’re basically meditating, which is also beneficial.”

If you think the acupressure mat may work for you, Claflin says it’ll become (mildly) more comfortable at the five- to 10-minute mark. Wearing a T-shirt is fine, as long as you can feel the spikes through it. And you can get up after 20 minutes: Claflin recommends lying on the mat for no longer than that.

As for me, I’m sticking with my foam roller, which can work out kinks in my back and maybe even increase blood flow—no kitten claws required. —Renée Reardin

Lay the mat on the floor for more pressure, or use it on a softer surface (bed, couch) for less.

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VITALS

Small But Mighty THE NEW SUPERFOODS IN PARTNERSHIP WITH ACTIVATION PRODUCTS

BY L AU R A J E H A ց What really makes a food super? It’s high in antioxidants and rich in vitamins and minerals, to be sure, but it’s also a versatile ingredient you can add to your meal plan (and grocery list) and truly look forward to eating.

Here are three under-the-radar superfoods that offer major nutritional benefits and are worth seeking out.

All-Purpose Power Grain: Fonio Fonio is an ancient grain from West Africa that is considered the continent’s oldest cultivated cereal. This edible grain is like a cross between couscous and quinoa in both appearance and texture, but it is actually a part of the millet family. Like quinoa, it is higher in protein than rice, wheat and

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barley, with as much as 12 grams of protein per 1 cup cooked fonio. Plus, it contains methionine and cysteine, essential amino acids that are scarce in other cereals. Methionine is a limiting amino acid, meaning it’s hard to find in plant sources, making fonio an important nutrient source for vegans and vegetarians. In some parts of West Africa, fonio is prized by pregnant women and nursing mothers because it’s a source of iron and folic acid—two nutrients that are important for proper growth and development—and is thought to help stimulate breast milk production.

Because fonio is a whole grain and a lowglycemic carbohydrate source, it has less of an impact on blood sugar levels than refined grains like white rice and pasta.

PHOTOGRAPH BY LAURA JEHA

Its high fibre content, when coupled with some of its compounds, like antioxidants and f lavonoids, has been shown to have an anti-diabetic effect, improving insulin response to keep blood sugar levels stable.

Increasing your intake of these compounds also decreases the risk of colorectal and colon cancers, and boosts gut health.

This multi-purpose grain is gluten-free and makes a great alternative to couscous for those with dietary restrictions or intolerances. It can also be made into a hearty breakfast porridge or ground into f lour for gluten-free baking projects. Compared to other whole grains, fonio is relatively quick-cooking, so you’re just a few minutes from an easy side dish or breakfast, making it an excellent addition to your pantry.

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VITALS

Plant-Based Protein: Shiitakes Mushrooms have a long history of use in East Asian countries for both food and medicinal purposes, and the rest of the globe is beginning to catch on. In the mushroom world, shiitakes are a star. These small capped mushrooms are dark brown and have firm, meaty flesh and a savoury, umami-rich taste. They’ve been shown to be just as effective in raising and maintaining vitamin D levels in the body as supplements. And consumption of shiitakes has also been reported to strengthen immune function. This is in part due to selenium, a mineral that helps protect against infection and oxidative damage.

Among shiitakes’ powers is their ability to be a sustainable food source. Mushrooms have a small environmental footprint in comparison to other plants, as they require relatively little water and land.

Mushrooms are inherently f lexible, which is why you see them incorporated into cuisines around the world. Shiitakes’ firm texture makes them a particularly good meat stand-in in stir-fries, soups, pasta sauces a nd g ra in-based sa lads, where they lend their unique full-bodied taste. Remove their woody stems before cooking, but don’t throw them away! Shiitake stems make for an extra-f lavourful vegetable stock.

Leafy BFF: Microgreens Microgreens are the definition of small but mighty. You may have seen these delicate greens sprinkled as an edible embellishment on top of avocado toast or soup, but it turns out they add a lot more than just an aesthetically pleasing touch.

Microgreens are the seedlings of edible vegetables and herbs like broccoli, arugula and basil. These tiny greens have a quick production cycle (two to three weeks) and take up little growing space in greenhouses, so they are fast and easy to produce. Microgreens differ from sprouts because they require both light and a growing medium to flourish and are safer to eat, as they don’t spoil as easily.

The power of microgreens is that they contain higher concentrations of beneficial compounds such as vitamins, minerals and antioxidants than their mature counterparts. For example, microgreens are two to three times more nutrient dense than fully grown spinach leaves cultivated under similar conditions. Look for microgreens that are grown in soil, as they may contain higher concentrations of vitamin C than those harvested hydroponically.

In fact, microgreens are also often a rich source of vitamins E and A, which have antioxidant properties that support immune function and wound healing.

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These are fat-soluble vitamins, so try drizzling microgreens with a little olive oil to boost their absorption. Microgreens are abundant in minerals and can be high in potassium, which is responsible for maintaining the precise fluid balance required for proper nerve transmission, muscle contraction and kidney function.

Use microgreens’ intense flavour, crisp texture and vivid colour to amp up any

dish. They can even be blended into smoothies in place of spinach or kale for a quick nutritional boost. Each of the different varieties has its own unique taste, so try out a few!

If you’re looking to pack the highest possible nutritional punch into your diet, try adding these lesser-known foods to your grocery cart. They’ll leave you, and your taste buds, feeling supercharged.

A Dropper A Day GREEN GODDESS DRESSING

THE NO-FUSS WAY TO ADD POWERFUL MICRO-NUTRIENTS TO YOUR DIET vitamins, minerals, enzymes, and essential fatty and amino acids. Its micro-nutrient profile can support cellular regeneration, cardiovascular health, brain function and a healthy immune system.

1½ cups chopped fresh basil leaves 1 cup chopped fresh parsley 1 cup Greek yogurt 3 tbsp lemon juice ½ tsp kosher salt ½ tsp Dijon mustard 2 small cloves garlic, minced 3 droppers Activation Oceans Alive® Raw Phytoplankton To make dressing, combine all the ingredients in a blender or food processor and blend until smooth.

Taste and add more salt if needed.

Many fruits and veggies are nutrient-dense superfoods— but they have zero benefit to your health when they sit unused in your fridge.

If you struggle to cook with superfoods, you might find a supplement like Oceans Alive® an easy way to enhance your diet.

Why Oceans Alive® Is Good for You Made with two strains of marine phytoplankton, Oceans Alive® is full of

Why It’s Good for the Ocean Oceans Alive® features phytoplankton that’s sustainably grown in a photobioreactor, which recreates a perfect oceanlike environment that’s free of contaminants.

Once the phytoplankton has been harvested, the water circulates back into the ocean and improves its ecosystem.

How to Take It Easily work Oceans Alive® into your daily routine by adding a nutrient-packed dropper-ful to water, a smoothie or even your morning yogurt.

Visit activationproducts.com/ get-oceans-alive to learn more.

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VITALS

Do It for the Climate

BY KATHERINE SHEPPARD z Many things have seemed like good ideas over the course of this very strange year—buying stuff from Instagram ads, giving myself boredom bangs—so why not experiment with menstrual cups again? Since my first, brief brush with the cup back in the ’90s, they’ve expanded into all manner of sizes, shapes and silicone firmnesses, while I’ve thrown away quite a few plastic tampon applicators.

Here’s what I learned about making the switch.

How to choose one Every vagina is different, and you’ll need to figure out how long yours is—which means determining your cervix height, which means getting a finger up there. If your cervix is hard to reach, choose a longer option, like the DivaCup. If you can touch your cervix easily, a shorter cup like Saalt might work. Anything in between, go with an average-length cup; I liked Aisle.

Most come in two sizes, and in general, brands recommend the smaller one for people who haven’t given

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birth vaginally and the larger one for those who have.

You shouldn’t really feel the cup once it’s inside you.

How to use one YouTube abounds with folding techniques for inserting your menstrual cup—I fold it in half, like a slice of pizza, then squish it flat and fold it again. Some firmer cups have the structural integrity to immediately stay in place, but softer ones might require you to manually circle the rim, making sure it has opened up all the way around your cervix. Cup removal is easier: Squeeze the bottom and pull. I do find that, after inverting the contents into the toilet, I want to be able to toss the cup directly into a nearby sink for cleanup. (Cup-safe wipes seem to defeat the eco purpose.) I’m not sure I have the confidence to walk out with that cup and wash it in the shared sink of a public restroom or my office bathroom—hence my using one during a stay-athome order. But I like the idea of ditching disposable products, so maybe I’ll work up the nerve.

֏ The average person will use about 11,000 disposable tampons and pads over a lifetime—not a bad reason to switch to a cup.

Aisle cup, $40, periodaisle.ca.

JUNE/JULY 2021

PHOTOGRAPH BY REGAN GIASSON/COURTESY OF AISLE

MENSTRUAL CUPS

VITALS

So This is Weird BODY BREAKOUTS

BY K A R EN ROBOCK ց You’ve just sized up a cystic breakout on your breastbone. Another doozy is popping up on your shoulder—and then there’s the peppering of little pimples across your thighs. As if life doesn’t feel fabulous enough these days, now you’ve got body breakouts to contend with. But take comfort in this: You’re not alone in experiencing bacne (back acne) and even buttne (also a thing).

About 5.6 million Canadians deal with acne, says Dr. Benjamin Barankin, a dermatologist with the Toronto Dermatology Centre. “Of those who get it on the face, 52 percent will also get it on their trunk,” he says.

When you factor in the less-than-ideal lifestyle choices that have come with pandemic life—from ordering in meals more often to skipping exercise to sleeping poorly—body breakouts are on the rise. According to one recent survey, 38 percent of respondents said pandemic stress had definitely worsened their body acne.

Fortunately, there are ways to banish breakouts on the chest, back, butt and legs.

What is body acne?

Whether you’ve got a zit on your chest or your chin, the underlying causes are almost identical. Facial and body pimples pop up due to excess oil production, blocked pores, C. acnes bacteria and inflammation, which are compounded by your genetics, hormone fluctuations and stress levels. That’s why most people who struggle with bacne also contend with facial breakouts.

Areas where clothing friction has caused dermatitis, or skin irritation, can also be prone to zits, especially when combined with sweat. Think, for example, between the boobs and along the upper back, following the lines of a sports bra. Breakouts on the bum are often related to tight-fitting clothing too. (People who sweat it out on Peloton rides are probably familiar with the occasional blemishes on their behinds.) Another common culprit is shaving, which can irritate hair follicles into producing pimples in the bikini area, around the armpits and on the legs (mostly the thighs, since there are more oil-producing glands there compared to the shins).

TRY THESE

1 Blast body breakouts.

Neutrogena Body Clear Pink Grapefruit Salicylic Acid Acne Treatment Body Wash, $10, walmart.ca

2 These little treatment bandages reduce congestion (and help to prevent picking!).

Mighty Patch Invisible+, $25, thedetoxmarket.ca

3 Say buh-bye to that surprise pimple with this clearing tea tree gel. The Body Shop Tea Tree Targeted Gel, $13, thebodyshop.com

Why am I breaking out now?

The surge in pandemic-related stress has resulted in more patients experiencing breakouts all over, says Barankin. There’s the full-on stress of life as we know it (which can kick the skin’s sebum production into overdrive), coupled with the lifestyle changes many have made in lockdown. If you’re someone who used to literally “work out” your stress, but you gave up exercise when your gym closed, you might be dealing with more hormonal breakouts due to higher levels of cortisol in your body. Or, if you took up daily sweat seshes in an attempt to jog away from anxiety but aren’t always showering after your workouts, you may be noticing more breakouts than usual. You might also be able to point a finger at Uber Eats. Studies show that high glycemic foods, those that cause your blood sugar to spike quickly, like bread and potatoes (hello, burger and fries!), as well as dairy (especially skim milk, says Barankin), can worsen acne for some people.

How do I get rid of body blemishes?

For starters, switch your usual ultra-creamy body wash for something designed to actually zap zits. A shower gel that contains salicylic acid or benzoyl peroxide will help unblock pores and exfoliate the skin’s surface to manage existing pimples and prevent future breakouts.

Add a product with a chemical exfoliant, like AHAs and BHAs, a few times a week to whisk away acne-causing dead skin cells and bacteria. After cleansing, a light hypoallergenic body lotion will help prevent dryness (which can exacerbate breakouts).

One of the gold-star solutions for facial acne is retinol—especially powerful for women in their 30s and 40s because it works on blemishes as well as fine lines. But slathering a pricey facial serum all over your shoulders may not be best for your skin-care budget— or treating body breakouts, since those products aren’t really made to penetrate the thicker skin on the torso, says Barankin. A more practical option is a gel or lotion designed to deal with body acne. Over-the-counter produts are likely to include active ingredients such as salicylic acid or benzoyl peroxide (but be aware that creams with this ingredient can bleach your sheets and pyjamas). And then there’s a new topical prescription treatment called Aklief that was created, and tested, for use on the back, shoulders, chest and face, and could be a game-changer for many women.

Of course, what you put on your skin is only part of the solution. Barankin suggests a multi-step approach to caring for body acne that includes wearing looser, more breathable clothing, cleansing and treating breakout-prone areas daily, and trying meditation, yoga and other forms of stress-reducing exercise.

