Psoriasis is a terrible condition. Both my children and I seem to be prone to getting it.
As it turns out there are some very definite triggers for painful outbreaks and here is a rundown of what they are…
• Skin abrasions from shaving
• Rug burns
• Small cuts
• Cold weather
• Damp or humid weather
• Cloudy weather
• Streptococcal or other simple infections – even just a sore throat can trigger your immune system to go wild
• Sunburn
• Taking aspirin
• Taking beta blocker drugs to combat high blood pressure
• Taking anti-malarial drugs or shot
• Taking lithium for manic depression
• Emotional stress including being too sad or too happy – extremes of emotion whether good or bad can cause stress in the body that can cause an outbreak
Psoriasis is one of those chronic conditions that is hard to cure so it is always hard to decide if you should go the natural route for a cure or stick with the greasy steroid creams that are usually prescribed for it.
As with any medical condition or complaint, there are many different ways of treating or dealing with psoriasis, some of which are dependent on pharmaceutical drugs whilst others are completely natural.
And of course, it almost always follows that treating any medical condition naturally is the best way of doing things if such treatments are going to be appropriate and effective.
If you have been recently diagnosed with psoriasis then you should prepare yourself to embark on quite a merry go round of being put on and off different prescribed drugs and creams.
I believe the more you know about these drugs (should you decide to take prescriptions) the better off you will be in general as you will have been more knowledegable about your problems …
In the meantime the treatment for psoriasis that I have found the most effective is to sit myself in the sun and bake away like a big old leathery lizard for a while. I encourage my children to do the same so they do not develop the hard itchy patches of skin associated with the condition.
I have discovered too that diet has a lot to do with whether or not you will experience an outbreak. Yet another way I try and keep this sort of thing under control is by feeding my family a diet rich in avocadoes and fish. This is because these foods are rich in Omega 3 acids that help ward off these types of attacks.
If you have broken out fully in the silvery flaky scales associated with the condition I have also found that applying a bit of the gel from inside the aloe vera plant can also go a long way towards healing the condition.

Those IQ scoring systems really are my pet peeve this week. I have done more research into the matter and I am absolutely horrified at what the consequences could be for my son.
I am worried because my son has not done too well on one and I can already see the guidance counsellors at school trying to peg him into being something that he is not – mainly a labourer like a construction worker.
Your kid’s IQ can translate down the line into affecting everything from whether or not he will be eligible for scholarships, a good job and opportunities to meet and work with stimulating people.
Economically and socially your kid can suffer from the following consequences if he or she scores low on an IQ test –
The Consequences of a Low IQ Score
• Low self esteem
• Lack of motivation
• Lack of ambition
• Lack of creative stimulation
• Hanging with a “bad crowd”
• Shame
• Being placed in classes with children less bright
• Being profiled as stupid
• A lack of educational opportunity
• A lack of social opportunity
• A lack of job prospects
• Being streamlined into an unsuitable blue collar occupation
• The inability to follow one’s dreams
• Being denied the chance to go to university
• Being looked down on by others
• Being rejected romantically because of a lack of education or low IQ
• Being in a low income bracket
• Being charged more for credit for not having a good job
• Being charged more for insurance for not having a good job
• Having less job security
• Having less respect in society in general
I decided to research how a person could raise the IQ of their child for the reasons above but even more importantly…
I LOVE MY CHILD AND I WANT HIM TO HAVE EVERY OPPORTUNITY TO DO THE BEST THAT HE POSSIBLY CAN IN LIFE!
I am sure that you care just as much for your kid as I do for mine.
I don’t mind telling you…
I hate IQ tests.
I do not feel that they are a full measure of any person’s ability.
However I also realize that they are a necessary evil in this society that must be dealt with and as archaic and inaccurate as they are and as much as I do not believe in them and hate them I have to help my kid deal with them.
In other words, I had to do everything I could to prevent my kid’s future from being at the mercy of the results of this test.