WHAT’S POPPIN’…

The latest launch from indie Canadian brand Three Ships is a plant-based gentle foam cleanser for breakout-prone skin. Papaya extract is on brightening duty while Aspen Bark extract—which contains naturally high levels of zit-zapping salicylic acid—fights breakouts. Vegan and cruelty-, sulfate- and paraben-free. $28, holtrenfrew.com —Leah Rumack BESTHEALTHMAG.CA

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Life Lesson

BY M E AG H A N W R AY ց When the world

HOW I STOPPED COUNTING CALORIES AND STARTED TO EAT WITHOUT FEAR

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ILLUSTRATION BY MELINDA JOSIE

shut down last year, so many of us had no idea what lay ahead. Alongside the fear and uncertainty, there was, I admit, a tinge of excitement—the same kind of feeling I had when school got out for summer vacation.

An abrupt stop to any routines meant a chance to reinvent myself and emerge from the end of this a more conf ident, more beautiful (read: thinner) woman. I know I wasn’t the only one with this idea.

In fact, barely a month into that first lockdown, which forced gyms to close their doors, weight-gain memes referring to the Quarantine 15—a play on the infamous Freshman 15—started floating around. Fitness gurus and nutritionists started sharing tips about how to lose those pesky quarantine pounds. My own friends lamented their new bellies and thicker thighs, and talked about getting their pre-pandemic bodies back. It says a lot about how we as a society feel about fatness that even during a pandemic, which has claimed more than three million lives around the world, gaining weight is right up there with the worst thing that could happen.

As a fat-positive advocate—and someone who routinely shares body-positive photos on Instagram—it pains me to admit I still f ight against the instinct to conform to societal standards of beauty. But to deny it wouldn’t be truthful; it would be turning a blind eye to the very real, unattainable expectations we have of ourselves that erode our self-esteem.

In my earliest years, I ate when I was hungry and stopped when I was full. I enjoyed the pleasures of delicious foods, without feeling guilty about overdoing it.

Through this way of eating freely, I naturally maintained a weight my individual body was meant to sit at. But somewhere during my childhood, I began internalizing messages that I should control my eating, restrict my food and become smaller.

Over time, these practices—which manifest as eating disorders for many—disconnected me from myself. I forgot what hunger and satiety felt like. At my worst points, physical hunger felt good, like a reward for denying my body of what it needed.

I binge-ate when restriction became too much and starved myself to compensate.

Eventually, the cycle became too much, and I slowly distanced myself from it.

When I noticed my disordered tendencies—calorie counting, and building eating plans and workout regimens—kicking in again at the start of the pandemic, I pivoted. Now, I thought, was the perfect time to give intuitive eating a real shot.

In the 25 years since registered dietitians Evelyn Tribole and Elyse Resch founded the evidence-based, mind-body health

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approach called intuitive eating, the antidiet practice has picked up popularity. The technique, according to the latest edition of their book Intuitive Eating: A Revolutionary Anti-Diet Approach, aims to free people of chronic dieting and help them rediscover the pleasure of eating. It involves 10 principles, including rejecting the diet mentality, honouring your hunger and making peace with food. Anti-diet dietitians like Christy Harrison and Ayana Habtemariam have joined the movement.

In the past, eating was never intuitive for me. Building a meal plan to keep organized or save money always required consulting the Internet, rather than just asking myself what I wanted and what made me feel good to eat. It was never a decision I made in collaboration with myself, and after years of chronic dieting, I didn’t even know what I really liked or disliked. I didn’t know how to make these decisions from a place of trust in my body. I posed questions to the Internet that only I could answer for myself.

When I started to follow the 10 principles, I admit I was afraid of gaining weight. A part of me even wished this intuitive eating technique would help me lose weight, but I knew there was a possibility it wouldn’t.

I had to be okay with that. What I wanted more was not to take any food groups or specific items off the table, ever. I hoped it would improve my anxiety, my selfesteem and my overall happiness. Lo and behold, it did.

Being able to cook all my meals at home helped me slow down and ref lect on my restrictive eating patterns. I experimented with keeping foods I used to binge on in my cupboards, which went completely against a previously learned weight-loss trick: If it’s not in the house, you won’t eat it. As it turns out, trusting myself to have foods typically seen as “bad” in my kitchen released me from the intense, insatiable cravings I used to get. Knowing the formerly forbidden foods were there, whenever I felt like eating them, was a freedom I’d never experienced before.

I stopped tricking myself into enjoying substitutes like caulif lower rice and zucchini noodles, and ate things like sticky coconut rice soaked in delicious green curry and angel hair pasta covered in homemade bolognese. For the first time in my life, I started cooking with butter. I watched cooking shows and flipped through cookbooks, allowing myself the joy of recreating the indulgent, rich meals that caught my eye, without analyzing their nutritional benefits or macronutrients. Everything really is better with butter.

L i ke ma ny people, despite keepi ng active, I’ve gained weight during quarantine. I feel it in my arms, I see it in my face.

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For a while, I struggled to look at myself during Zoom calls. But I’ve learned that having a bit of extra weight and a few pieces of clothing that no longer fit me is nothing compared to the agony of constant dieting and not being able to enjoy foods I love without the fear of getting bigger.

Before this experience, I thought this new way of life could lead to weight loss.

In the back of my mind, I still hoped that once I began eating intuitively, my natural body weight would be less than what it is.

I’ve had to reckon with that not being the

case, and now, depending on the day, I feel mostly okay about it. Sure, I could be smaller, but that would require going back to the way I lived before—and that’s a place I have no interest in going to.

I’ve gained a lot more than weight—like the freedom from restriction and the space in my life to think about more important things. I’ll leave this lockdown with new stretch marks on my stomach and my arms. They’re reminders that I let myself expand into the world with the intention of loving myself more.

Crash Course INTUITIVE EATING 101 Vincci Tsui, a Calgary-based dietitian and certified intuitive eating counsellor, breaks down the “anti-diet diet.”

What sets intuitive eating apart from a diet?

It isn’t a set of guidelines as to what or how much you’re supposed to eat. Some people frame it as a change of mindset around food: It’s about getting people attuned to their inner wisdom when it comes to making choices around food. One person eating intuitively could look completely different from someone else who is also eating intuitively.

The problem with some of the diets out there is that they make an assumption about you or only consider certain factors around food, like calorie count. The reality is that food, our bodies and our experiences are much more complex than that.

Who do you work with?

I do see a lot of people who struggle with disordered eating. When they’re following someone

else’s rules, people with eating disorders lose that connection to what they themselves truly need.

For some people, it’s about figuring out what they need and what satisfies them when it comes to food, and that allows them to seek out what they truly need in other areas of their lives as well.

I also work with a lot of folks who might have read or heard about intuitive eating and want to know how it could fit in their lives. Having individual support to make the principles of intuitive eating fit is important. That’s the main job of a counsellor.

Does intuitive eating work for everyone?

I honestly think the vast majority of people can integrate some of the principles of intuitive eating into what they’re doing.

We really don’t have to label it. Rejecting diet culture— I think everyone can do that.

The most important thing is eating in a way that makes you feel good. —Rebecca Gao

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շ What Has the Pandemic Done to My Body?

This is ourselves— under pressure.

By Bee Quammie

Throughout the pandemic, one voice has reverberated through the corridors of my mind. My mother, a nurse for 30-plus years—who retired at the end of 2019 and then went right back to work at a COVID19 testing centre in March 2020—has always said “stress will make you sick.” She told me that when I was an anxious child chasing perfection, when I was a new mom chasing perfection and now, during the pandemic (I’ve dropped the perfectionism but still hang on to the stress).

Throughout my life, stress has almost always found a path from the internal to the external: teeth grinding, appetite loss, dizzy spells. Living under the weight of the pandemic for more than a year has been no different for me—or for nearly everyone I’ve spoken with. Here are some ways stress can present itself physically and what to expect when it finally begins to subside.

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Sleep issues I did some informal research on Twitter by asking Canadian women what pandemic stress has done to their bodies. An overwhelming number of people chimed in about the toll it’s taken on their sleep. For many, insomnia became a constant compa n ion. O t hers st a r ted finding they had a very difficult time waking up. Another common response was that their dreams (or nightmares) were extremely vivid and upsetting.

Pandemic sleep disruption is so common that neurologists have actually coined a term for it: COVID-somnia.

“Almost all my clients have reported sleeping problems or sleep disturbances,” says Roxanne Francis, a psychotherapist and corporate consultant ba sed i n Aja x, Ont. “ When we are faced with a stressful situation, our bodies release the hormones adrenalin and cortisol.” Adrenalin prepares our bodies for a fight-or-flight response, while cortisol helps out by reducing the bodily functions that aren’t a priority during that response. As Francis explains, when stress occurs over a prolonged period, the fight-or-flight system is always activated and these hormones are continuously released. “It becomes difficult to fall asleep, thanks to increased blood pressure and heart rate, increased energy and poor digestion.”

Good sleep hygiene—how we prepare for sleep and create an optimal sleep environment—is critical for healthy sleep at all times, but especially during periods of stress. Journalling, doing light exercise and limiting screen time at least one hour before bed sound like simple steps, but they can make a big d i f ference—a nd t hey ’re great habits to continue after a difficult time. Managing stress will help turn off that constant fight-or-f light response, reset your hormone levels and lead to even better sleep.

Teeth grinding I started grinding my teeth in my sleep as a teen—my family could hear me doing it from outside my bedroom, and I woke every morning with incessant jaw pain and headaches.

My dentist eventually fitted me with a (very sexy) mouthguard, but I admittedly have not kept up with wearing it. Throughout the pandemic, my teeth grinding has returned with more regularity, and I often don’t realize I’m clenching my jaw until I read one of those tweets reminding you to unclench and drink some water.

A March 2021 survey from the American Dental Association found that 70 percent of dentists saw an increase in patients dealing with teeth grinding and jaw clenching during the pandemic. For relief, the Canadian JUNE/JULY 2021

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Do I smell different now?

It might have something to do with your microbiome.

Raise your hand if working from home is making you smell… different. Not good, not bad—just different. While most of the evidence is anecdotal, it’s possible that this change in scent is thanks to your microbiome. Our skin is teeming with microorganisms like bacteria and fungi, and we’re used to exchanging these micro-organisms with other people at work and school, in social settings and on transit. Since we started keeping six feet apart from the rest of the world, the diversity of microbes we’re encountering has gone down dramatically. So if you’re smelling a little off lately, it might be because your body is missing out on those interesting microbes from strangers.—Rebecca Gao BESTHEALTHMAG.CA

D ent a l A s s o c i at ion re commends applying a cold or warm compress to your jaw, massaging your jaw and relaxing your mouth (lips barely touching, teeth apart, tongue resting on the roof of your mouth). If none of that works, you might be in the running for a (very sexy) mouthguard, like me.

Reproductive issues When I put out my investigative tweet about women and their

ILLUSTRATIONS BY AUDREY MALO

stress responses, I was struck by how many saw weight gain in their lower abdomen during the pandemic—and then were diagnosed with fibroids. Uterine fibroids can be relatively unnoticeable or can grow to the point where they cause heav y men st r ua l bleed i ng, abdominal pain and fertility issues. While stress is a known contributor to increased uterine fibroid pain, studies have also shown a correlation between

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շ chronic psychological stress and fibroid onset, particularly for Black women.

Stress has done a number on people’s periods too. Science shows that cortisol (the hormone our bodies create under stress) can affect the hypothalamus, the part of your brain that controls your menstrual cycle.

Cor tisol f looding the hy pothalamus can lead to lighter or late periods—or no periods at all, called amenorrhea. Dr. Oliv ia Rose, a naturopath ic doctor in Toronto, adds that chronic psychological stress and elevated cortisol can disrupt the communication pathway between the brain and the adrenal glands, where stress hormones are produced. “That leads to fluctuations in progesterone and estrogen levels, which could possibly affect the g row th of uterine f ibroids,” she says. “Research has also shown that an increase in [the stress hormone] norepinephr i ne c a n le ad to t he development of ovarian cysts and missed periods.”

If you’re absolutely sure you aren’t pregnant, a thyroid function, ovary function or prolactin test can pinpoint the exact cause and plan of treatment to get your cycle back on track.

General stress management c a n h e lp re a l i g n you r h ormones, Rose says. “I encourage my patients to eat a balanced diet, which may include cutting back on caffeine and alcohol intakes, especially when stressed. Exercise and meditation are also helpful.” Once your stress levels have lowered, stress-related amenorrhea can resolve itself, letting your periods return.

Greying hair Part of folks’ pandemic stress has been around their limited access to skilled hairstylists, leaving some of us to DIY it while others rock their hair as is. Many could relate when CTV National News anchor Lisa LaFlamme chose to let her grey roots grow in. Greys appear when your hair follicles stop

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WTF Is WFH Doing to My Back? producing pigment, and one of the most common predictors of your greying pattern is actually genetics. While a 2020 study did show that acute stress in mice leads to accelerated greying of the fur, for humans, the verdict is still out.

One thing stress can do is cause a condition called telogen eff luvium, which causes hair to shed at around three times the normal rate. This ex pl a i n s why ju st a s m a ny women told me about t heir hair loss as they did about their g reys. The good news w it h stress-related telogen ef f luvium is that it does not cause permanent balding, so your h a i r sh ou ld s top sh e dd i n g after about six months. And the good news with greying is that you can always choose to embrace it or dye it—whatever brings you the least stress.

More than a year after working from home became the norm, many of us are still doing our jobs remotely—and wrecking our backs in the process. Our postures and habits probably weren’t great to begin with, but WFH “immediately intensified the situation with even worse ergonomics, and problems surfaced real fast,” says David Koivuranta, owner of Toronto Neck and Back Pain Clinic.

One of the biggest culprits is the laptop: While desktop computers encourage us to position ourselves for good ergonomics, a laptop pretty much always leads to strain, no matter how you slice it. “If the monitor is high enough, your shoulders and upper back are strained,” says Koivuranta. And if your shoulders are comfortable, he says, you’re likely looking down more, which is going to be a problem for your neck and can trigger headaches. The easiest fix is to turn your laptop into a desktop: Invest in a separate mouse and keyboard, and raise your laptop to eye level.

We’ve also lost normal bits of daily movement—the commute, walking to your co-worker’s desk for a chat—making us more sedentary and leading to an increase in back pain. To counteract this, take frequent micro-breaks, which negate the effects of sedentary work, says Koivuranta. He suggests doing “yoga for cheaters”: Work through your favourite poses quickly, in 60 to 90 seconds. Frequent small breaks are actually more effective for reversing the effects of a sedentary lifestyle than cramming in a major workout twice a week.

Whether these changes will fix your back pain in the long run depends on individual factors, including underlying medical problems, how healthy and active you are and how long you’ve been slouching over your desk. But if you’re generally healthy and this is a temporary work set-up, these small changes can help prevent future pain, improve your posture and lead to recovery. —Rebecca Gao JUNE/JULY 2021

Will My Butt Ever Bounce Back?

Are my eyes getting worse?

Optometrist Naomi Kong explains.

“The pandemic has absolutely been hard on our eyes. More screen time and fewer breaks have resulted in digital eye strain, dryness, overall irritability and just blinking a lot less. Farsighted people who didn’t have noticeable prescriptions are becoming more symptomatic, and prescriptions in nearsighted people are increasing. But the 20/20/20 rule can help: Every 20 minutes, take a 20-second break and look at something 20 feet away. It relaxes your eyes and promotes active blinking, which is really beneficial.”

A partial list of pandemic problems and how to fix ’em.

What's wrong: Your glutes forgot how to function.

What happened: Sitting at a desk for far too long causes the muscles in your butt to weaken, so they no longer stabilize your hips and pelvis. The result is a condition called (yes) gluteal amnesia, though doctors might call it by its far more memorable name—dead butt syndrome.

What to do: Moving your butt (so it remembers its function!) helps. So does doing 15 glute bridges, a popular yoga pose.

system. You might be pooping less frequently or pooping with more effort.

What to do: Drink plenty of water and stock up on highfibre foods like avocados, leafy greens, whole grains and beans.

Also, get up and move every day.

What's wrong: You've got quarantine constipation.

What happened: Persistent stress, poor sleep, lack of exercise and changes in eating—aka the stay-at-home special—disrupts your colon, while excess sitting compresses your abdomen and jams up your digestive

What's wrong: You can't walk without stabbing pain.

What happened: You irritated your plantar fascia, the tissue that connects your heel to toes along the bottom of your foot. A common running injury, plantar fasciitis also results from walking around barefoot or in socks, which puts more stress on your arches, tendons and ligaments.

What to do: Slip on your shoes at home for a portion of the day— they’ll provide arch support and a solid base to help your feet work less hard.

JLab Audio Go Air Lightweight and easy to wear, these affordable wireless earbuds are sweat-resistant too, if you’re struck by the sudden urge to go for a midday run. $40, staples.ca

PuroBasic Wired Headphones These neon-coloured volumelimiting headphones for kids have soft, adjustable ear cups that can make home-school far more comfy. $46, bestbuy.ca

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Which headphones will make my ears hurt less?

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Jabra Elite 85h These headphones provide proper noise cancellation with a comfortable over-the-ear fit—and they’re water-resistant, in case of any desk spills. $350, jabra.ca

ILLUSTRATIONS BY AUDREY MALO

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In her new cookbook, Hot for Food All Day, Lauren Toyota shows that vegan recipes can be seriously delicious— and super simple to make. Here are four tasty places to start.

Easy Brussels Sprouts Pasta

Excerpted from Hot for Food All Day

by Lauren Toyota.

Copyright © 2021

by Lauren Toyota.

Published by Penguin Canada, a division of Penguin Random House Canada Limited. Reproduced by arrangement with the Publisher.

All rights reserved.

MAKES 4 SERVINGS This pasta has always been a tried-and-true go-to.

I usually just eyeball the whole thing, so I’m glad it’s finally documented and can become part of your regular rotation too! The sauce is light and simple, using shallot, garlic, white wine, lemon juice and zest, nutritional yeast, and pasta water.

Don’t overcook your Brussels, because you want them bright and bursting with colour. A cast-iron pan is best for preparing this dish to get that beautiful char on the Brussels that other pans just won’t produce.

1 package (14 oz/400 g) linguine ½ cup raw walnuts 3-4 tablespoons olive oil, divided 1 pound Brussels sprouts, trimmed and halved

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½ cup sun-dried tomatoes (not oil packed), thinly sliced ¼ cup finely chopped shallot (about 1 shallot) 2 tablespoons minced garlic (3 or 4 large cloves) 2 teaspoons fresh thyme ⅓ cup dry white wine 2 tablespoons nutritional yeast 2 tablespoons lemon juice (about 1 lemon) 1-2 teaspoons lemon zest (about 1 lemon) Sea salt and ground black pepper, to taste ½ cup shredded vegan Parmesan, for garnish

Step 1 Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Cook the linguine to al dente.

Reserve ¼ cup of the pasta cooking water and set aside. Drain the pasta, but do not rinse.

Step 2 While the pasta is cooking, heat a large cast-iron pan

PHOTOGRAPH BY VANESSA HEINS

over medium-high heat and toast the walnuts for 4 to 5 minutes, until fragrant.

Remove the walnuts from the pan and remove the pan from the heat to cool.

Coarsely chop the walnuts and set aside.

Step 3 Heat the same pan over medium heat with 2 tablespoons of the olive oil.

Add the Brussels sprouts cut side down and spread out into an even layer.

Cook for 3 to 4 minutes without touching to allow them to get nicely browned.

Toss once so the other side gets colour, and cook for another 2 to 3 minutes.

Transfer the Brussels to a dish and set aside.

Step 4 Lower the heat to mediumlow and ensure the skillet isn’t too hot from browning the Brussels. If the pan is very dry, you can add another drizzle of olive oil or a bit of stock or water to the pan. Sauté the sundried tomatoes, shallot, garlic, and thyme. Stir to combine well and cook for another 3 to 4 minutes, tossing occasionally and adjusting the heat as necessary so the garlic doesn’t burn.

Step 5 Add the wine and simmer for another 3 to 4 minutes, tossing occasionally. Add the nutritional yeast, lemon juice, lemon zest, and remaining 1 tablespoon olive oil. Toss to combine and cook for another 2 to 3 minutes.

Step 6 Add the linguine and toss everything until well combined. If the mixture looks dry, you can add the reserved pasta water and toss to combine. Toss the walnuts and Brussels back in, along with the sea salt and black pepper to taste.

Serve immediately, garnished with the vegan Parmesan.

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All-Green Fresh Rolls With Green Curry Dipping Sauce MAKES 10 ROLLS I fell in love

with the simplicity of fresh rolls when travelling in Bali.

They’re on every menu, and they all taste amazing!

It might just be the tropical heat that makes them taste so good, but I ate my weight in rolls. It was on my agenda to master making them at home, and I decided that filling them with lots of crunchy green stuff would be the game plan. I love that these are all green because, let’s face it, most of my best recipes are brown, so it’s nice to change things up!

Even if you can’t quite get the hang of rolling them on your first go, it all tastes the same in the end. And just wait until you get that creamy green curry dipping sauce in your mouth. It’s fantastic!

GREEN CURRY DIPPING SAUCE (MAKES ABOUT ¾ CUP) ½ cup canned coconut cream ¼ cup tightly packed fresh cilantro 2 tablespoons green curry paste 2 large garlic cloves 2 tablespoons lime juice (about 1 lime) 1 tablespoon seasoned rice vinegar 1 teaspoon granulated sugar ¼ teaspoon sea salt Pinch chili flakes (optional) FRESH ROLLS 10 dried rice paper sheets 5 large green leaf lettuce leaves (ribs removed), torn in half 2 avocados, sliced ½ English cucumber, ribboned with a peeler 1½ cups sugar snap peas 1½ cups packed microgreens or sprouts 1½ cups fresh mint leaves 1½ cups fresh basil leaves 1½ cups fresh cilantro leaves

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Step 1 To make the green curry sauce, in a high-powered blender, add the coconut cream, cilantro, green curry paste, garlic, lime juice, vinegar, sugar, sea salt, and chili flakes. Blend until very smooth. Transfer to a small saucepan and bring to a low simmer, cooking about 2 to 4 minutes, until slightly thicker and reduced.

Step 2 Once all your vegetables are prepped for the fresh rolls, fill a wide shallow dish that’s slightly larger than the rice paper sheets with tepid water so you can soak the whole sheet. Soak one rice paper sheet at a time, for 10 to 20 seconds. You still want to feel the cross-hatch pattern on the surface of the rice sheets. Don’t oversoak or it will be too soft and difficult to roll.

Step 3 Assemble the rolls one at a time. Lay the wet rice paper sheets on a work surface. Add a piece of the lettuce and divide the avocado, cucumber, snap peas, microgreens or sprouts, and fresh herbs among the sheets in whatever order you like.

Roll one side of the rice paper over the filling, tucking it in as you start rolling again and also folding the sides in. Continue rolling until completely sealed.

Place on a plate or cut in half if you prefer.

Step 4 Serve with the green curry dipping sauce.

Leftover dipping sauce will get thick from refrigeration.

Add a teaspoon of water at a time to thin it out until it’s a smooth, dippable consistency.

Sloppy Joe Zucchini Boats MAKES 8 BOATS Sure, you can make this sloppy joe filling and eat it on a soft kaiser, but that’s so basic.

I want to give you a healthier option so you can eat even more sloppy joe stuff. You can round out these zucchini boats with garlic bread or rice on the side and serve as a meal. Or, if you’re too lazy to prep the zucchini altogether, just pour the sloppy joe mixture into an oven-safe dish, top with the vegan cheese shreds, and bake for 20 minutes until melty! Serve with slices of garlic toast for dipping for a perfect last-minute party appie.

4 large zucchini 3 tablespoons olive oil, divided 1 cup finely chopped white or yellow onion (about 1 onion)

1 cup finely diced green bell pepper (about 1 pepper) 2 tablespoons coconut sugar or light brown sugar 2 tablespoons gluten-free tamari or low-sodium soy sauce 1 tablespoon minced garlic (about 2 large cloves) 2 teaspoons vegan beefflavoured bouillon base or 2 cubes 2 teaspoons chili powder 2 teaspoons onion powder 1 teaspoon smoked paprika 1 teaspoon sea salt 1 teaspoon ground black pepper 1 package (13.7 oz/390 g) veggie ground round (about 3 cups) 2 cups canned crushed fire-roasted tomatoes ¼ cup vegan Worcestershire 2 cups mixed vegan cheese shreds (1 cup each mozzarella and Cheddar) 3 tablespoons Italian-style bread crumbs

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Step 1 Cut each zucchini in half lengthwise. Use a paring knife to score around the inside edge about ¼ inch from the sides, being careful not to cut through the zucchini. Use a spoon to carefully scoop out the flesh. Save the zucchini flesh for another use.

Step 2 Take 1 tablespoon of the oil and brush both sides of the zucchini boats with a light layer. Arrange the zucchini halves side by side on a large baking sheet with the hollowed parts facing up.

Step 3 In a large nonstick pan, heat the remaining 2 tablespoons of oil over medium heat.

Add the onion and green pepper, and sauté for 3 minutes. Add the coconut sugar, tamari, garlic, bouillon base, chili powder, onion powder, smoked paprika, sea salt, and black pepper, and cook for another 2 minutes. Add the ground round, crushed tomatoes, and Worcestershire, stir to combine, and cook for another 5 to 6 minutes. Cover the pan, lower the heat to medium-low, and cook for 20 minutes, until reduced, thick, and darker brown.

Step 4 Preheat the oven to 425°F. Step 5 Spoon the sloppy joe mixture generously into the zucchini boats, piling the mixture above the edges.

Top with the vegan cheese shreds and sprinkle the bread crumbs evenly on top of each. Bake for 35 minutes, until the zucchini is tender and the cheese is melted. Broil for 3 to 5 minutes to crisp up the top, if necessary.

In praise of prepackaged vegan products ֑ We’ve come a long way with vegan convenience products, and it makes me joyful!

Bottom line: I use them.

Do I use them all the time in every meal?

No. But I use them in this cookbook. How often you make and eat things is your own damn business. But I stand behind the vegan food products at the grocery store because, at the end of the day, ain’t nobody got time to make every single thing from scratch. Find and support the brands you love—below are just a few of my favourites.

Vegan cheese is so good. If you’ve been scared to try it, know that it’s better than it’s ever been! If you can only find slices, you can just shred the whole stack on a box grater. Daiya has a line of shreds called the Cutting Board Collection that melts and tastes amazing.

For slices, I like Follow Your Heart/Earth Island, Field Roast Chao Slices and Violife.

Vegan deli slices are what they sound like: meatless deli slices! I usually use the Tofurky brand slices myself.