When my son Theo was fifteen thought college was just not going to be possible for my boy.
It seemed that everybody thought my child was stupid. But I knew way better.
In fact I think my kid is a genius. He is a slow reader but he mastered a super sophisticated animation program all by himself at age ten and makes his own anime cartoons.
I also happen to know that he has superb a photographic and oral memory and can recite entire episodes of various television series off by heart.
How could a kid as bright and sharp as that be labelled as below average!
He is also one of the wittiest and funniest people I know and his observations about the foibles of the world make him the friend of almost everyone he meets.
So how can a kid who can draw, remember and communicate so well be considered stupid by teachers and other academic professionals?
He could take an IQ test and score less than 100 points. That’s how!
The profiling of children that is part of today’s educational and college admission systems is broken down into the following values –
Here is how the IQ profiling structure works.
130+ Very superior
120-129 Superior
110-119 High average
90-109 Average
80-89 Low average
70-79 Borderline
Below 70 Extremely low!
The numbers above are the “cut and dry” numbers that are used to measure intelligence and that also can dictate your child’s future. However these numbers are far from being the ideal measurement of what your child is truly capable of accomplishing in life.
I learned that my boy, who is artistic, creative and a visual learner probably had no chance of passing the IQ test that was administered to all high school students.
This is because most of the intelligence quotient tests administered today are actually literacy tests and not real measures of how smart or stupid a person actually is…
Yet another problem is that these IQ tests are based on cultural references and if your child does not live up to the middle class white bread standard of what passes for “fitting in” in this society then he or she will be stereotyped as stupid for the rest of his or her life.
The bottom line – if your child does not do well on an IQ test it does not mean your child is stupid. It means the he or she is nervous and a poor performer in testing situations
In order to try and turn the Titanic that seemed to be my eccentric but talented son’s brains around I spent all of my time researching all of the things that I could possibly do in this world to increase my kid’s chances of passing that IQ test with flying colors.
I researched everything from diet to what games were good for him to play to how much television he should watch a week.
I made the evolution of my son’s literacy my business so that he could pass that IQ test .no matter how much I disagreed with it. I simply had no choice.

You are especially prone to getting yeast infections after you have a pregnancy so I thought it would be worthwhile to write about it for a change.
First of all you need to know that the advice you get on the internet after typing in a search such as “home remedy – yeast infection” is not always the right advice.
I typed these keywords “home remedy – yeast infection” into Google and the very first thing that popped up was one of the most dangerous cures for this condition that exists – using BORIC ACID.
Boric acid is a poison that does not belong in your home. Yet you can find home remedies that advise inserting this in your vagina.
Yet another cure I kept seeing was to go on these intolerably long fasts that involved drinking only water and lemon or certain types of juices. As someone who is a little bit familiar with the way the human body works (because I am a medical researcher) I cannot begin to tell you how unhealthy these food deprivation diets are.
The principle behind starving yourself every day is to try and not feed the yeast cells in your body but the problem is that you end up starving YOU as well. Some of these “yeast elimination” diets have calorie intake rates on them that are so low that NO human being could stick to them for more than a day or two.
By now you can probably tell that I am speaking from very hard won experience.
Of course as I was once a chronic sufferer of these terrible infections you can imagine that I was all over the internet always looking for an alternative to the antibiotics that were causing me to be trapped in a treadmill of antibiotic use and recurrent pain.
In fact, you could say I was just like you.
Now being a medical researcher I knew that doing things like inserting boric acid in your vagina or starving yourself and surviving on only liquids to “rinse” yeast out of your body was very bad for you. However I could not help but think of all of those women out there who do not know this was bad for you and how much they must be suffering as a result.
Also did you know that going on a juicing fast is also a terrible idea? This is because juices contain sugars that can feed yeast colonies the same way that sugar can.
I guess what I am trying to say here is that you have to be very careful when it comes to seeking out alternative or natural cures as they might not be so good for your yeast infection either.
I can’t stress this enough. In order to get rid of yeast infections you need to wipe out the root cause for good.