Veggie ground round is a meatless ground beef substitute. There are plenty on the market, so find your fave and use it!

Soy curls are the best thing ever. Really the only kind I’ve ever seen is a brand called Butler Soy Curls. You can easily order it online rather than running around to a ton of stores and searching the shelves.

Frozen french fries and tater tots are vegan—hallelujah!

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Baked Peanut Butter & Jam Oat Bars

with the thickened flax meal mixture until smooth. Add this to the mixing bowl of dry ingredients and fold together until fully combined.

MAKES 16 BARS I don’t want

to knock oatmeal—it’s filling and healthy—but I’m not the biggest fan of mushy porridge for breakfast. I make it ’cause it’s quick, but with a little planning, you can bake that oatmeal with peanut butter into a bar dolloped with your fave jam...now we’re talking. These are just the right amount of soft and chewy, and make another great grab ’n’ go brekky.

1 tablespoon golden flax meal 3 tablespoons water 2 cups gluten-free rolled oats (not quick cooking) 1 cup gluten-free all-purpose flour 1 cup coconut sugar ¼ cup tapioca flour (can substitute arrowroot flour) 1 tablespoon baking powder 1 teaspoon sea salt 1 cup natural crunchy or smooth peanut butter ¾ cup nondairy milk 1 tablespoon vanilla extract ¼ cup favourite jam

Step 1 Preheat the oven to 350°F. Line an 8 by 8-inch baking pan with parchment paper by cutting two strips both 8 inches wide and crossing them in the pan to create clean edges. Trim the excess overhang, if needed.

Step 2 Combine the flax meal and water, and set aside to thicken, 5 to 10 minutes.

Step 5 Spread the mixture evenly into the baking pan all the way to the edges. Take a dough cutter or knife and lightly score or mark every 2 inches across in each direction, creating the indented lines for 16 square bars. Do not cut through the pan of oat bars at this stage.

Step 6 Dollop about ½ teaspoon of jam on top of each square and gently press it with the back of the teaspoon into the top of each bar.

Step 7 Bake for 25 minutes, until the edges are golden brown and the bars look soft and raised.

Cool in the baking pan on a wire rack for 20 minutes before lifting out by the parchment paper edges and placing onto the wire rack.

Slice bars where you made the scores.

Step 8 Cool completely before storing leftovers in the fridge.

You can warm slightly in the microwave for 30 seconds before eating. Consume within 7 days.

HOT TIP If you don’t require

these to be gluten-free, then you can use rolled oats that aren’t specifically labelled as such, and you can substitute 1¼ cups of all-purpose flour for the GF and tapioca flours.

Step 3 In a large mixing bowl, combine the rolled oats, allpurpose flour, coconut sugar, tapioca flour, baking powder, and sea salt.

Step 4 In a large liquid measuring cup or another mixing bowl, combine the peanut butter, nondairy milk, and vanilla

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“Made you look.

And yes, I’m wearing Always Discreet.”

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Always Discreet Boutique Underwear. Fits close. Keeps you dry, too. © 2020 P&G

Goods

45 Ways to Create an Outdoor Oasis

by RENÉE REARDIN photographs by SUECH and BECK

Mix popsicle-bright throw pillows on outdoor seating for colour and comfort.

1. Oui Outdoor Pillow Broken Stripe Tiger Lily, $40, chapters.indigo.ca 2. Rust Toned Fringed Outdoor Cushion, $30, homesense.ca 3. Red Floral Patterned Outdoor Cushion, $30, homesense.ca 4. Oui Outdoor Pillow Broken Stripe Black & White, $35, chapters.indigo.ca 5. Oui Outdoor Pillow Broken Stripe Washed Indigo Multi, $40, chapters.indigo.ca 6. Oui Outdoor Pillow Mini Flange Sunflower, $40, chapters.indigo.ca 7. Long Green Outdoor Cushion, $25, homesense.ca 8. Shibori Outdoor Lumbar Cushion, $30, homesense.ca

Embrace your inner maximalist: Stripes and solids, trims and fringe, and florals and tiedye all add cheer to summer days.

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STYLING BY FRANNY ALDER

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Sitting Pretty 1. A bucket keeps your family’s drinks ice-cold. Canvas Oval Outdoor Party Tub, $20, canadiantire.ca 2. Turn your garden accessories into statement pieces with a few metallic stunners, like this bronze watering can. Dansk Watering Can, $70, eq3.com 3. Swap your standard tree pot for something with more texture.

Baba Tree Drum Basket, $125, and Bala Tree Drum Baskets, $100$125, goodeeworld.com 4. These insulated tumblers will keep your rosé chilled as you sip in the sun. Oui Insulated Wine Bottle & Tumblers Set Spiral (set of 3), $50, chapters.indigo.ca

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5. Play your favourite tunes on this splashproof Bluetooth speaker.

Tykho 3 Bluetooth Speaker with FM Radio, $100, 313designmarket.com

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6. This sandalwoodscented candle will make your apartment balcony smell like a lakeside escape.

Cottage | Mahogany + Coconut + Sandalwood, $35, malathebrand.com

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7. This terrazzo pot is a pretty home for your favourite plant.

Archie Pot, $93, 313designmarket.com 8. Turn your terrace into a French bistro with these wicker pieces, perfect for a morning espresso or cinq-à-sept aperitif. Bee & Willow Home Nantucket Wicker Stacking Chair, $100, bedbathandbeyond.ca, and wicker stool, $80, homedepot.ca

֒ԡA small balcony or front porch can feel like a lush escape with loungey chairs and greenery.

BESTHEALTHMAG.CA

STYLING BY FRANNY ALDER

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Blanket Statements These vibrant beach towels are perfect for picnicking in your backyard or the park. 1. Destination Summer Sunny Isles Turkish Cotton Towel in Warm Stripe, $17, bedbathandbeyond.ca 2. Oui Reversible Beach Towel Cabana Stripe, $35, chapters.indigo.ca 3. Honeycomb Velour Beach Towel, $25, bedbathandbeyond.ca 4. Destination Summer Palm Wave Beach Towel, $17, bedbathandbeyond.ca A light and airy throw is a smart piece to have on-hand to give your skin a break from the sun and stay warm post-sunset. 5. Ivory + Charcoal Textured Throw with Tassels, $35, homesense.ca A woven area rug brings texture to your outdoor space.

6. IKEA Morum rug, $150, ikea.com Add extra blooms to your garden with a floral rug, perfect to brush off feet by an entryway or to pair with a bistro set.

7. Easy Care Abstract Floral Indoor/Outdoor Accent Rug, $39, bedbathandbeyond.ca

Take Cover 1. This dreamy chair is begging to become the hero of your reading nook. Wicker Teardrop Chair with Water Resistant Cushions, $380, homesense.ca 2. Mix prints into your space with these cushions, which will complement your backyard’s greenery. Rox Creative Green Dream Cushion Collection set, $140, roxcreative.ca 3. A warm blanket will keep you cozy on brisk mornings. Herring Throw, $120, eq3.com

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4. Add a statement vase to your plant lineup.

White Minimalist Face Vase, $17, homesense.ca 5. Crack open a fantastic summer read—or five.

Swimming Back to Trout River by Linda Rui Feng, The Book of Difficult Fruit by Kate Lebo, Crying in H Mart

by Michelle Zauner, The Five Wounds by Kristen Valdez Quade and When Justice Sleeps

by Stacey Abrams, $25 –$38, available at local booksellers.

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6. These glass lanterns work just as well outside as in. Norr Lantern, $44, vdevmaison.com Oui Metal & Glass Lantern Gerbera Daisy Small, $40, chapters.indigo.ca

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7. Liven up your deck with a printed rug.

Black Diamond 5x7 Indoor/Outdoor Rug, $80, homesense.ca 8. Mix and match outdoor herb and plant pots in colours like white, black and clay. Herb Pots, $9, and Palm Pots, $25, eq3.com

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֒ԡThis IKEA rug (6) is water-resistant and easy to brush clean, making it a fuss-free outdoor pick.

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Bright Side

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1. This throw acts as a bold backdrop to al fresco dining.

Dusen Dusen Knit Throw, $255, 313designmarket.com 2. Leave your phone inside and reach for an instant camera instead. Fujifilm Instax Mini 11 Instant Camera, $90, chapters.indigo.ca 3. With a bold hue and an ombré fade, these patio-safe glasses are pretty picks for serving fruit-filled sangria, smoothies, and anything else you need to beat the heat. Canvas Drink Set (set of 8), $30, canadiantire.ca

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4. Polypropylene plates and bowls are poolside-safe and kid-friendly. Kalas plates (set of 6) and bowls (set of 6), $2 per set, ikea.com 5. Handcrafted by Colombian artisans, these plaid place mats punch up a table setting. Ames Jipi Plate Mat (set of 6), $100, goodeeworld.com 6. Wooden rings will make sure your napkins aren’t carried away by a breeze. Siafu Home Napkin Rings (set of 6), $100, goodeeworld.com 7. Go the sustainable route with reusable cotton napkins, like these printed picks with scalloped trim.

Siafu Home Congolese Napkin (set of 6), $100, goodeeworld.com

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8. Speaking of sustainable options, these bamboo plates are an eco-friendly alterative to disposable ones.

Poketo Bamboo Dinner Plates (set of 4), $63, 313designmarket.com

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֐ԡThis cotton throw measures 127 x 178 cm— big enough for a family picnic, or for everyone to pile under after the sun sets.

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Made from organic bamboo fibre and cornstarch, these doodlecovered plates are also shatterproof and dishwashersafe.

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In Full Swing 1. Socially distanced s’mores are still super tasty, so stock up and gather guests around this wood-burning fire pit. Cast Iron Wood Burning Fire Pit, $100, homesense.ca 2. This tranquil hammock will entice you to dive into your favourite read— or just take an extended siesta. Vivere Brazilian Hammock Chair, $74, homedepot.ca 3. A citrusy pillow adds extra comfort to your swing while brightening up your outdoor space.

Oui Outdoor Pillow Citrus Branches Tiger Lily, $40, chapters.indigo.ca 4. Pour your coffee or tea into this mug and come out for a mid-afternoon break from your screen.

Abstract Mug, $14, vdevmaison.com 5. This floral tray makes it easy to carry your treats and sips from inside out. Oui Tray Summer Floral Citrus $25, chapters.indigo.ca 6. Lend a glow to your outdoor oasis with solar-powered lamps, which’ll help boost the atmosphere and protect the planet.

Solvinden, $18–$25 ikea.com

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WENTING LI

FOOD STYLING BY DARA SUTIN; PROP STYLING BY STACEY SMITHERS

POOL FLOATS. POPSICLE MOULDS. SUNSCREEN PICKS AND BARBECUE TIPS. WE’VE GOT EVERYTHING YOU NEED TO KEEP YOUR CHILL.

GO JUMP IN A LAKE. YES, EVEN THAT LAKE. How I learned to love swimming in Lake Ontario.

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T EX ACTLY 11:07 P.M. on September 8, 1954, a 16-year-old named Marilyn Bell took off from a log retaining wall in Youngstown, New York, and started swimming home to Toronto. The water was a chilly 21°C. The waves were 15 feet high. Eels bit her stomach and legs in the darkness; she fought them off with her fists. By dawn, she had covered more than 20 kilometres. By 5 p.m., she had about six to go.

Pink flares cracked over the Canadian National Exhibition to guide her in, but the current kept pushing her west. Finally, a full 21 hours and 64 kilometres after leaving New York, Bell touched the concrete breakwater just off Toronto and entered the history books, becoming the first person to swim across Lake Ontario.

It was a big moment for Canada and the tenacity of teenage girls.

It was also a big moment for swimming in Lake Ontario, which

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lost a whole lot of its lustre by the time I was Bell’s age, not quite half a century later. Although Toronto has done heroic work since the 1970s to stop sewage overflow from reaching the water, and although our beaches are among the world’s cleanest, locals have held onto a nagging suspicion that something filthy lurks in the lake. It’s why, as an adult, despite living a quick walk from the shoreline, I stuck to the same outdoor city pools I grew up swimming in. My favourite remains the Sunnyside/Gus Ryder pool, a round-edged giant named after—who else?—Marilyn Bell’s male coach. (Okay, in fairness, he also taught thousands of kids to swim.)

So it was going to take a dramatic turn of events to get me anywhere near the open water—some combination of, oh, a global pandemic that suddenly made people and change rooms scary, plus a stay-at-home order that put nicer lakes out of reach, plus the northern hemisphere’s hottest summer on record, plus a devastating lack of AC in my house. At a spot near Ontario Place on an impossibly humid afternoon, coaxed in by the reassuring presence of couples and children, I couldn’t resist any longer: I waded in to my ankles, then my knees, then my hips. The water was cool and eel-free. I dropped my shoulders under the waves (face: still off limits) and started paddling. I was swimming in the lake.

It’s probably the only time that I—truly incapable of improving on a half-assed breaststroke—have ever had anything in common with elite swimmers. With indoor pools closed by COVID-19, they were forced to do their training in lakes. “After our move to open water, we saw a lot of creativity,” says Bette El-Hawary, the executive director of Swim Nova Scotia. Some coaches climbed into kayaks or onto paddleboards; the athletes would swim to them and back. “Other teams bought rope from Canadian Tire and pool noodles from the dollar store,” El-Hawary says, “to set up the lanes and make their own 50-metre pool.”

The swimmers liked the novelty of open-water training, but it was an adjustment for them too: Certain lakes had more aquatic life than others, the water might get choppy and visibility could be an issue. “There’s always some fear of the unknown,” ElHawary says. The training demanded more of the athletes, as well; out in the lake, there’s nothing to rest on. But that’s the challenge of swimming, says Liz Johnson, lead physiologist with the Canadian Sport Institute Pacific. “It’s really unique in the fact that there’s no coasting.”

Even in a lake hovering around 20°C, racers swimming against the drag of the water are going to generate a lot of heat. “Our resting core temperature is 37°C, and I’ve measured swimmers getting above 39.5°C, which is really warm, given the amount of heat lost to the open water,” Johnson says. What she hasn’t measured, though, is a thumping heart. That’s because hearts work differently in the water: Since we’re exercising in a more or less horizontal position, our hearts aren’t fighting against gravity to pump blood back to them. “Your heart rate when swimming is generally 10 to 15 beats lower per minute than when you’re doing something of similar intensity on land, like running or cycling,” Johnson says.

So open-water swimming might not feel like your typical workout. Open-water swimmers might not look like your typical athletes, either. It’s one of the few sports where body fat actually offers a competitive advantage, helping with buoyancy and performance. (If you float easily, you don’t have to work as hard to keep afloat.) Female marathon swimmers have comparatively more body fat than male marathon swimmers do—roughly 31 percent to 19, according to a 2014 Swiss study—and the longer the race, the more we excel. Lynne Cox set both the women’s and men’s world records for swimming the English Channel—twice.

In fact, in ultra-distance swims, even the average woman is faster than the average man. As Cox writes in her memoir, “Thank God (or Ben & Jerry’s) for my body fat.”

Our bodies are built to do well in the water. But the more I return to the lake, the better my mind does too. It’s the rare place

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The new aqua fit

Hot Tip

DRINK UP

Cool Move

FLOAT ON

Pineapple float, $15, indigo.com

HBC Stripes, $25, thebay.com

Stella & Finn lounger, $30, canadiantire.ca

Cactus float, $50, lowes.ca

S TA N D - U P PA D D L E BOARDING (SUP) A 2016 Australian study found that SUP newbies who paddled three times a week for just six weeks improved their VO2 max—a key indicator of aerobic endurance— by more than 23 percent.

And mastering that tippy board helps out of the water too: A 2018 Brazilian study found that older adults who tried SUP saw their balance improve on dry land.

CANOEING AND K AYA K I N G Sit-down paddling is, unsurprisingly, great for the upper body—for your trunk even more than your arms. Plus, paddling helps lift confidence: According to a study in the spectacularly named Journal of Leisurability, B.C. kayakers reported enhanced feelings of self-worth and satisfaction.

L I T E R A L LY JUS T CRUISING ON A P O O L F L O AT Don’t discount the advantages of being outdoors—one 2020 study found that spending as little as 10 minutes in a natural setting led to reduced stress, anxiety and anger, and increased energy. When we put our face in water, our heart rate slows and our parasympathetic nervous system—which helps us relax—dials up. And early research suggests that floating around can boost feelings of serenity, happiness and overall well-being.

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NOPE. BUT THE COUNTERPRESSURE OF THE WATER DOES, AHEM, BLOCK THE EXIT, WHICH PAUSES BLOOD FLOW—UNTIL YOU GET OUT OF THE WATER AGAIN.

where I can forget about the pandemic: I don’t need to remember a mask or anxiously calculate my distance from the nearest passing person, because there is no one around me. I can focus on the cold water lapping across my warm back as I dog-paddle forward or the extra kick in my legs that lets me travel a little further out. Everything else gets quiet.

El-Hawary has spent more summers than she can “When you swim in cold count swimming in Halifax’s lakes, but whenever water, you don't sweat she drops her towel at the boat launch and makes as much and your drive her way in, she finds the water different. “One day, to drink isn't as strong— I’m swimming against a headwind. The next, I’ve but you're still losing a got a tailwind. The next, there’s early-morning fog,” fair amount of fluids. she says. “I never have a plan, because the elements So hydration is really change all the time.” It’s another reason open-water important once you're swimming is the perfect way to stay cool in a panback on land.” demic summer. When each day remains stubbornly Liz Johnson, Canadian Sport Institute Pacific physiologist indistinguishable from the one before it, the lake still holds the promise of surprise.

BESTHEALTHMAG.CA

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BE F ORE YOU HE A D OU T S IDE There are a million facial sunscreens around, but Supergoop! Play Everyday Lotion [ 1 ] (from $29, sephora.ca) distinguishes itself with its SPF 50, mild scent and totally nongreasy texture.

(Though it rubs in easily, Supergoop! also makes an SPF 40 Unseen Sunscreen that’s completely clear on darker skin tones.) Tackle your body next with a liberal application of Coppertone Sport [ 2 ] ($14, well. ca), which is a classic for a reason: It’s reasonably priced, readily available and absorbs quickly into your skin, then stays put even if you break a sweat (from exercise or otherwise).

A SWEATY Gal'S GUIDE TO

WHILE YOU’RE IN THE SUN A sunscreen spray makes for easy top-ups, and Neutrogena’s Ultra Sheer Body Mist [ 3 ] ($15, loblaws.ca) works at any angle, meaning it’s considerably easier for solo sunners to reach their own backs. On the other (sweaty, slippery) hand, Shiseido

SUNSCREEN

You know the drill: You have to wear a broad-spectrum sunscreen that’s waterresistant with an SPF of at least 30. After that, though, there’s a whole wide world of choice out there—and it can be exceptionally hard to make decisions in this heat. We rounded SLAP A HAT ON up some quality picks that'll keep you protected.

SHADY CHARACTER HAT, $82, FREEPEOPLE.COM

JOANNA HAT, $60, CA.BRIXTON.COM

T3 COTTON DUCK HAT, $85, CA.TILLEY.COM

֏ The shelf life of sunscreen. Past that, it won’t protect you—but it will irritate your skin.

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GOLDIE STRAW HAT, $315, HEIRLOOMHATS.COM

COVERAGE

THREE YEARS

GOLD BUTTON SKIPPER CAP, $36, ZARA.COM

HAT ATTACK VISOR, $140, CLUBMONACO.COM

WASHED BASEBALL HAT, $30, GAPCANADA.CA

DRAMA

Ultimate Sun Protection Lotion [ 4 ] ($49, shop.shopperdrugmart.ca) claims it actually works better when exposed to water, heat and perspiration—something about negative ions in the formula combining with positive ions in sweat or water to form additional protection. We’re not entirely sure about that, but we do know it goes on light and dries to become invisible.

Blue Lizard Sensitive Mineral Sunscreen [ 5 ] ($15, amazon.ca) doesn’t have any chemicals, fragrances, irritants or oxybenzone, the common sunscreen ingredient shown to be damaging to coral reefs. What it does have, however, is very smart packaging: The plastic has been injected with a dye that’s sensitive to UV light, causing the tube cap to turn blue to remind you to reapply. And when you do, it’s also worth reaching for Baby Bum Mineral Sunscreen Face Stick [ 6 ] ($13, well.ca)—the easy-to-use solid stick is a great choice for sneaky spots like your scalp, especially the part in your hair.

A F T E R M I S TA K E S WERE MADE It can happen to the best of us. An elbow—or, okay, an entire right arm— somehow manages to escape your attention. Vichy Idéal Soleil After Sun Balm [ 7 ] ($27, vichy.ca) is packed with willow herb, a plant extract known for its soothing effects, and does wonders to prevent peeling and heal burns. And even if you haven’t scorched yourself, a day in the sun can be mighty drying to skin.

Coola’s Radical Recovery After-Sun Lotion [ 8 ] ($56, well.ca) is made with aloe vera—that post-sunshine staple—and sunflower oil, which is high in antioxidants, to restore moisture to parched skin.

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Why do we even sweat, anyway?

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STAY HYDRATED

$11, sephora.com

ENORMOUS INSULATED BOTTLE Yeti knows from comically large flasks, and the Rambler’s double-walled vacuum insulation will keep a whopping 1.36 L of water cool all day long. $70, yeti.com

BESTHEALTHMAG.CA

EVEN MORE ENORMOUS INFLATABLE SPRINKLER Connect a garden hose to this gentle giant—seriously, it’s nine feet tall—and water will shower over you straight from the giraffe’s mouth. $75, costco.ca

Dolphins speak.

Elephants paint.

Even spiders manage to use tools. But, in the end, humans do have an edge over animals: We’ve developed a hugely efficient way to control our body temperature. Dogs pant to cool down.

Seals pee on their flippers. All we have to do is sweat.

Humans have anywhere from 1.5 million to five million sweat glands.

As our temperature rises, our nervous system gets to work, stimulating those glands to release the salt water we have in our bodies, says Sarah Everts, the Ottawa-based author of The Joy of Sweat, out in July. “Our hot skin evaporates the sweat from our body, which whisks the heat away,” she says. “This trick— evaporative cooling— is what dogs do when they pant. They’re

evaporating water off their wet tongue.

We do it over our entire bodies.”

Not all of us sweat the same way— on a hot afternoon, certain people will be soaked through, while others, miraculously, will appear bone-dry.

Everts explains that those lucky ducks are sweating so efficiently that their sweat evaporates instantly. It’s still unclear exactly what’s responsible; it’s most likely a mix of genetics and where you grow up.

“People are born with all their sweat glands, but they only become fully active within the first couple years of your life,” she says. “Researchers wonder if climate dictates the activity of those glands.”

It’s not as though humans abhor all perspiration: Sweat lodge ceremonies are common around the world, and it can feel like a workout barely counts if we don’t break a sweat. But there's still stigma attached to a wet handshake or dark patches under a work shirt.

Enough. “Sweating is a fantastic temperature-control system and one of the things that makes us human,” Everts says. “So I think we need to stop giving sweat the side eye.”

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IT CAN ACTUALLY PUT YOU AT GREATER RISK, BECAUSE YOU MIGHT APPLY SUNSCREEN LESS OFTEN OR FORGO IT ALTOGETHER.

2

FACIAL MIST This minty-cool spray

by Mario Badescu is packed with cucumber, aloe and green tea.

Pro move: Let it chill in the fridge for maximum refreshment.

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Cool Move FREEZE ALL THE FRUIT

For too long, frozen fruit has suffered a bad rap—acceptable for a smoothie, sure, and maybe some muffins, but roundly considered to be fresh fruit’s lesser cousin. Here’s the thing, though: There’s zero nutritional difference between just-bought fruit and the frozen stuff. In fact, frozen fruit has more vitamins, minerals and nutrients than the fruit that’s been languishing on your counter for the past five days. It’s also the perfect ice cube, a dead-easy cocktail garnish and a refreshing snack on a sweaty afternoon.

Plus, TikTok swears that frozen mandarins taste just like sorbet, and we’re not about to argue with TikTok.

a hot grill. “If you like a rare steak, it’s about four to six minutes total, and mediumrare is six to eight minutes,” Burthwright says. Bringing that steak up to room temperature before chucking it on the grill will get you a more even cook.

A LAZY GaL'S GUIDE TO

GRILLING Jenny Burthwright knows her way around a grill: For the past nine years, she’s run Jane Bond BBQ, a Calgary restaurant that blends southern[1] style barbecue with THE CUT If the temperature i n f lu e n c e s f ro m outside remains solidly Burthwright’s own lodged in “holy @#$%&” Jamaican roots. She territory, you want to reach for a steak—it’s the gives us seven sizcut of meat that’ll allow zling ideas for super you to minimize your time hovering in front of easy grilling.

[2] THE RUB Mediocre sausages and bland chicken can be improved exponentially with a basic rub: Burthwright suggests playing around with the aromatic spices in her Jamaican mix, like allspice, cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger and thyme. “Since we can’t travel right now, it’s fun to get international,” she says.

[3] THE FISH “I’m a big fan of grilling whole fish like tilapia or catfish—it’s an awesome way to present a dish,” Burthwright says. The key is to get your heat high

N O S TA LG I C

NEW-FANGLED

MAKE YOUR OWN POPSICLES

Twin Pop Moulds, set of 6, $15, gourmetwarehouse.ca

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For Living Freezie Set, 4 pack, $10, canadiantire.ca

Tovolo Classic Pop Moulds, set of 5, $15, crateandbarrel.ca

Zoku Ring Pop Mould, set of 8, $27, well.ca

Lekue Tropical Ice Cream Mould Set, set of 4, $24, walmart.ca

to create a nice sear, and oil your fish to make sure it doesn’t stick. Lightly brushing the fish with mayo before it hits the grill sounds bizarre, but it can absolutely help. “Ever made a grilled cheese sandwich with mayo? Boom. Same concept, and it comes out perfect,” Burthwright says.

[4] THE CHAR Lettuce, meet fire.

Burthwright had a grilled Caesar salad on her menu that offered colossal flavour for comparatively little effort. “We cut a head of romaine in half, brushed it with roasted garlic butter and gave it a quick sear on the grill,” she says.

[5] THE SERIOUS CHAR If you’re looking for a vegetable that you can stick on your barbecue, completely forget about, char beyond recognition and still devour, look no further than the pepper.

“Put it on the grill whole; the blacker it gets, the better,” Burthwright says. “It almost braises itself, so when you open it up, there’s this sweet oil inside.”

[6] THE CROWD-PLE ASER Since it looks like socially distanced barbecues will still be a thing this summer— and since you’ve probably got some time on your hands—consider cooking a

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CAN I KEEP MOSQUITOS AWAY WITHOUT SLATHERING MYSELF IN STINKY REPELLENT? YES! AN ODOURLE

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prime rib roast to feed your guests. “You’ve got to go low and slow,” Burthwright says. “Plan for a good three to five hours, at least.” She cranks all her burners to heat up the grill and then turns off the right side, where she cooks her roast.

“You get that high-heat sear, and then you get circulation from the heat on the left side, turning your barbecue into an oven.”

[7] THE DESSERT You can throw peaches or pineapples straight on the grill, and everyone will be delighted. Or you can do what Burthwright does—cook those peaches or pineapples on the grill in a skillet seasoned with bacon fat—and everyone will be thrilled.

Hot Tip SLEEP BETTER IN AUGUST

“Our body temperature drops when we fall asleep at night, but being in a room that’s too hot interferes with our core temperature, which means we wake up often. You want to try to keep the room temperature consistent throughout the night—18 C tends to be ideal.

A very cold shower right before bed will also cool you down so you can enter that sleep state.” Dr. Katherine Rasmussen of Calgary’s Centre for Sleep and Human Performance

Chill out with a CBD cocktail

BY ALFRED SIU IN PARTNERSHIP WITH QUATREAU

SUNHIGH FIZZ 6 oz / 180 ml Quatreau Passionfruit & Guava Sparkling Water (half a can) 1½ oz / 45 ml habanero blood orange syrup 1 oz / 30 ml fresh lemon juice (from half a lemon) 1 egg white or 2 tbsp aquafaba (vegan option) Fresh lemon wheel

To make syrup, add 10 g deseeded habanero pepper to 100 ml blood orange juice (can be bought frozen) to saucepan, then add 100 g white sugar. Turn heat to medium and stir often to incorporate sugar quickly. Make sure it doesn’t boil (which will throw off the water balance). Once sugar has dissolved, turn off heat and steep for 30 minutes.

Strain habanero.

Syrup should be kept refrigerated, where it will last for 2 to 3 weeks.

Add habanero blood orange syrup, fresh lemon juice and egg white (or aquafaba) to cocktail shaker.

Add ice to fill shaker and shake hard for about 20 seconds.

Fine strain into 16 oz collins (or tall) glass with ice. Top off with Quatreau Passionfruit & Guava Sparkling Water.

Gently lift ice from bottom of glass

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with a bar spoon (or regular spoon) to incorporate ingredients.

Garnish with fresh lemon wheel and a recyclable or reusable straw.

Enjoy!

Serves 1 TIP! If you’re not into habaneros, you can substitute red bell pepper for the same flavour without the heat.

PASSION AND FUZZ 12 oz / 355 ml Quatreau Passionfruit & Guava Sparkling Water 3 fresh lemon wheels 5 thin slices ginger 1 oz / 30 ml honey syrup Lemon peel

To make syrup, combine three parts honey with one part water in a saucepan over medium heat.

Stir occasionally until blended, then leave to cool before using.

Add lemon wheels, ginger and honey syrup to a large glass. Give it a gentle muddle to release some juices.

Add Quatreau Passionfruit & Guava Sparkling Water.

Mix quickly, then top with ice cubes and garnish with lemon peel. Enjoy!

Serves 2

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S APORIZING DEVICE CALLED A SPATIAL REPELLENT (LIKE THE RADIUS FROM THERMACELL) PROTECTS A 225-SQUARE-FOOT AREA FROM BOTHERSOME BUGS. SV

UE

• ON B

N UR IN

SHE BLINDED ME WITH SCIENCE

In her books, her op-eds and her wildly popular Twitter feed, Dr. Jen Gunter helps women around the world separate vagina facts from vagina jade eggs.

Now she’s untangling that feared and misunderstood time: menopause.

BY KATE RAE ¬ PHOTOGRAPHS BY MICHELLE YEE

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Menopause has long been the punchline to a rambling joke about women’s health.

More recently, though, it has become a paycheque, with many companies and practitioners promising magical cures to cash in on our discomfort, anxiety and desperation.

Enter Dr. Jen Gunter. She devotes her social media presence 1 to tackling damaging myths about women’s health and taking down purveyors of “bullshit” solutions—Gwyneth and her vaginal steams very much included. Now the Canadianborn San Francisco-based ob-gyn hopes to make this phase of our lives more manageable, healthy and happy with her new book, The Menopause Manifesto 2 , which delivers history, feminism and stone-cold facts. Those pills, creams and fake tests you’ve been hawked? Time to chuck them in the trash.

Footnotes 1. @DrJenGunter, where she has more than 335K followers.

2. The Menopause Manifesto by Dr. Jen Gunter. Random House

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Canada. On sale: May 29, 2021. $27.

3. The dedication page sets it straight: “For every woman.

Your awesomeness is unrelated to your estrogen.”

Thank you for writing this book. As someone white-knuckling it through menopause, it was so helpful to read.

Oh, great! Yeah, women need a lot more information.

Do you want women to dog-ear your book and bring it into their next doctor’s appointment? What’s your hope?

I hope it helps inoculate people against the misinformation online. Lies about hormones and therapies seem to be Instagram and TikTok fodder. I hope this helps people realize what’s a scam, who is scamming

4. “Getting motivated to exercise is hard,” she writes. “If it were easy everyone would be doing it…For the first few years of my menopause transition I was exercising about 250 minutes a week

them—and who is just woefully misinformed—and what might hurt them. And I hope it helps them have the conversations they need to be having with their healthcare providers and to be able to push back if they’re not getting the information and help they need.

But where can we get help? Articles about women’s health always blithely say, “Talk to your health-care provider,” but you really only get 15 minutes with your family doctor.

I think it’s impossible to have a conversation about menopause in 15 minutes. It’s not even possible to have it in an hour, because you’re talking about health implications for 40 or 50 years of someone’s life. That’s like saying to a 16-year-old, “We have 15 minutes to talk about your adulthood. Let’s go.”

I really think providers need to say, “Listen, I want to help you with your menopause, and I cannot help you all in one visit, so let me give you some basic information, and we’ll have you come back or we can follow up with a phone call, and we can do it over several discussions.” It’s a big concept. And people come in with so much misinformation about hormones.3 I’ll say, “What do you hope hormones can do for you?” and they’ll come in with this long laundry list of things that sound like, well, life—not menopause.

Right, so when someone walks into your office and says, “Hey, I’m sleeping like crap,” it’s important to remember it might not always be menopause-related.

Exactly. Menopause doesn’t happen in a vacuum. When you’re in your late 40s or early 50s, and you might have children in middle school or high school, it’s a stressful time. There’s a lot of other things going on. So many women take care of everybody else except themselves. The three healthiest things a woman can do to help her menopause are not smoke, exercise regularly and eat right. So I always start off with the basics. You can’t look at hormones as a magic wand. They aren’t. They are a piece of the puzzle for some people, though not for everyone. But they’re not the whole picture.

What you said in the book about how exercise is like free money—that was a

and was the strongest I’d been. And then, because of life—an arm injury, the stress of kids in middle school, increased travel, and writing The Vagina Bible—I somehow found myself exercising less

and less until I was basically not exercising at all. […So] I did what I tell my own patients— start with a ridiculously little amount of exercise, just keep at it every other day.

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“Each time I tried to talk myself out of exercising—because there are always resons to put it off— I reminded myself that exercise is like free money,” Gunter writes. “Even a little is good.”

light bulb for me. I always think, Oh, if I can’t commit to a seven-days-a-week regimen, what’s the point? But every little bit counts! A 10-minute dog walk is great! That’s like 10 free bucks.

Many women are very guilty of a rightor-wrong binary because that’s how this patriarchal society has made us feel—we’re either good girls or bad girls. It’s taken me a long time to move away from that. There are days where there’s too much going on—but if I can only get in 15 minutes in, that’s okay. It’s better to do it than not, and the more I just do a little bit, I find, ooh,

maybe I can do 20 minutes or maybe 30.

And I know a lot of people have difficulty exercising 4 or have physical limitations, but even doing gentle stretching, even balance exercises is always beneficial.

There’s oil-based, there’s hyaluronic acidba sed a nd t here’s si l icone -ba sed. By and large, I’d say the silicone and hyaluronic acid moisturizers tend to be really well-tolerated.

What symptoms are women most likely to seek treatment for?

I think the most bothersome ones are hot f lushes 5 and sleep disturbances. Vaginal dryness6 is one I treat all the time. Women come in and are always so surprised that there’s a wealth of over-the-counter moisturizers.7 Those can work for many people.

Let’s talk about menopausal hormone therapy—why do you use this term over hormone replacement therapy?

Menopausal hormone therapy is the term all providers should be using now. HRT is really out of date, because we’re not replacing something. Your ovaries are supposed to stop producing estrogen. I think it’s really

5. “Hot flushes are also known as hot flashes,” Gunter writes, “although I prefer the word ‘flush’ as for me flash evokes an instantaneous event, while flush feels like something that lingers

body and blooming out of my head. Some women like to call their hot flushes power surges, and whatever term works for you is just fine.”

pads, for incontinence; moisturize; trim pubic hair, don’t remove it; if you smoke, do your best to quit; and embrace lubricant.

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for a few minutes, which is typical for this experience. My absolute favourite term is ‘hot bloom,’ which dates back to at least the 1700s—to me it really feels as if the heat is welling up inside my

6. Vulvar and perianal skin care is crucial, says Gunter. Her tips for gentle care: use an unscented facial cleanser rather than soap to clean; avoid wipes; use incontinence pads, not menstrual

7. Vaginal moisturizers are most effective when the issue is dryness, Gunter writes, but they can also help many women who have pain with sex.

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important to get away from this idea of a replacement, ’cause it’s not. It’s a treatment.

It’s a therapy. Otherwise, it makes it sound like it’s essential. And it’s not, necessarily.

And it’s the estrogen that provides the therapy. Then you have the oral routes and the transdermal routes, like patches, gels and rings.

So transdermal—whether you put it on your skin or in the vagina—is by far the safest, because it doesn’t increase your risk of blood clots. Oral estrogen could increase the risk of the major complications, like heart disease, blood clots, stroke and possibly dementia long term. The risks are still not super huge, but why not take the lower risk? Progesterone—or progestin—can be given orally, in an IUD or in a combination patch, combination ring or vaginal gel.

It can be incredibly hard to get time with a doctor—even without a global pandemic—whereas I can have a 90-minute conversation with a naturopath who will ask me everything about my life. That’s pretty tempting, when I’m desperate to be heard.

Absolutely. Unfortunately, from what I’ve seen, the majority of naturopaths—there might be good ones out there—are spreading gross misinformation 8 within those 90 minutes. I think naturopaths are taking advantage of the gaps in medicine as opposed to solving them. What if, in 90 minutes, that naturopath had an incredible conversation about diet and exercise and sleep hygiene? But they make their money on salivary testing. They make money by telling women they have to come back regularly to retest their hormones.9

menopause transition is so chaotic. You can have super high levels one cycle and two months later, look like you’re in menopause—and two months later, have normal estrogen levels again.

Another one of your big red flags: compounded hormones.11 There’s very little data around them. Why would you want to use something where you don’t know how much hormone is getting absorbed into your body? Here are these providers who believe in hormone levels saying how important it is to know your hormone levels and yet giving someone a therapy where absorption is unknown! It makes no sense. As I explain in the book, many of these [compounded formulas] contain less or more hormones than they indicate they’re supposed to.

So a woman concerned with osteoporosis cannot at all be assured that a transdermal compounded estrogen could protect her.

Okay, let ’er rip: What are the supplements and treatments you find most enraging?

Nu mber one: a ny t h i ng homeopat h ic.

I mean, that is 100 percent a scam. Homeopathy is based on abusing the laws of physics. It was invented in the late 1700s.

It has been disproven in multiple studies. If someone recommends homeopathy, walk out the door. Do you really want to see a provider who thinks the laws of physics don’t apply? Do you want the pilot f lying your plane to not believe in the laws of physics? I don’t think so.

3,000 years to advance, and you’re still doing what we were doing?

What about MTHFR12 testing?

This latest trend irritates me to no end.

MTHFR is a genetic mutation that’s related to many functions. It’s a nothing variant.

However, in the naturopathic and functional-medicine communities, this has become a cottage business. People come in, and they have MTHFR testing and special supplements and hormone levels and all kinds of things. These practitioners make up lies about how it impacts estrogen and how it impacts your ability to get vaccinated and how it impacts pregnancy…the testing is completely unnecessary. It is not needed. But it’s a huge thing on Instagram right now, and it’s absolutely obscene.

And let’s add topical progesterone to that list. One, it’s not going to help with any of their symptoms, so they’re paying a lot of money for a placebo. But if they’re also taking estrogen, they’re now not getting their uterus protected and they are increasing their risk of endometrial cancer.

I really wanted it! A couple of years ago, I saw a woman on Twitter say, “Oh my god, you guys, I got this cream, it’s a magic cream, I’m sleeping, I’m happy…” and I went in search of the magic cream. How desperate we all are for the magic cream!13 It really shows you the power of placebo, right?

I admit I’ve tried quite a few things you lay out as red flags, including salivary hormone testing.10 It’s much harder to say if a therapy is good, but it’s easy to say if it’s awful. First of all, salivary hormone testing doesn’t tell us anything. It’s a nonsensical test, and the results are meaningless. Hormone testing is generally not needed because we don’t base treatment on hormone levels. We treat based on symptoms, and we see if the hormones make you better or not. Seeing “where you are” is not predictive. The

What’s next?

Something that really irritates me is the notion that a therapy is ancient so it must be good. The ancient Greeks believed that women were “overly moist.” We don’t accept that understanding of physiology, so why would we accept treatment based on it? In ancient Egypt, if you had ear pain or jaw pain—something we might think now is an ear or sinus infection—they fumigated your vagina, thinking it was all related. As I say in the book, I never mean to insult people from 3,000 years ago—they were doing the best they could at the time.

I often think people in ancient cultures would be horrified to think, Wait, you had

Yeah, she really believed it. She was saying, “Oh god, this is saving me.”

It’s very dangerous. Yeah, that really irritates me. My next one is the conf lation of phytoestrogens and estrogens. They are different things. People think they’re getting estrogen from their food. Providers lead people to believe this, so I have patients come in convinced they’re using phytoestrogens when they’re using estrogen, so I think that’s an issue.

And my last one is the absolute misinformation about plant-based hormones.

Because all hormones—with the exception of Premarin—are made from the same thing. So whether you take estradiol from Big Pharma or get estrone from a compounding pharmacy, it is made in the

8. Red flags: salivary hormone levels; hormone levels to “see where you are”; hormone-heavy therapy; speaking of estrogen as if it’s a wonder drug; recommending

9. Testing hormones to “check” doesn’t tell any woman about her progress in her menopause transition or when to expect her final period, writes Gunter.

And it’s unnecessary

10. Salivary hormone tests are unreliable, Gunter writes. “Any provider offering salivary hormone testing for menopauserelated concerns shouldn’t be managing anyone’s menopause.”

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topical progesterone; identifying as antivaccine or engaging in other medical conspiracy theories; recommending special supplements; selling products on their website.

as hormone levels don’t guide recommendations for menopausal hormone therapy (MHT).

11. A compounded product made by a pharmacy is the same hormone as can be prescribed in a pharmaceutical product, with none of the precision or safety monitoring,

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The story of menopause, Gunter writes, is not about deserted youth, frailty and diminished worth.

It’s about value, agency and voice, and the knowledge to keep yourself in the best of health.

same place from the same thing. It’s literally like having a box of generic Cheerios a nd t hen t a k i ng some out a nd w rap ping t hem up i n a pret t y g la ss bot t le with a ribbon and saying, “Here are your bespoke pl a nt- ba s e d C he er io s.” It ’s a sc a m. Women deserve medicine. They don’t deserve marketing.

Because they know we’re desperate.

Everybody wants an easy answer. Everybody. I want easy answers to all my medical problems as well, and for my children and for my partner, and for people I love. But

Gunter writes. “With a pharmaceutical hormone I know exactly how much hormone is in each dose, how much of that dose is absorbed and how quickly, and how that hormone behaves in the

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body. I also know how the hormone impacts the lining of the uterus.

None if this is available for compounded products.”

life is complex. Medicine is complex. And there are no easy answers. But there are many solutions, and those solutions can be found in a lot of places. If people are only selling you homeopathy or only telling you to have compounded hormones, you’re not getting the wealth and breadth of evidencebased medicine you should be hearing about. If you’re making a decision about treatment, it’s not even an informed decision, because you haven’t been informed!

I l ove t h i s q u o t e o f yo u r s: “Fa c t s can bring certainty to the chaos and

uncertainty of menopause.”

P e o p l e a r e s o h ap p y t o h a ve t h i n g s explained in a way they can understand so they can sit back and make the decision that works for them in an informed manner.

I’m all about options. I trust women to make decisions about their bodies. What I have found over my whole medical career is that people want a plan. When they come in and they’re desperate—and I hear they are desperate, and I appreciate that they are desperate—many people mistake that as desperate for a prescription. But what they are desperate for is a plan.

12. Many alternative health websites talk about a link between conditions like depression, autism, and breast cancer and a gene called MTHFR—but there’s no evidence that the link really exists.

clitoris]. None of which has been evaluated for [the] method of delivery—rubbing into the clitoris [for 15 minutes]... I mean come on. Rubbing the clitoris for 15 minutes is masturbation and that

13. Another “magic cream” that Gunter has no time for: Scream Cream. She writes: “This *cough* product... includes a variety of ingredients that are supposed to improve blood flow [to the

has shown to be very effective in treating desire and arousal disorders.

Rubbing coconut oil or a silicone lube on the clitoris will almost certainly produce the same results.”

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OF TEN,

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Roop Bassra photographed by Alia Youssef

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THREE YEARS AGO, Sharlene Rutherford, president and CEO of

the Alberta Women’s Health Foundation, watched her mom with worry. Her mother was struggling with pain, heart irregularities and anxiety—things that would come up out of the blue. During a doctor’s visit, her mother gave a rundown of what she was going through. “He looked at her, pointed to his head and said, ‘I think it’s all up here,’” Rutherford recalls. But the family knew he was wrong. They pushed for more testing. And blood tests showed her mom was suffering from metal poisoning.

The clue had been in her medical records all along. The problem was in her hip, where a joint replacement device implanted more than a decade earlier was wearing down, releasing cobalt into her bloodstream. It’s a severe and well-known complication from a kind of metal-on-metal hip implant.

“This took way longer than it should have [to figure out],” says Rutherford. Her mother underwent a hip replacement two years ago to change the faulty device, but she’s still recovering.

Her mother’s story is one example of a problem Rutherford hears about frequently in her work: a woman dismissed by healthcare providers only to suffer lasting harm.

She wants a revolution in the way women’s health is valued, researched and funded in Canada. She wants the focus extended beyond what’s known as bikini medicine—breasts and reproduction—and more attention placed on improving a woman’s overall health across her lifespan.

“If we look at my mom as an example [of why we need change], there was the patriarchal attitude toward her, the fact there was not much research done on how that hip replacement would impact women and her own lack of a voice to question her doctor,” Rutherford says.

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In January 2021, Rutherford—along with Jennifer Bernard, president and CEO of Women’s College Hospital Foundation in Toronto, and Genesa Greening, president and CEO of BC Women’s Health Foundation—launched Women’s Health Collective Canada (WHCC), the first alliance of women’s health foundations in the country. Their goal is to eliminate inequities by raising awareness about the specific health needs of women throughout their lives and increasing the fundraising dollars directed specifically to women’s health and research.

“Women can lead corporations and fly fighter jets, but they continue to be misdiagnosed, neglected, dismissed as complainers or told their symptoms are all in their heads,” Rutherford says.

“We’re punching through glass ceilings everywhere, but the fact of the matter is there’s still a glass wall through which women are not being heard.”

If you assess women’s health based on longevity alone, women in Canada are doing great—life expectancy at birth for a woman in Canada today is 84 years compared with 80 for men. But being alive isn’t the same thing as thriving. Women struggle with conditions like endometriosis, thyroid disease and heart disease, which dramatically affect their quality of life. Yet, historically, women’s health has been underfunded and underappreciated. Outside reproduction, women and men are often lumped together in health research. This harms women of all ages.

“Who gets funded, what gets funded, who gets included and who makes the decisions—it’s still predominantly men,” says Greening. “And that is showing up in women’s health outcomes.”

As part of its launch, the WHCC surveyed Canadian adults about their knowledge of women’s health. They found that women and men underestimate many health problems endured by women.

Only one in 10 respondents knew that women have adverse reactions from prescription medications more often than men do.

Even fewer knew that as many as one-third of women suffer from sexual dysfunction. Only about 20 percent of respondents knew women experience higher rates of heart disease than men, despite ongoing and well-publicized campaigns to raise awareness about this condition in women—it’s our number one killer.

Organizers of the WHCC want to raise funds for research into women’s health—much like the Children’s Miracle Network does for kids, says Rutherford. The WHCC has not identified specific research projects but wants to increase the overall dollars put toward women’s health in Canada. They also want data collected and analyzed by sex in broader research programs.

The WHCC is being driven by a new urgency, as the pandemic takes a heavy toll on women both at home and on the front lines.

“Research studies on previous epidemics and pandemics have shown that women are disproportionately affected, and we know that when women are unhealthy, our economy and communities both suffer,” says Greening.

Rutherford and her colleagues at the WHCC have set their sights on addressing the gender gaps in health in Canada. Here’s a look at the enormous task ahead The Gap: Clinical Trials and Research For decades, scientists excluded women from clinical trials because they believed male subjects were better for research. Even female

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animals and female cell lines were disproportionately unused.

Most men don’t have the hormonal fluctuations that accompany menstrual cycles. Scientists worried female hormones would distort the results, making their findings less applicable for humans in the real world. “[Using only men] is a simpler model to work with if you’re looking at a basic science perspective,” says Sandra Davidge, executive director of the Women and Children’s Health Research Institute at the University of Alberta, where she was a Canada Research Chair in maternal and perinatal cardiovascular health for many years.

Making matters worse, in 1977, the Food and Drug Administration in the United States recommended that women of child-bearing potential be excluded from early-stage drug trials. The policy ref lected concerns about unknown drug effects on pregnant women and their fetuses—a valid concern, given the thousands of babies born with limb deformities after their mothers received the sedative thalidomide. But this meant women were left out of trials of pharmaceutical drugs, even if women relied on those drugs to manage medical issues. It wasn’t until 1993—two years after the first woman was appointed director of the National Institutes of Health in the U.S.—that Congress passed a law requiring the inclusion of women and minorities in clinical research.

But these long-standing policies led to drugs being widely used despite little knowledge about their effects on women. Many of these products are still used today. Greening, of BC Women’s Health Foundation, says the under-representation of women in clinical trials may explain why women experience 75 percent of adverse drug reactions in Canada. “We live with a legacy that there are therapies on the market and there are clinical approaches to care that were never really tested on women,” she says.

Biological sex can affect the way a body responds to a drug. For one, women tend to have a higher percentage of body fat, so some drugs can linger longer in the body. Enzymes in the liver affect the way drugs are metabolized. Hormones alter our response to drugs.

And gender matters too: Women are prescribed more medications than men, often inappropriately. A 2016 study published in Age

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GAP

Roop Bassra, 38 I got my period when I was 11 years old. From the get-go, I got it every 14 days. My family doctor put me on birth control—he said my hormones were out of whack. I stayed on birth control until I was 23. I wanted to try life without it. About a year and a half later, I started getting a sharp, shooting pain in my abdomen, even when it wasn’t my period time. It scared me. My family doctor knew right away that it was endometriosis. I was really lucky in that sense. But the options were the pill or surgery. I didn’t want surgery, so I went back on the pill.

A couple of years later, I started nursing school, and my periods were getting worse.

By the time I hit 30, I was missing days of my practicum because I couldn’t get out of bed. An ob-gyn sent me for surgery, which confirmed endometriosis was the problem— they burned off quite a bit of it. By then, I was married and trying to get pregnant, so I stayed off the pill. My periods were still painful. The doctor said that would happen for

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and Ageing found that one in three women in British Columbia over 65 received inappropriate prescription medications compared to one in four men.

This has real-life consequences. Take the case of Ambien, first approved in the U.S. in 1992. Twenty-one years later, however, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration called on the drug’s manufacturers to lower the recommended doses of this widely used sleeping medication for women, after a series of clinical trials and driving simulation studies showed that women struggled with alertness after waking up. Today, the manufacturer has set one dose for women and another for men.

The experience with Ambien demonstrates that “if you don’t look, you won’t see the issue,” says Paula Rochon, a geriatrician and health services researcher, and the Retired Teachers of Ontario chair in geriatric medicine at the University of Toronto. When researchers collect data on sex and ask questions about sex and gender in their investigations, they can pick up different responses from men and women. “Then, you can do things differently by tailoring therapies or practices to those differences,” Rochon says.

She and other experts in women’s health want health data to be collected and analyzed separately for men and women, in what’s known as sex-disaggregated data. The COVID-19 vaccines are a current example of why this kind of data is important. It’s unclear as yet whether women face significantly higher risks of blood clots from vaccines than men do. Without collecting the data, that question will never be answered The Gap: Funding for Women’s Health Research Only seven percent of the Canadian Institutes of Health Research New Investigator Awards were given to women’s health researchers, according to a 2020 study in B.C. Women’s health researchers received less overall funding and their grants were funded for a shorter duration. Nationally, only 1.2 percent of Canada’s research chairs are in women’s health.

Women’s health funding addresses conditions like endometriosis, urinary incontinence and menopausal discomfort—which

a few months, but it just got worse. A year and a half after my first surgery, I went in for a second. The surgeon told me that all the endometriosis had already been removed, and I shouldn’t be having pain, but I was barely able to work. At some of the worst times, I’d look at the patients and think, I deserve to be lying down there.

But I just pushed through, and thought, This is the way I have to live. A friend sent me an article about a New York specialist. That’s where I learned about excision surgery. I had met a patient at work who had endometriosis, and she told me about the specialized endometriosis clinic at B.C. Women’s Hospital. I got a referral through my GP to the Centre for Pelvic Pain & Endometriosis, but there was a wait-list just to see someone and another wait-list for excision surgery. I couldn’t wait that long. I ended up flying to the United States for the surgery.

I’d also developed adenomyosis, where the endometrium breaks through the muscle wall of the uterus. The surgeon told me to be monitored if I got pregnant naturally, because the pregnancy might not go as long as a normal pregnancy should. But I couldn’t get pregnant naturally. I started IVF but, again, my pain just got so severe

when I was off birth control. Eventually, I stopped working.

I ended up having a hysterectomy at 36. I would say life is 50 percent better since the hysterectomy. Not having periods rule me has been life-changing, but I still suffer from endometriosis and have fatigue and nausea from that. I still need to see an excision specialist to remove the endometriosis. I’m still unable to work. I get sick very easily if I eat the wrong thing.

Not being able to get pregnant was one of the most painful journeys, physically and mentally. I battled a lot of depression and anxiety. It affects my husband’s life as well. I know you have to look at your life and think, What can I do moving forward to make myself happy again? Even if I don’t have kids, it’s still worth living.

I wonder why nobody looked at my 11-yearold self and thought, Why is she having periods every 11 to 14 days? For all those years, no one told me anything. I had endometriosis, most likely, and I never knew. An earlier diagnosis and access to specialists could have prevented it from getting this severe. Having more specialized centres would be beneficial, because there are so many of us who need help.

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“ONE

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dramatically affect a woman’s quality of life but are not life-threatening. That said, these conditions lead to mental health issues like severe depression, which do lead to deaths. “Quality of life is so critically important and yet completely underfunded,” Davidge says.

About one million people in Canada are affected by endometriosis, according to estimates from EndoAct Canada, an independent collaboration of patients, clinicians and researchers. But endometriosis-related research projects received only $7.3 million in funding from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research over the past two decades—which works out to about $7.30 per person with this condition. Meanwhile, women are struggling with the painful consequences of the illness and are often unable to reach health-care providers who can help. According to a study published in 2020 in the Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology Canada, it took 5.4 years, on average, for a woman to receive a diagnosis of endometriosis in this country. And when they are diagnosed, they end up waiting for specialist care. EndoAct Canada estimates that women wait somewhere between three and nine months for an initial appointment at a specialized endometriosis centre. After that, they wait another year for surgery or pain care, depending on where they live.

Heart disease too is under-researched, underdiagnosed, undersupported and undertreated, even though it kills more Canadian women than any other condition. In recent years, science has shown that women often present with different symptoms than men do when they’re having a heart attack, and they can experience different types of heart attacks. Women, especially those in their 40s and 50s, are far more likely to have a spontaneous coronary artery dissection, which is a tear in a blood vessel in the heart. Women account for more than 90 percent of these cases. Post-menopausal women, on the other hand, make up about 90 percent of cases of takotsubo cardiomyopathy, known as broken heart syndrome. “The point is that heart disease is more complicated in women than in men, and we haven’t recognized that,” says Sharon Mulvagh, a cardiologist and professor of medicine at Dalhousie University.

She attributes the lag in women’s heart research, in part, to a lack of female physicians and researchers in the field. Only about

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Vincenza Spiteri DeBonis, 64 Five years ago, on March 8, I was washing dishes, and I felt a fatigue I have never felt before. It was a chore to stand there. I wanted to go to bed. But I was having people over for coffee. They came and went, and I had severe pounding in my chest but figured I should start dinner. I couldn’t tell you what was wrong. It wasn’t a pain. It felt like I just didn’t have enough room in my chest for the things I have in my chest, like my heart and my lungs. I took my blood pressure and my pulse—we have the equipment because we need to check my husband’s frequently—and both were very low.

I called my family doctor and told her some of the things I was feeling. I said, “Can I come in and see you?” She told me to go to emerg. I thought, Well, that’s rather dramatic, but she insisted.

Looking back, I was quite worried about how it would worry my husband. He’s had significant health issues throughout the

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22 percent of cardiologists in Canada today are women, even though women have been at parity in medical schools for more than two decades in Canada. In cardiology and in medicine more broadly, women are less likely to be in leadership roles, including working as primary investigators on major studies. “This contributes to the lack of awareness of cardiovascular health and disease issues in women,” Mulvagh says. “As the saying goes, if you’re not at the table, then you’re on the menu.”

Evidence has emerged over the past year that the COVID-19 pandemic is disproportionately harming female researchers. In an analysis published in March 2021 by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine, women in academic STEM positions said the pandemic has negatively affected their mental well-being, productivity, work-life boundaries and networking.

Women published fewer papers and received fewer citations of their work between March and December 2020. This could affect their job stability and ability to attract funding—and, ultimately, the state of women’s health research.

The Gap: Quality of Life in Older Age Five years from now, more than one-fifth of the population of Canada will be 65 years and older. The majority will be women.

They will increasingly outnumber men as they age. By the time they reach 100, they will outnumber men four to one The pandemic unmasked systemic problems in the way elders are treated in Canada. Reports from multiple provinces revealed chronic neglect and underfunding in long-term care and a lack of support available for those at home. Older women bore the effects disproportionately. Most deaths from COVID-19 have been in people 80 years and older, with more women dying than men, according to the federal government’s summary of COVID-19 cases But older women have been neglected when it comes to health funding and research, Rochon, the geriatrician, says. When most people think about women’s health, they focus on younger women, particularly those in the reproductive years. “We need to recognize that older women are a very big group in Canada, and

years, and I didn’t want to stress him. I’ve known him for 40 years, and we’ve been together for 25. We don’t have kids. That’s another layer of intensity because it’s just the two of us. I understood later that worrying about causing worry to others is a barrier women put in front of ourselves.

But off we went to the hospital I used to work at. Part of my work revolved around health equity. That included gender, but I never personalized it.

The doctor told me I had had a hear t attack. I was in denial. I didn’t have the typical blockages or high blood pressure. My ECG was normal. But my cardiac enzymes were very high. I was going on my father’s experience—he’d had cardiac disease, and I’d looked after him, and his ECG was never fine. So I said to the doctor that I’d look into it and asked if I could go home. He said no.

My husband was pulling out his hair—he was baffled that I thought I could go home.

In the end, they never did find out the reason for my heart attack. When I was being discharged from the hospital, the cardiologist said I was obviously under terrible stress, and that’s why I had it. That shocked me. I was upset and insulted. I wasn’t stressed. But it was very hard for me

PHOTOGRAPH BY JENNIFER ROBERTS

that they didn’t know why I had had a heart attack. How could I prevent this from happening again if no one knew what caused it? The uncertainty was a big piece. And I couldn’t get answers.

A close friend who had experienced heart issues a few years before told me to get a referral to Women’s College Hospital’s cardiac rehab program. When I asked my cardiologist, he said it hadn’t occurred to him that I would be interested in the program. Of course I’d be interested! It was life-changing. There was physical rehab and education. They were able to teach me how and when to use my nitroglycerine spray when I have angina. No one told me before that I should be using nitro spray if I continued to have chest pain. It was meaningful for me to be there with a group of women supporting women and talking to one another.

One of the biggest barriers for me to get care was that I didn’t know I was in trouble.

I didn’t know what the signs were. I didn’t worry about heart disease, even though my father had cardiac disease for many years and my mom died of a dissected aorta. That wasn’t my life. But I understand now that if I don’t take care of myself, then I’m not going to be able to take care of others.

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“ I A S K E D O N E D O C T O R W H O S P E C I A L I Z E D I N W O M A N’S H O R M O N E H E A LT H F O R A N U L T R A S O U N D A N D S H E S A I D , ‘ N O , A L L Y O U R T E S T I N G I S N O R M A L .’

S H E M A D E M E F I L L O U T A M E N T A L H E A L T H Q U E S T I O N N A I R E .”

there are important differences between older women and men that impact women’s health,” Rochon says Older women are more likely to live alone in the community and be widowed, she explains. At the same time, they make up the majority of long-term-care residents, and many of them have dementia. They’re also more likely to have conditions like urinary tract infections and arthritis. And yet they’re often grouped in with men in studies of older adults.

Rochon wants researchers to collect and analyze data by sex, as well as age. When they fail to do so, or can’t because of a lack of data, they lose the opportunity to pick up patterns that could lead to better, more individualized treatments for both women and men, she says. “[And when we can’t] tailor our therapy accordingly, it can lead to things like heart disease being missed and not treated appropriately, or women getting drug doses that are too high for them and having side effects.”

The Gap: Social Determinants of Health Gender doesn’t act in isolation. It intersects with identity, race, rurality, social supports, housing, income, education, environment, ability, sexual diversity and social connections. “When there’s even just one of these additional factors, like a woman living in a rural area, her health issues are not just doubled— they’re catapulted,” says Lori Brotto, executive director of the Women’s Health Research Institute and a professor in the department of obstetrics and gynecology at the University of British Columbia.

The Project for an Ontario Women’s Health Evidence-Based Report (or POWER), one of the largest Canadian studies to explore gender and social determinants of health, found women were more likely to live in lower-income households than men.

They headed 85 percent of single-parent households, which have lower incomes than those headed by men. Lower-income adults were more than three times more likely to have fair or poor health, and three to five times more likely to report fair or poor mental health. They were two and a half times more likely

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Sharan Scali, 31

I’ve always experienced random bouts of bloating. I’m a personal trainer and nutritionist. I know it’s not normal for a 25-yearold girl to be walking around looking like she’s six months pregnant after eating. I went to many doctors who would do a basic test panel and tell me everything’s fine. I asked one doctor who specialized in women’s hormone health for an ultrasound, and she said, “No, all your testing is normal.”

She made me fill out a mental health questionnaire. Then, one ob-gyn diagnosed me with polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS).

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to report that they couldn’t carry out activities because of pain or discomfort, and twice as likely to report limitations in the activities of daily living.

We need research to look more closely at intersectionalities, Greening says. The majority of people living in poverty in Canada are women and girls. Racialized women, especially, face high levels of poverty: One in five racialized families lives in poverty, as does one in four Indigenous people. That compares to one in 20 nonracialized families. Fifteen percent of people with disabilities live in poverty—nearly two-thirds of whom are women. Poverty, race and other factors like education affect access to good health care, Greening says. “All of these things play into understanding how women navigate the health-care system and how the system interacts with them.”

The Gap: COVID-19 May Make Things Worse for Women The pandemic has had a devastating toll on many women. In Canada, they took on the bulk of unpaid care. They were more likely to live in long-term-care homes and more likely to work in them. They were more likely to be laid off or have their hours cut, especially if they earned low wages. In a survey from BC Women’s Health Foundation, women reported higher rates of depression and anxiety during the pandemic. They claimed 2.4 times more prescription-related mental health needs than men from April to December 2020. Their housing and food insecurity shot up. They said, in greater numbers than men, that they could not cope.

“Across the board, it didn’t matter which variable we were looking at: Women bore the brunt of the unintended consequences of COVID,” says Brotto.

It’s unclear what will happen in the year ahead. But this much is certain: Right now, the pandemic has reversed gains made in women’s health. And that is a matter of life and death.

“We know how absolutely essential women’s health is to the health of our community and our economy,” says Greening. “[We have to] advocate that women’s health is prioritized as a response to COVID. This is the time for the conversation.”

Another ob-gyn said I didn’t have it. At that point, I was very confused.

I’d been married for about three years when I decided to go to a fertility clinic.

I didn’t even know if I wanted kids. I just wanted to know if I did have PCOS and if it would affect my chances of having children.

At the fertility clinic, they asked if I wanted an ultrasound of my ovaries, which I’d never been offered before. As soon as they did it, they asked if I knew I had cysts growing on my ovaries. They said one ovary had a 12-centimetre cyst and the other a 10-centimetre cyst. Each ovary is only around two centimetres.

They said I would need a minor laparoscopic surgery. If I got pregnant with those cysts, it would be a big complication. They said there was no rush, so I went on vacation and had my phone off for a couple of weeks. When I turned my phone on at the airport, there was a message to call the clinic immediately about test results. They said the cysts might be cancerous. And if a cyst burst, I could lose my ovaries completely. I went to the surgeon and was put on an eight-month wait-list—with these potentially cancerous cysts on my ovaries.

I have a very active job, for which I use

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my body every single day. I was told not only that any movement could cause these cysts to burst, but also that nothing needed to be done immediately.

I started to have bad pressure and pain; I couldn’t sleep through the night. I’d wake up to pee every hour because everything was just pushed so hard in my stomach. About a month after I saw the surgeon, I went to an ER. They put me on painkillers and said they were going to do emergency surgery.

I had suffered some trauma to my ovaries from ovarian torsion. They rushed me into surgery and saved my ovaries. But my menstrual cycle never came back. So I ended up back at the fertility clinic. They said if I wanted to have a kid, I needed to start trying now. We ended up going the IVF route.

I went from being a healthy 25-year-old who didn’t know if she wanted kids to pushing for IVF right at 27. That was three years ago.

I’m finally 15 weeks pregnant.

It’s been a really hard couple of years. It’s something I haven’t been able to open up to anyone about. But by sharing my story, I hope more people can start to take the initiative when they know something is wrong.

Don’t trust what other people say about your body. You know it best.

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THE COMEBACK

PHOTOGRAPHS COURTESY OF ARTIPLANTO

As the weather heats up and vaccines roll out, it’s time to linger outdoors—which means less attention for your inside plants. These faux fellows bring lots of joy without the babysitting.

Montreal-based Artiplanto has a collection of artificial plants so realistic, you’ll accidentally water them. Plus, one (real!) tree will be planted with every purchase. artiplanto.com ֑

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